The Intramural Research Programs within 24 NIH Institutes and Centers offer a rich calendar of events highlighting research by people who are often leaders in their fields. One of this year’s great lectures is available to watch in the video linked below—its content very compelling, considering the social science research that many of our IRP scientists conduct.
When it comes to devising new ways to provide state-of-the art medical care to people living in remote areas of the world, smartphones truly are helping scientists get smarter. For example, an NIH-supported team working in Central Africa recently turned an iPhone into a low-cost video microscope capable of quickly testing to see if people infected with a parasitic worm called Loa loa can safely receive a drug intended to protect them from a different, potentially blinding parasitic disease.
Only one building was restricted during the 1951 NIH open house—Building 7, specially designed for infectious disease research. Children under 16 were not admitted. And there was only one demonstration: Dr. Karl Habel of NIH's National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases (NIAID) showed the special procedures necessary in the collecting and handling of material for research on and vaccine development for rickettsial diseases carried by ticks. In this photo, is Dr. Habel following his own advice?
If 580 posters displaying scientific data from research across the intramural programs at 24 NIH Institutes and Centers sounds like a lot to take in, have a look at the size of the crowds coming to see them. Walking into the Natcher Conference Center on Postbac Poster Day is like walking into a maze abuzz with urgency. Bulletin board after bulletin board of postbac research posters summarize months of work, each one surrounded by fellow scientists, NIH staff, and visitors staff who are interested in the research and asking questions.
In 1951, Dr. Robert Bowman showed visitors to NIH’s Building 3 his prototype of a device that scanned wavelengths of fluorescent light emitted from various samples. Bowman’s spectrophotofluorometer, or “SPF,” allowed scientists to use fluorescence as a way to identify and measure tiny amounts of substances in the body. This scientific breakthrough is still used today.
I was super excited when I got invited for my first in-person interview. If you have gotten invited for an interview, congratulations! Getting selected for an interview is a huge accomplishment and the first step towards securing an academic position. Your odds of getting the job at this point are also much higher as departments typically interview three to eight people for each position. Take a day or two to celebrate, and then you should really start to prepare for the interview. Before you go on any interview there are three important things that you need to do in advance to prepare.
Here’s a mystery with some history: President Harry Truman laid the cornerstone of the NIH Clinical Center on June 22, 1951. Someone removed it for construction reasons on June 14-17, 1977. Where is it now?
What is a rare disease? And how rare is “rare”? When I began my research at the NIH, I had a textbook understanding of rare diseases, but now, after four years as a postdoc in the IRP, I understand a bit more of what it means to the patients and researchers who try to help them.
Many scientists at the NIH used the metabolic chamber—a room constructed as a scientific instrument in which volunteers could live—to study how our bodies use air, food, and water under different conditions. Would you have volunteered for a study? Today's NIH Intramural investigators have even more advanced technologies to learn about energy expenditure's affects on obesity.
Most workplaces would never think of having hawks, turtles, beetles and stick bugs at an event for kids—but most workplaces are not the National Institutes of Health. Each year, the NIH Bethesda campus holds its Earth Day celebration in conjunction with Take Your Child to Work Day. Employees share their love of science with their kids while also learning about how to protect the environment.
