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Center of Biomedical Research Excellence (COBRE)
Centers of Biomedical Research Excellence (COBRE) support thematic, multidisciplinary centers that augment and strengthen institutional biomedical research capacity. This is accomplished by expanding and developing biomedical faculty research capability and enhancing research infrastructure, including the establishment of core facilities needed to carry out the objectives of a multidisciplinary, collaborative program. The centers promote collaborative, interactive efforts among researchers with complementary backgrounds, skills and expertise. Researchers supported through COBRE are expected to compete independently for external peer-reviewed grant support.
 
Each COBRE includes:
  • A principal investigator who is an established biomedical research scientist with expertise central to the research theme of the center, has an active research laboratory, has relevant peer-reviewed funding and has demonstrated administrative leadership and mentoring experience.
  • Three to five individual research projects—each supervised by a single Research Project Leader (RPL)—that stand alone but share a common thematic scientific focus.
  • At least one mentor for each RPL, and a development and mentoring plan addressing how the RPL will transition to competitive grant support from NIH institutes and centers or other Federal or non-Federal agencies or organizations.
COBRE support comes in three sequential 5-year phases:
  • Phase 1 focuses on developing research infrastructure and providing junior investigators with formal mentoring and research project funding to help them acquire preliminary data and successfully compete for independent research grant support.
  • Phase 2 seeks to strengthen each center through further improvements in research infrastructure and continuing development and support of a critical mass of investigators with shared scientific interests. After 10 years of COBRE support, centers are expected to be able to compete successfully for other sources of research funding, such as program project or center grants from other NIH institutes and centers or other funding sources.
  • Phase 3 transitional centers provide support for maintaining COBRE research cores developed during Phases 1 and 2, and sustain a collaborative, multidisciplinary research environment with pilot project programs and mentoring and training components.
The COBRE-Diabetes grant is in Phase 2, focusing on developing research infrastructure and providing junior investigators with mentoring and funding.
 

Executive Team

The Lead Principal Investigator and Director for the COBRE is Mariana Gerschenson, Ph.D., a Hispanic, translational researcher, and the Deputy Director is Marjorie Mau, MD, MS, a Native Hawaiian, physician-scientist. Combined, both Directors have decades of administrative experience, mentoring expertise, and current and continuous NIH funding. Dr. Gerschenson’s expertise lies in pediatric IR, and pediatric and adult metabolic disease. Dr. Mau is a board-certified endocrinologist with more than two decades of clinical epidemiology, health disparities, and clinical intervention research at UH.
 
Dr. Olivier Le Saux, PhD, and Dr. Alexandra Binder, ScD, are Director and Co-Director, respectively of the Metabolic and Analytic Core. Dr. Le Saux is Professor and Chair of the Department of Cell and Molecular Biology. He studies cardiovascular calcification in animal models and patients, which is a complication of diabetes. Dr. Binder is Associate Professor at the University of Hawaii Cancer Center. She is a molecular epidemiologist and biostatistician, whose research centers on the analysis of -omic data to explore the mechanisms that shape chronic disease risk and accelerated aging trajectories. She has extensive expertise in in silico analysis of high-dimensional, genomic and epigenomic data.
 
Dr. V. Andrew Stenger, PhD, and Takashi Matsui, MD, are Co-Directors of the Pilot Project Program. Dr. Stenger is a Professor in the Department of Medicine, Director of the University of Hawaii Magnetic Resonance Research Center, and a Fellow of the Intentional Society for Magnetic Resonance in Medicine, which is the primary scientific organization in the MRI research field. Dr. Matsui is Professor and Chair of the Department of Department of Anatomy, Biochemistry and Physiology, and Deputy Director of the Center for Cardiovascular for Research Center at JABSOM, with extensive experience in cell signaling research, especially in cardiac insulin signaling pathway.
 
The Executive Team convenes monthly to determine appropriate allocation of COBRE resources and infrastructure support for scientific projects, mentoring, and developmental activities.
 

Mentoring Teams

We provide a detailed formal mentoring plan for each of our Research Project Leaders that addresses the challenge of mentoring early career faculty in our remote location. The cornerstone of the mentoring plan is the Mentoring Team for each RPL. This includes a local primary mentor who is knowledgeable in the area of the project, and another external mentor or collaborator with substantial complementary expertise, and the COBRE Executive Team.
  
