G MIST is committed to providing high quality training for developing industry-savvy employees of biotechnology, pharmaceutical, drug discovery and development, molecular diagnostics, biofuel and value-added agricultural companies. Workforce development is a key to long term economic development of these business sectors. We accomplish this with activities/programs that spark student interests and imagination, provide educational tools for teachers, and generate support by the general public.

From its conception in 1983 to its modern day use in a myriad of clinical and research applications, the Polymerase Chain Reaction (PCR) has revolutionized modern molecular biology.   This lecture and laboratory course will focus on the Polymerase Chain Reaction and its applications in basic molecular biology research, genetics, molecular pathology, including cancer and genetic diseases and identification of viral, bacterial and other pathogens.

This lecture and laboratory course will focus on two important technologies which share strong interfaces with basic molecular biology research, genetics, molecular pathology (including cancer and genetic diseases), and identification of viral, bacterial and protozoan pathogens, namely the polymerase chain reaction and molecular hybridization technology.

This lecture and laboratory course is structured to provide life scientists who are not experienced in cell culture with an introduction to principles and practices that will facilitate their ability to develop the use of in vitro systems. The course is predicated on the application of the most rigorous principles of quality control.

This course is designed to introduce the participant to molecular hybridization and in situ hybridization techniques.  The application of these techniques to current research questions in genetics and gene expression, molecular pathology, and pathogen detection and identification will be discussed.  Probe application and detection systems will serve as the basis for both RNA and DNA in situ hybridization techniques to be addressed in lecture and laboratory.  This course will be staffed by clinical and basic scientists familiar with the applications of hybridization techniques to the problems of human disease.

Studies of post-transcriptional gene silencing (PTGS) led to the discovery of the phenomenon of RNA interference (RNAi) and the role-played in that process by small interfering RNA (siRNA). Although only recently identified, siRNA molecules already are taking the research world by storm as their potential as functional genomic tools is beginning to be appreciated. Compared to antisense and knockout techniques, siRNA can more rapidly and effectively create loss-of-function phenotypes and they may even provide an approach for gene therapy. In this hands-on lecture-lab workshop participants will learn the latest information about RNAi and the use of siRNA as a functional genomics tool.

In response to the growing demand to learn how to extract maximum information from the tremendous amount of data generated in a micorarray experiment Beginning with a hybridized array, this course will spend extensive time on optimizing the scanning process and acquiring an informative scan. This data will then be analyzed using GeneSpring software to generate clustering associations. Finally, using microarray and protein interaction data, pathways defining gene interactions will be assessed using Pathway Assist software.

This lecture and laboratory course will provide an introduction to proteomics technology. Both principles and advanced methodologies will be discussed with an emphasis on protein identification tools, shotgun sequencing and bioinformatics technologies.

The emerging field of Clinical Proteomics refers to the application of proteomic technologies to investigate protein expression differences in clinically obtained biological samples. Researchers involved in Clinical Proteomics face numerous methodological, analytical, and statistical challenges that need to be addressed in order for successful completion of projects. Additionally, large scale biomarker discovery efforts include the coordination of many different disciplines, such as biochemistry, proteomics and mass spectrometry, clinical chemistry and bioinformatics. In this course, students will be exposed to many of the challenging aspects of biomarker discovery projects, as well as to the numerous analytical platforms that may be employed.