The Clinical Translation Science Award (CTSA) initiative calls upon academic health centers to engage communities around a clinical research relationship measured ultimately in terms of public health. Among a few initiatives involving university accountability for advancing public interests, a small CTSA workgroup devised a community engagement (CE) logic model that organizes common activities within a university-community infrastructure to facilitate community engagement in research. While the model focuses on the range of institutional CE inputs, it purposefully does not include an approach for assessing how community engagement influences research implementation and outcomes. Rather, with communities and individuals beginning to transition into new research roles, this article emphasizes studying community engagement through specific relationship types and assessing how expanded research teams contribute to the full spectrum of translational science. The authors propose a typology consisting of three relationship types—engagement, collaboration and shared leadership—to provide a foundation for investigating community–academic contributions to the new CTSA research paradigm. The typology shifts attention from specific community–academic activities and, instead, encourages analyses focused on measuring the strength of relationships through variables like synergy and trust. The collaborative study of CE relationships will inform an understanding of CTSA infrastructure development in support of translational research and its goal, which is expressed in the logic model: better science, better answers, better population health.

During our previous attempt to search for the candidate genes to acute lung injury (ALI), we unexpectedly identified PBEF as the most highly upregulated gene in a canine model of ALI by crosshybridizing canine lung cRNA to the Affymetrix human gene chip HG-U133A. The result suggested that PBEF may be a potential biomarker in ALI. To extend and translate that finding, we have performed the molecular cloning and characterization of canine PBEF cDNA in this study. Deduced amino acid sequence alignment revealed that the PBEF gene is evolutionarily highly conserved, with the canine PBEF protein sequence 96% identical to human PBEF and 94% identical to both murine and rat PBEF counterparts. Canine PBEF protein was successfully expressed both by in vitro transcription coupled with translation in a cell-free system and by transfection of canine PBEF cDNA into the human lung type II alveolar adenocarcinoma cell line A549. The expressed canine PBEF protein was visualized by either an anti-V5 tag peptide polyclonal antibody or an anti-canine PBEF peptide polyclonal antibody. RT-PCR assay indicates that canine PBEF is expressed in canine lung, brain, heart, liver, spleen, kidney, pancreas, and muscle, with liver showing the highest expression,followed by muscle. Isolation of the canine PBEF cDNA and expression of its recombinant protein may provide molecular tools to study the molecular mechanism of ALI in the canine model and to elucidate the potential role of PBEF as an ALI biomarker.

There are many obstacles that urban youth experience in pursuing health careers, but the benefits of diversifying the classroom and workforce are clear. This is especially true today as educators and policymakers seek to enhance underrepresented minority students’ access to health careers, and also achieve the health workforce needed to support the Affordable Care Act. The creation of student pipeline programs began more than 40 years ago, but success has been equivocal. In 2008, Mentoring in Medicine (MIM) conducted a research project to identify how students learn about health careers; develop strategies for an integrated, experiential learning program that encourages underrepresented minority students to pursue careers in health; and translate these into best practices for supporting students through their entire preparatory journey. Six focus groups were conducted with educators, students, and their parents. The inclusion of parents was unusual in studies of this kind. The outcome yielded important and surprising differences between student and parent knowledge, attitudes and beliefs. They informed our understanding of the factors that motivate and deter underrepresented minority students to pursue careers in health care. Specific programmatic strategies emerged that found their place in the subsequent development of new MIM programming that falls into the following three categories: community-based, school-based and Internet based. Best practices derived from these MIM programs are summarized and offered for consideration by other health career education program developers targeting underrepresented minority students, particularly those located in urban settings.

The August 2011 Clinical & Translational Science Awards (CTSA) conference Using IT to Improve Community Health: How Health Care Reform Supports Innovation, convened four “think tank” sessions. Thirty individuals, representing various perspectives on community engagement, attended the Health Information Technology (HIT) as a Resource to Improve Community Health and Education session, which focused on using HIT to improve patient health, education, and research involvement. Participants discussed a range of topics using a semi-structured format. This article describes themes and lessons that emerged from that session, with a particular focus on using HIT to engage communities in order to improve health and reduce health disparities in populations.