The Immunology Graduate Program emphasizes several areas, including:
- Molecular and computational immunology; transcriptional and post-transcriptional mechanisms regulating the expression of immunologically relevant genes and immune cell development and function.
- Cellular, biochemical, and structural immunology; signal transduction in lymphocytes and innate immune cells, effect of cytokines and chemokines on immune cell function, identification of tumor antigens, and mechanisms of inflammation.
- Organ-based immunology; immune cell effector mechanisms and interactions in the intestine, lung, vasculature, and central nervous system.
- Pathogenic mechanisms and therapeutic approaches for immunologically-relevant diseases; autoimmunity, viral, bacterial, and parasitic infectious diseases, cancer, pathologic inflammation, aging, obesity, cardiovascular disease, and neurodegenerative diseases.
The Immunology Graduate Program focuses on preparing students to become immunologists capable of undertaking careers encompassing independent scholarly research work at universities, institutes or the biotech/pharma sectors. This is accomplished through laboratory training that emphasizes mastery of cutting-edge immunological techniques and experimental approaches that enable the development of hypothesis-driven projects. Students also take core courses required by the Ph.D. in Biomedical Science Program as well as courses in Immunobiology (MEDS 5329) and Advanced Molecular and Cellular Immunology (MEDS 5335), and their scientific critical thinking and communication skills are honed through participation in journal clubs and research-in-progress seminars.
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Background
The Ph.D. Program in Immunology was approved by the Graduate School of the University of Connecticut in 1969. It was activated in 1971 coincident with the start of the NIH Training Grant, Basic Immunology and Immunological Cell Injury. Currently, the Immunology Graduate Program (IGP) has 24 faculty, and is training 24 Ph.D. graduate students supported by University Fellowships or faculty grants.
Graduates of the Immunology Graduate Program continued their postdoctoral training and/or hold positions at:
| Bristol-Myers Squibb New York University University of Michigan Harvard University Biopolymer Inc. University of Tokyo Rockefeller University University of Iowa Yale University Boehringer-Ingelheim Inc. State University of New York Abbvie Pharmaceuticals National Institutes of Health Tufts University University of North Carolina Alton Jones Science Center Brown University Western New England University Johns Hopkins University |
University of Massachusetts Miles Laboratories Columbia University Merck Dana Farber Cancer Center Jackson Laboratory Pfizer University of Southern California Genentech Emory University Ohio State University Fox Chase Cancer Center Scripps Clinic and Research Foundation Food and Drug Administration, Pasteur Institute, Paris, France King’s College, Oxford University University of Wisconsin Alloy Therapeutics PlateletBio |