Research News - October 17, 2014

ANNOUNCEMENTS

1. Animal Researchers - notice of the AAALAC Site Visit November 3

MGH will host a site visit team from the Association for Assessment and Accreditation of Laboratory Animal Care International (AAALAC) starting Monday, November 3 and ending Wednesday, November 5 for a triennial assessment of our entire laboratory animal care and use program.

There will be 4 members on the site visit team led by Cecile Baccanale, DVM. We expect them to visit the Boston and Charlestown campuses, Shriner’s Hospital, and our Grafton, Southbridge, and Cambridge sites.

In addition to the CCM-managed facilities, we anticipate that the site visit team will be particularly interested in inspecting satellite housing spaces and laboratory areas where research procedures using animals are performed. AAALAC's assessment will follow specifications in the Guide including regulatory compliance, personnel training and education, occupational health and safety, hazard identification and risk assessment, drug storage and control, veterinary care, animal transportation, record keeping, plus security and access control.

Please check your email for a notice from the IACUC on how to best prepare your animal use areas for this inspection.

Questions? Contact any CCM veterinarian or the IACUC office (aclancy1@mgh.harvard.edu; rminkel@mgh.harvard.edu) if you have any questions.

2. Bash "ShellShock" Vulnerability Update for our Apple Macintosh Community

There is a new vulnerability present in Mac operating systems. It is very important that you patch your Mac, because this patch is not currently a part of an automatic update from Apple. For manual patching details, visit the KnowledgeBase article that includes instructions on how to update. Bash is the way many Unix-based systems understand commands. Apple computers and systems running Linux, among others, run bash. Under certain circumstances, this bug in bash (referred in the news as ShellShock) could be exploited to allow an attacker to run commands of any kind (read more - Bash "ShellShock" Bug). If you have any questions or concerns, please contact the Partners Enterprise Apple Support Team at peas@partners.org.

3. Harvard purchasing program ending October 28, 2014

On Wednesday, October 1, Harvard announced to their community that they will be exiting the retail sales and services business and will be shutting down operations of HUIT's Harvard Technology Products & Services on October 28, 2014. For the past 25 years, we have depended upon TPS as the primary source for purchasing Macs, iPads, PC's and academic software. Starting Friday, October 24, Partners and the Hospitals will no longer be able to make purchase through Harvard with a Partners PO/eBuy request. This situation remains fluid and that we have not yet finalized the future ordering process of Macs and iPads, but all known details about the current ordering options are posted. We are also exploring options regarding the procurement of academic software titles, and updates will be posted. If you have any questions or concerns, please contact the Partners Enterprise Apple Support (PEAS) Team at peas@partners.org.

4. Core of the Week: CCIB Monoclonal Antibody Sequencing Core

CCIB Monoclonal Antibody Sequencing Core 
Director: Ashok Khatri
Location: 149 Thirteenth St. Room #4-323A, Charlestown, MA

The primary goal of the CCIB Monoclonal Antibody (mAB) Sequencing Core facility is to provide advanced de novo protein sequencing technology services to CCIB and the Partners research community. The Core Facility, established originally as a resource for protein/peptide sequencing for the CCIB, is now formally established as an institution-wide resource focused on the sequencing of monoclonal antibodies and other novel proteins/peptides. The mAB Core Facility primarily provides the services of protein/peptide purification, amino acid sequencing, and mass spectral analysis for the determination of the primary sequence of monoclonal antibodies. Investigators from throughout the MGH consult with the staff of the Core Facility to facilitate the most effective use of the resources.

To learn more about the CCIB Monoclonal Antibody Sequencing Core, please click here.

5. PCORI October Newsletter: Funding Application Updates, New Blogs and Videos

Please click here to read the latest news from the Patient-Centered Outcomes Research Institute.

EVENTS

1. Introduction to Proteomics and Metabolomics

Thursday, December 18, 1:30pm - 5:00pm, Simches Room 3.110

Sponsored by the MGH Clinical Research Program and the Harvard Catalyst

This introductory course is intended for clinicians, investigators, graduate and medical students, and clinical research staff with an interest in functional genomics and precision medicine.

Key principles necessary for basic, clinical, and translational researchers to design proteomic and metabolomics studies and to perform and analyze data will be discussed.

Registration is required. Contact Jillian Tonelli with any questions.

