The IAC-USNC/IBRO, also known as the US-Canada IBRO Regional Committee, announces the 2008 program to support scientists from developing countries in attending high level neuroscience courses at the Marine Biological Laboratory (MBL) and at Cold Spring Harbor Laboratory (CSHL).
The IBRO Board of Schools and the IAC-USNC/IBRO seek to encourage highly qualified and motivated research trainees from resource-limited countries to apply for admission to summer neuroscience courses at the MBL in Woods Hole, Massachusetts and CSHL in Cold Spring Harbor, New York. Substantial (usually complete) financial support is available to enable the participation of students from resource-restricted countries in these programs. This is an effort to enable the most meritorious alumni of IBRO Neuroscience Schools and other outstanding young scientists to gain "capstone" experiences in leading training programs. These experiences are intended to benefit scientists who will continue to study and work in less financially advantaged regions such as those in Latin America, Africa, Central and Eastern Europe, and Asia/Pacific.
Applications should be submitted through the normal MBL and CSHL application mechanisms. You should indicate on the application that you would like to be considered for the IAC-USNC/IBRO funds. The MBL or CSHL will inform students if they have been selected. No applications should be sent to IBRO or the IAC-USNC directly. While not required, the IAC-USNC/IBRO does request that persons preparing their applications let the committee know they are applying (preferably in advance of the application deadline). Scientists who applied before but were not accepted might consider applying again as the application pool varies each year.

More information about MBL courses included in this program (Neural Systems and Behavior, Neurobiology, Methods in Computational Neuroscience, Neural Development and Genetics of Zebrafish, Neuroinformatics, and "SPINES" is available at the MBLs web site http://www.mbl.edu/education/ under "Summer Courses" and "Special Topics Courses." This program will support the CSHL courses Advanced Techniques in Molecular Neuroscience and the Workshop on Autism Spectrum Disorders, in addition to Neurobiology of Drosophila, Imaging Structure & Function in the Nervous System and Ion Channel Physiology. More information about the CSHL courses is available at http://meetings.cshl.edu/courses.html.

More information about this effort and suggestions for preparing a competitive application are available at http://www.iac-usnc.org/MBLcoursefellowships.html.
Information about the experiences of 2007 participants is available at http://alumni.ibro.info/Pub/Pub_Main_Display.asp?LC_Docs_ID=2731. Please do not hesitate to consider this opportunity, as the application deadline for some courses is February 1, 2008.

The IAC-USNC/IBRO is a joint committee of the Society for Neuroscience and the US National Academies (the "Society for Neuroscience International Affairs Committee and National Academies US National Committee for IBRO). The goal of the committee is to increase understanding of the nervous system in health and disease worldwide. Support of participants is made possible by IBRO funds allocated to the committee. The committee is able to oversee such efforts due to support of the IAC-USNC/IBRO by US National Institutes of Health (NIH), specifically the National Institute of Mental Health, the National Institute of Neurological Disorders and Stroke, and the National Institute on Drug Abuse.