 

Advisory Committee (AC)

The Advisory Committee (AC) is an independent assessment committee and advisory to the COBRE-Diabetes. The AC is composed of three recognized scientists with administrative experience, leaders in the field of diabetes and/or with expertise directly relevant to the research plans of the junior investigators; and two institutional leaders. The EAC is composed of:
picture of Steven KahnSteven E. Kahn, M.B., Ch.B., Leonard L. Wright and Marjorie C. Wright Chair; Professor, Division of Metabolism, Endocrinology and Nutrition; Director, Diabetes Research Center, University of Washington. He is an endocrinologist whose research focuses on the mechanisms responsible for the critical impairments in insulin secretion that result in the development of diabetes. With his colleagues, Dr. Kahn is also examining novel approaches to preventing and treating type 2 diabetes.
 
picture of Steven LipshultzSteven E. Lipshultz, M.D., A. Conger Goodyear Professor, Department of Pediatrics, University of Buffalo, Jacobs School of Medicine and Biomedical Sciences. He is a pediatric cardiologist who has been an Associate Dean and Department Chair. He studies IR/diabetes and cardiovascular diseases in children. Dr. Lipshultz is principal investigator of a study using comparative genomics and proteomics to study the development of pediatric cardiomyopathy. His team is conducting an NHLBI-funded multi-center international study of whole-exome sequencing in children with cardiomyopathy to determine the influence of genomic variation, genotype-phenotype correlations, modifier genes and gene-environment interactions on the development and progression of pediatric cardiomyopathy and on therapeutic successes, and the incidence of adverse clinical events.
picture of Lori SusselLori Sussel, Ph.D., Sissel and Findlow Family Chair, Professor of Pediatrics and Cell and Developmental Biology, Director of Basic and Translational Research, Barbara Davis Center for Diabetes. Her research focuses on the complex transcriptional networks that regulate development, differentiation and function of the pancreas. Recent investigations are focused on issues relating to the regulation of alpha and beta cell identity and function with a specific focus on transcription factors and long non-coding RNAs. She leads an outstanding team of scientists and clinicians at the Barbara Davis Center for Diabetes dedicated to finding treatments and cures for Type 1 diabetes.
picture of Vassilis SyrmosVassilis Syrmos, Ph.D., Vice President for Research and Innovation for the University of Hawaii. Dr. Syrmos serves as the senior institutional official on the Advisory Committee. He is charged with providing critical leadership and coordination of systemwide research and innovation efforts, including management and direction of UH’s research support, technology transfer and many compliance functions. He is a Professor in the College of Engineering and an electrical engineer whose interests include geometric and algebraic approaches in linear system theory, computational algorithms methods for signal and image processing, robust/optimal filter design in systems, medical imaging, and prognostics and diagnostics methods related to condition based maintenance systems.
Peter HoffmannPeter R. Hoffmann, Ph.D., Professor, Department of Cell and Molecular Biology at the John A. Burns School of Medicine, University of Hawaii. He is the Principal Investigator of the Hawaii IDeA Network for Biomedical Research Excellence (HI-INBRE). He will serve as the senior faculty member on the Advisory Committee. Dr. Hoffmann's research is focused on the roles of selenoproteins and enzyme systems in regulating inflammation and immune responses. His laboratory has expertise in mouse models of inflammation and immune responses and has formed collaborations with faculty across different UH departments, nationally and internationally.

The AC provides programmatic oversight and mentoring guidance. The AC meets twice a year; we are grateful for their guidance and commitment to our Center’s success. The responsibilities of the AC include providing general oversight, suggestions for mentoring, consideration of provided evaluation metrics, and scientific advice for the COBRE-Diabetes as well as for individual projects.

The goal of the AC is to evaluate whether the goals of the Center remain well aligned with the institution’s strategic priorities, evaluate the scientific progress of the supported RPLs, PPLs, and Metabolic and Analytic Core, evaluate RPL progress toward acquiring independent research funding, and reviewing/approving proposals for replacement Research Projects when such a need arises.