The teaching program of the research training group
Training objectives
The main training objective of the Research Training Group is to provide excellent, multi-facetted training while conducting high quality research on immunotherapy. Due to the interdepartmental approach in our program and laboratory rotations, PhD students will learn how to work in teams composed of experts from different disciplines. This academic training is structurally supported by seminars, progress reports and journal clubs on key aspects of immunotherapy. Finally, annual retreats with evaluation by the advisory board of the Research Training Group and active participation in the summer university with excellent students from local high schools will help to shape scientific and teaching expertise.
Current doctoral training in Germany is frequently limited to internal laboratory meetings and bench work. Thus, the acquisition of key skills required to become an independent researcher (e.g. data presentation, methods, scientific writing, and grant applications) is not part of standard doctoral education. Therefore, the Research Training Program aims at achieving the following key learning and scientific outcome parameters for students.
Key learning outcomes consist of:
(i) The gain of in-depth knowledge of immunotherapy: Students will obtain a broad overview of innovative and translational areas of modern immunology where frontiers of the domain are advancing. This goal will be accomplished by weekly journal clubs, weekly talks by excellent international guest speakers and annual retreats with external scientific advisors. Finally, the program will support travels to national and international meetings to support the presentation of own scientific data and to advance the scientific projects.
(ii) Excellent training in basic and clinical immunology of graduate students (medical doctors and biologists) in the field of immunotherapy: Basic training will be provided by journal clubs, methods seminars and courses. In addition, medical doctors may participate in clinical rounds. Students may see cancer patients as well as patients with autoimmune and chronic inflammatory diseases (e.g. IBD, asthma) receiving immunotherapy with biologicals, small molecules blocking signaling events or anti-viral agents. This will help medical doctors to complete their speciality training and allow the biologists to understand key clinical problems in the field of immunotherapy. In addition, experts developing innovative therapies and those who apply these therapies to patients will be invited to present latest data to all students, medical doctors and biologists.
(iii) The acquisition of early teaching skills of the students: Students will publicly present their work and scientific publications in weekly seminars (progress report, journal club) in front of students and principal investigators. Furthermore, students will actively organize summer schools for local high school students and give lectures on immunology and immunotherapy under the supervision of principal investigators and the Center for Didactical Quality Assurance (PD Dr. Herzer) at the University of Mainz.
(iv) The capacity to become independent researchers: Students will be supervised by experienced investigators and learn in a multidisciplinary environment. Using laboratory rotations and a learning by doing approach, the students will acquire the intellectual capacity to quickly analyse complex scientific problems in a methodologically sound manner. Laboratory rotations and internships are mandatory for each participant. In this way, the program will promote the students to become independent researchers and prepare them for their future careers in leading positions in academia and industry.
The key scientific outcome consists of a better immunological understanding of chronic inflammation and cancer and the discovery of novel targets for immunomodulatory and immunosuppressive drugs that can be used to treat cancer and chronic inflammation. Furthermore, the Research Training Group will aim at the characterization of vaccines, adjuvants and carrier proteins for optimised immunotherapy. Students are expected to contribute to at least one or two publications in excellent international journals in the field of immunotherapy.The scientific program of the Research Training Group will be divided into three synergistic work packages entitled the Identification of target antigens for vaccination and immunotherapy (section 1), Vaccines, carrier proteins and adjuvants (section 2) and Immunotherapies and signaling in chronic inflammation and cancer (section 3). The first work package will involve basic research in the field of immunology on innate and adaptive immune responses with a special reference to dendritic cells and T lymphocytes. Furthermore, the pathologic activation or inactivation of immune cells in chronic and immune-mediated diseases will be studied by analyzing patient samples or mouse models of these diseases. The aim of this work package is to characterize new molecules that regulate immune responses or promote and perpetuate chronic inflammation and cancer.It also aims at a better understanding of the protective and pathogenic immune mechanisms in the mentioned diseases. It is our vision that such studies will ultimately lead to the identification of new targets and to the development of innovative translational therapies for chronic inflammatory diseases and cancer. The second work package will deal with the structural characterization of carrier proteins as well as with the development and functional characterization of vaccines and adjuvants. These studies will be important for the development of improved vaccines and carrier proteins. Finally, the third work package has a main focus on immunotherapy and signal transduction in animal models of chronic inflammatory diseases, specific infections and cancer (e.g. inflammatory bowel diseases, asthma, multiple sclerosis, colon cancer, lung cancer). Methods in this work package comprise gene targeting, transgenic systems, antibodies, antisense DNA, siRNA, viral gene transfer and small molecules. These studies may ultimately lead to individualized and more specific therapies or even the development of new drugs in a translational approach. We believe that the combined approach of the three work packages will result in strong synergistic effects that are required to perform bedside to bench and bench to bedside medicine. Exchange of techniques and interactions between clinicians and scientists will be encouraged and supported by structural elements within the program such as regular journal clubs, annual retreats and seminars.
Supervision and mentoring:
Students will be supervised by the principal investigators. To allow individual coaching, each student has an individual advisory PhD committee, denoted DAC, consisting of three experienced principal investigators (supervising scientist, scientific advisor, scientific coordinator), an external advisor and a student representative. The DAC has the following tasks: scientific supervision of the project, supporting the scientific independence of students and promoting their scientific networks, and identification of suitable laboratories for methods training, laboratory rotations and industrial training. Each student will benefit from the three external advisors of the Research Training Group and meet the personal advisors at least once per year. The annual retreats and the meetings with the advisors will support the scientific interactions of students and their networking and provide personal and scientific advice on the PhD training. Furthermore, excellent female students will be proposed for the Dagmar-Eißner Award, a special award by the School of Medicine in Mainz for young female researchers.
