Life Sciences Division involved in proposal process for UT Centers of Excellence (November/December 2000)

The University of Tennessee announced last week the establishment of a number of centers of excellence as part of their initiative to move UT among the top 25 research universities in the U.S. These centers were awarded on a competitive basis. Several members in the Life Sciences Division were involved in the proposal process and will be participating in the work under the following centers:

For the past several months, staff in our Toxicology and Risk Analysis Section have been discussing collaborations with faculty and staff in the Institute of Agriculture at UT. Research areas of mutual interest have focused on assessing the impacts of pesticides and microbial pathogens associated with foods. There are numerous investigative opportunities associated with the "safety" of foods as they are grown and processed for consumption such as; development of quantitative microbial risk assessments; research and development of microbial dose/response models; spatial analysis of the movement, transmission and survival of pathogens in the farm environment; persistence of antibiotic resistant microbes; rapid detection and identification of chemicals and pathogens; elimination of microbes on foods using radiation; and, hazard analysis and control point cost/benefit analysis. These discussions led to TARA collaborating with the Institute of Agriculture on the proposal to form the Food Safety Center of Excellence.

Several people from Mammalian Genetics and Genomics and Computational Biology Sections have contributed to this proposal. Dr. Dabney Johnson is co-PI for the mutagenesis core, one of six funded cores. This core will provide mutant mice for phenotypic assessment to researchers throughout the UT System. Jay Snoddy is the lead person from CBS for the bioinformatics core.

Dabney Johnson is a Participating Investigator in this center. She will be responsible for supplying animal resources and expertise in mouse genetics, mutagenesis, molecular biology, and genomics. Other people from LSD involved in this center are: Gerry Bunick, Leif Hanson, Frank Larimer, and Ying Xu. Michelle Buchanan and Bob Hettich from the Chemistry and Analytical Sciences Division, and Eli Greenbaum from the Chemical Technology Division are also participating in this center.