UCLA Dentist-Scientist and Oral Health-Researcher Training Program

In response to PAR-20-056, we propose to reestablish the T90/R90 comprehensive institutional training program at the UCLA School of Dentistry. This application has been built on more than 20 years of our combined research training and career development at UCLA that launched careers of dentist-scientists and oral health-scientists and prepared them for adverse challenges in science, healthcare, and society. The application continues this long-standing tradition and aims to bolster a vigorous and diverse dental, oral and craniofacial research workforce via a rigorous and interdisciplinary training program that offers trainees novel and innovative research training experiences in a highly supportive institutional environment. We have assembled an excellent team of faculty mentors who embody four areas of scientific strengths – (1) Cancer Biology, Oral Cancer & Stem Cells, (2) Craniofacial Biology, Bioengineering & Regenerative Medicine, (3) Microbes – Virulence Mechanisms and Advanced Imaging by CryoEM, and (4) Translational Genetics, Epigenetics, & Genomics. Our interdisciplinary training program links trainees to mentors at the School of Dentistry, School of Medicine, School of Engineering, Jonsson Comprehensive Cancer Center, Molecular Biology Institute, Stem Cell Institute, and California NanoSystem Institute. The integration of these interdepartmental centers and institutes provides a rich training environment with enormous physical resources and centralized core facilities. We offer five training tracks, (i) Dentist-Scientist Trainee Program (dual degree DDS/PhD), (ii) Dentist-PhD Program (predoctoral research training to dentists), (iii) Dentist-Scientists Postdoctoral Fellow (postdoctoral training to dentists), (iv) Predoctoral PhD Trainee (predoctoral training in oral health), and (v) Oral Health Postdoctoral Fellow (postdoctoral training in oral health). Collectively, our proposed training program will train the next generation of dentist-scientists and oral health scientists to conduct basic, translational, and clinical research to improve dental, oral, and craniofacial health.