Introduction

Under the Department of Defense’s Research and Educational Program for Historically Black Colleges and Universities and Minority-Serving Institutions, the Army Research Office awarded a three-year grant to Cal State L.A. in January 2012 to focus on research and student training in the discovery of antibacterial compounds from natural product sources. Dr. Howard Xu, the principal investigator, and his lab members (including students) will collaborate with University of Michigan's Prof. David H. Sherman, former director of Center for Chemical Genomics, and scientists there to explore diverse marine natural products resources in discovery of novel antibacterial compounds with activities preferentially for multidrug resistant Acinetobacter baumannii.

Additionally, this grant also awards DoD BioDefense Scholarships to highly qualified and motivated graduate and undergraduate students to engage in multidisciplinary antibiotic drug discovery research. These scholars will receive stipends, summer internships and support to travel to collaborators' site and/or scientific conferences. Furthermore, the grant provides funding to promote national defense relevant research, student training and collaborations at Cal State L.A., to update and modify curriculum and to enhance outreach activities.