2. Join the Research Technical Lunch

Thursday, October 30, 12-2PM, WebEx or Prudential Center

This month, Brent Richter, Director, Enterprise Research Infrastructure & Services (ERIS) and many of his team will present and discuss new initiatives and changes within ERIS while also providing a few service updates. This discussion will first touch on HPC (ERISOne) and Infrastructure services and their extension to both leverage ‘cloud (AWS)’ and to enable large data science projects; and second describe development and deployment of an organization that thinks about both Macs and all PC’s together within the context of a risk-based approach to using these devices. Diane Keogh, Corporate Director Partners eCare Research and Reporting will discuss how Partners eCare will support clinical research. Diane will update us on the July Epic Revenue Cycle implementation at MGH, what to expect in May 2015 when BWH goes live with the full Epic Revenue Cycle and Clinical suite, and will field your questions and concerns. RSVP Online by 10/28 and note if you plan to attend remotely so that details are sent to you. Visit the website and contact rcc@partners.org with questions about Tech Lunch.

FUNDING OPPORTUNITIES

1. NSF Rapid Response Research Funding Opportunity for Ebola Research

In light of the recent emergence of the lethal Ebola virus in the US, the National Science Foundation (NSF) is accepting proposals to conduct non-medical, non-clinical care research that can be used immediately to better understand how to model and understand the spread of Ebola, educate about prophylactic behaviors, and encourage the development of products, processes, and learning that can address this global challenge.

Researchers are invited to use the Rapid Response Research (RAPID) funding mechanism, which allows NSF to receive and review proposals having a severe urgency with regard to availability of, or access to data, facilities or specialized equipment, as well as quick-response research on natural or anthropogenic disasters and similar unanticipated events.

Complete guidance on submitting a RAPID proposal may be found here:
http://www.nsf.gov/pubs/policydocs/pappguide/nsf14001/gpg_2.jsp#IID1.

2. Limited Submission Funding Opportunities

We ask that all MGH Investigators interested in applying for any limited submission award submit a Letter of Intent (see detailed instructions below) to the MGH Executive Committee on Research (ECOR) by the deadline indicated for each award to be considered to receive an institutional nomination.

Process
Submit a one- to two-page Letter of Intent (LOI) to the MGH Executive Committee on Research (ECOR) via email to ecor@partners.org. In addition to your LOI, please include an NIH Biosketch.

The letter of intent should include:
1. Name of the Principal Investigator with appropriate contact information
2. A descriptive title of the potential application
3. Brief description of the project
4. Brief description of why you specifically should be selected to receive institutional nomination for this award

In the event that there is more than one MGH investigators interested in applying for each limited submission award, the LOIs will be used to assess candidates and a review and selection process will take place.

Current Limited Submission Funding Opportunities
Please click here for more information and for our internal deadlines.

• NINDS Neuroscience Development for Advancing the Careers of a Diverse Research Workforce (R25)
• The Midlife in the United States Study (U19)
• Clinical and Translational Science Award (U54)

If there is a limited submission funding opportunity you do not see listed above or you have any additional questions, please contact Erin McGivney at 617-643-6471.

3. Private Funding Opportunities

Please contact Corporate & Foundation Relations in the Office of Development at devcfr@mgh.harvard.edu if you wish to submit a proposal in response to any of these funding opportunities. Note that proposals are still routed through the standard InfoEd/Research Management process.

• Research Grant Competition, National Lung Cancer Partnership
• Scientific Research Grants, National Blood Foundation

Please click here for further details on these funding opportunities.

4. NIH Update for Week Ending October 17, 2014

For the latest National Institutes of Health notices, requests for applications, and program announcements, follow this link: http://grants.nih.gov/grants/guide/WeeklyIndex.cfm

IN CASE YOU MISSED IT

Reminders of recently posted funding opportunities, deadlines and events

Howard M. Goodman Fellowship 2015
Application Deadline: October 28, 2014

Bullock Postdoctoral Fellowship 
Application deadline:  November 3, 2014

The MGH Research Scholars Program 
Application Deadline: November 4, 2014

MGH ECOR Formulaic Bridge Funding
Application Deadline: 7th day of each month

Boston Biomedical Innovation Center (B-BIC) Accepting PILOT & DRIVE Grant Pre-Proposals

MGH New Faculty Orientation - October 23

CRP Spotlight Series: CRC Discussion Group on Epic - October 27 
 
The Warren Triennial Prize & Symposium - November 24

Save the Date! SAC 2015 - April 1 & 2, 2015

Executive Committee On Research (ECOR) Massachusetts General Hospital

50 Staniford Street, Suite 1001, Boston, MA 02114

ecor@partners.org