DESCRIPTION (provided by applicant): Texas Southern University is requesting support for the Center for Biomedical and Health Research Excellence (CBHRE) formerly known as the Institute for Biomedical and Health Disparities Research. The purpose of the CBHRE is to support the conduct of research on two diseases, cancer and cardiovascular, which are leading causes of death in Houston, the state of Texas and the nation. The RCMI program is being reinvented and reinvigorated. The goals of the program are to: 1) upgrade research infrastructure to enhance the university's biomedical research capacity and help promote a research rich environment; 2) enable investigators to become more successful in obtaining competitive extramural support for the conduct of biomedical research, particularly on diseases that disproportionately impact minority populations; and 3) foster vibrant environments conducive to professional development in biomedical sciences. Based on these goals, at the end of five years of RCMI support the CHBRE proposes multiple outcomes including substantial increases in publications citing NIH support; more proposal submissions; more grants awarded; increased number of investigators receiving "mainstream" extramural grant support; and increased number of professional development activities. The CBHRE will have an evaluation component that will be responsible for monitoring the progress of the CBHRE at regular intervals and making recommendations for improvement. The CBHRE will institute a Pilot Program project using a rigorous set of criteria and investigators supported by this program will undergo professional development activities that will help them gain independence within two years of completion of the CBHRE program. The CBHRE and agreed on college and university resources will be leveraged to form new and strengthen collaborations. The CBHRE will be organized into the following activities and/or cores: Administrative Core, Collaborations and Partnerships, Pilot Project Program, Professional Development, Assessment and Evaluation, Environmental Toxicology Research Core, Molecular Biology Research Core and Pharmacology Research Core. Each activity and/or core is designed to support the purpose, goals and objectives of the CBHRE. The core research laboratories will be organized in a manner that will allow investigators access to the state-of-the-art facilities, instrumentatio and service oriented scientific expertise. Multiple investigators will come together to conduct research on cancer and cardiovascular diseases based on discovering common biological, biochemical, genomic, lipidomic, and/or proteomic malfunctions to help understand the mechanistic and clinical relevance of the disease processes.

PUBLIC HEALTH RELEVANCE: The focus of the research supported by the CBHRE will be cancer and cardiovascular diseases that disproportionately affect minority populations and lead to burdensome morbidity and mortality among this community. Collectively, cardiovascular disease (including stroke), cancer, and diabetes account for approximately two-thirds of all deaths in the U.S. and about $700 billion in direct and indirect economic costs each year. The CBHRE proposes to approach the study of these diseases by marshaling all of its former, current and future biomedical research resources to launch a three-pronged approach to discovering new mechanistic information about the underlying causes of these diseases and identifying prospective remedies.