HHMI Expands Under New President - The Scientist - Magazine of the Life Sciences
Abstract
WASHINGTON—The Howard Hughes Medical Institute (HHMI) next month will announce a $40 million-a-year program ranging from support for graduate training in the biomedical sciences to funding of health policy and cost-containment studies. Purnell Choppin, HHMI’s former vice president and chief scientific officer who was appointed president of the institute on September 1, said the education prograin will include funds to upgrade science departments at undergraduate colleges and support for short courses in ethics and other subjects at scientific conferences. Funding for the biomedical education program—a major expansion of HHMI’s activities in this area— represents more than a third of the National Science Foundation’s entire $99 million science education budget for this year. The new program will also support graduate training at non-academic research institutions, noted George Thorn, chairman of HHMI’s trustees. Thorn and other institute staff members said the new graduate student fellowships will be modeled on NSF fellowships and overseen by the National Academy of Sciences. NAS staff members said HHMI recently asked NAS to submit a proposal for advertising and administering 60 HHMI-funded graduate fellowships to support Ph.D. research in the biosciences for up to five years. Choppin said the fellowships and other elements of the