(Posted July 6, 2009) The Graduate Division is pleased to announce the three winners of the first Postdoctoral Scholar Research Award.  The winners are Dr. Mimi Kao (Dr. Allison Doupe, Mentor; Physiology Department), Dr. Jed Lampe (Dr. Paul R. Ortiz de Montellano, Mentor; Pharmaceutical Chemistry Program), and Dr. Stephen M. Wilson (Dr. Maria Luisa Gorno-Tempini, Mentor; Memory and Aging Center). Each award recipient will receive funding in the amount of $5,000 toward his or her research expenses.
 
The Postdoctoral Scholar Research Award funding is intended to allow postdocs to pursue novel ideas and directions in their research for which there is no current lab funding.  Many of the proposals submitted for the award in this first round were excellent in terms of their scholarly merit, originality, and research significance.  But the winning proposals stood out as particularly strong models of separable research. As Graduate Dean Dr. Patricia Calarco explained,  “ The hope is that, with the help of this award, postdocs will develop research that they can take with them when they eventually leave UCSF, and that they will be able to publish independently.”
 
The winning research proposals are entitled:
 
M.H. Kao: “Contributions of the cerebellum to the production of learned vocalizations in songbirds.”
J.N. Lampe: “Understanding ligand binding dynamics in the OCT1 drug transporter using 2D NMR with unnatural amino acids.”
S. M. Wilson: “Functional neuroimaging of lexical and sublexical processes in reading.”
 
Applications are accepted for the Postdoctoral Research Award twice a year.  The next deadline is November 1.  More information and downloadable application forms are on the Graduate Division website at:
 
http://postdocs.ucsf.edu/postdocs/financial-support/pdra