# DEEP SOUTH TRANSLATIONAL RESEARCH MENTORED CAREER DEVELOPMENT PROGRAM

> **NIH NIH KL2** · UNIVERSITY OF ALABAMA AT BIRMINGHAM · 2020 · $1,043,209

## Abstract

We propose the Deep South Translational Research Mentored Career Development
Program KL2 to focus on the growing gap between research and the translation of research into clinical
practice that has been labeled the “valley of death”. Our Partner Network brings existing training infrastructure,
ongoing partnerships, and complementary research expertise in diseases and disparities that are
disproportionately represented within an area of the southeastern US known as the “Deep South”. We aim to
create a career development program that fosters “team science” and instills scholars with mastery of
translational research (TR) core competencies through an intensive curriculum that will nurture “translational
thinking” by helping Scholars use logic, imagination, intuition, and systemic reasoning, to examine potential
solutions to diseases and conditions that disproportionately affect the Deep South. Over the grant period, we
intend to provide enhanced training for 18 early career faculty scholars who will be supported by a
collaborative research base (109 mentors) supported by more than $315 million in extramural funding. Our
overall goal for this career development program is to facilitate new, and expand existing, innovative
opportunities to train early career faculty across the T1-TR spectrum in areas such as drug discovery
and development, integrative “omics”, clinical informatics, and outcomes research aimed at
addressing disease and health care disparities that disproportionately affect the Deep South. We will
mentor these early career investigators towards becoming academic leaders within our CCTS Partner
Network and nationally. Our specific aims are to: 1) Identify, recruit, and cultivate a diverse cohort of early
career faculty investigators across the Partner Network; 2) Enhance the personalized career development of
translational scientists from a broad range of clinical and methodological disciplines through individual, peer,
and team mentoring particularly focused on future grant development and grant submission support to assist in
the transition towards an independent research career; 3) Provide a curriculum and collaborative,
multidisciplinary experiential training in translational research incorporating a spectrum of clinical disorders,
with emphasis on prevalent diseases and health disparities in the US Deep South; 4) Advance mentoring
and team building skills of faculty to foster “team science” and continue the expansion of cross-institutional
training experiences for KL2 Scholars and other early career investigators; The Deep South Translational
Research KL2 will provide new and expand existing infrastructure across our regional partners for
career development, to recruit and train individuals with significant potential to be highly successful
translational researchers, and to mentor them toward becoming academic leaders at our institutions
and nationally, and ultimately to improve healthcare in the Deep South.

## Key facts

- **NIH application ID:** 9926326
- **Project number:** 5KL2TR003097-02
- **Recipient organization:** UNIVERSITY OF ALABAMA AT BIRMINGHAM
- **Principal Investigator:** Kenneth G Saag
- **Activity code:** KL2 (R01, R21, SBIR, etc.)
- **Funding institute:** NIH
- **Fiscal year:** 2020
- **Award amount:** $1,043,209
- **Award type:** 5
- **Project period:** 2019-05-06 → 2024-04-30

## Primary source

NIH RePORTER: https://reporter.nih.gov/project-details/9926326

## Citation

> US National Institutes of Health, RePORTER application 9926326, DEEP SOUTH TRANSLATIONAL RESEARCH MENTORED CAREER DEVELOPMENT PROGRAM (5KL2TR003097-02). Retrieved via AI Analytics 2026-05-23 from https://api.ai-analytics.org/grant/nih/9926326. Licensed CC0.

---

*[NIH grants dataset](/datasets/nih-grants) · CC0 1.0*