This one-day course will be offered via Zoom only. Course schedule is 10:00am – 4:00pm, with a 1-hour lunch and (2) 10-minute breaks (one in the morning and one in the afternoon). Attendance is required as it will not be recorded.

This course will be a brief and thorough introduction to modern methods of time series analysis. Topics to be covered include elementary time series models, trend and seasonality, stationary processes, autoregressive/integrated/moving average (ARIMA) processes, fitting ARIMA models, forecasting, spectral analysis, the periodogram, spectral estimation techniques, multivariate time series. Additional topics may be covered if time permits. Some applications will be provided to illustrate the usefulness of the techniques

Prerequisites:
Course in probability and statistics and familiarity with matrix theory and linear algebra.

Course Goals:
This course will provide students with a theoretical foundation in the analysis of time series in the time domain including identification, estimation, and prediction in several well-established time series models.

By the end of the course, you will be able to:
• Analyze datasets to construct plausible time series models
• Estimate parameters of ARMA and ARIMA models
• Model and forecast with ARMA, ARIMA and SARIMA processes
• Analyze multivariate time series models

Register

Workshop on Communicating Race and Ethnicity in Health Research

Intended for participants of all training levels, this workshop helps members of the biomedical research community develop skills about how thoughtfully to communicate the use of race and ethnicity in their work.

We will highlight examples of current communication of race and ethnicity in published research; cross-disciplinary "best practices"; common poor practices (i.e., ambiguous or harmful language); and how participants can improve their own writing and communication around race and ethnicity.

Our four-hour interactive workshop will include brief lectures paired with small-group activities in which participants will practice applying core concepts. We will also share a detailed resources packet that includes guidelines, readings, and other materials supporting thoughtful and clear communication of race and ethnicity in research.

Workshop Speakers

Rae Anne Martinez, MSPH
PhD candidate
Department of Epidemiology at UNC Chapel Hill
Nafeesa Andrabi, MA
PhD candidate
Department of Sociology at UNC Chapel Hill
Andi Goodwin, MA
PhD student
Department of Sociology at UNC Chapel Hill
Rachel Wilbur, PhD
Postdoctoral Fellow in Indigenous Community Well-Being
Harvard University

Register

This workshop is brought to you by the NC TraCS Comparative Effectiveness Research (CER) Program and the UNC Pharmacoepidemiology Program at the UNC Gillings School of Global Public Health.

Adoption, Implementation and Sustainment of Family-focused Prevention in Health Care Systems: How Do We Get There?

This NIH Collaboratory Rethinking Clinical Trials Grand Rounds features:

Margaret Kuklinski, PhD
Endowed Associate Professor of Prevention in Social Work
Director, Social Development Research Group
Acting Director, Center for Communities That Care
School of Social Work, University of Washington

Stacy Sterling, DrPH, MSW
Kaiser Permanente Division of Research
Co-Director, Center for Addiction and Mental Health Research
Associate Adjunct Professor, UCSF Department of Psychiatry and Behavioral Sciences
Associate Professor, Department of Health Systems Science, Kaiser Permanente Bernard J. Tyson School of Medicine

Learn More

This course will take place over three mornings (3/6/23, 3/8/23, 3/10/23), 2.5 hours per morning, and will be offered via Zoom. Attendance is required as the course will not be recorded.

This course introduces participants to constructivist grounded theory (CGT). Grounded theory (GT) methods consist of flexible guidelines to fit particular research problems, not to apply mechanically. With these guidelines, you expedite and systematize data collection and analysis. GT methods can assist researchers in making their work more analytic, precise, and compelling.

In this course, following an exploration of the history and development of GT, we examine GT basic guidelines and major strategies, including initial line-by-line and focused coding, the use of gerunds, memoing, diagramming, theoretical sampling, and categorising. Throughout the sessions, there is an emphasis on CGT's epistemological foundation and resultant adaptations to the research process, including regarding the literature review, researcher positionality/ies and reflexivity, and participant involvement.

The course will include a number of hands-on exercises to exemplify, and give participants an opportunity to practice, the strategies being discussed. For the coding exercise, you may bring and use some of your own qualitative data, or if you do not have data yet, some will be supplied. Clear guidelines and support are provided to course participants with regard to all aspects of CGT.

The sessions will utilise CGT readings and resources from Kathy Charmaz, Robert Thornberg, Adele Clarke, and myself, and will draw on the extensive scholarship of Barney Glaser and Anselm Strauss. A pack of materials will be shared with participants in advance of the course. This course will be of interest to those doing full CGT studies but also to those who may be interested in learning about and potentially using some of the powerful GT strategies (such as coding) in studies with a different overall methodological approach.

Register

Integrating memos and codes in qualitative analysis (online)

This 2.5 hour course will be offered via Zoom. Attendance is required as the course will not be recorded.

Course Summary:

This course focuses on what it means to develop codes and how to integrate memo writing into the larger process of coding and analysis. Coding and memo writing function as simultaneous and fluid tasks that occur during actively reviewing interviews, focus groups, and multi-media data. We will discuss the tension between deductive and inductive codes and how codes can emerge and shift unexpectedly during analysis. We will also cover how to identify code connections, possible hierarchies, and higher-level themes.

Instructor: Paul Mihas, MA

Paul Mihas is the Assistant Director of Qualitative Research at the Odum Institute for Research in Social Science at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. He is the former managing editor of Social Forces, a journal of sociology published at the University of North Carolina Press. He has partnered with ResearchTalk Inc. since 2001 as a senior qualitative analysis consultant and has lectured on qualitative methods, software, and strategies for analysis at several universities, including the University of Puerto Rico and Howard University. Since 2013, he has taught at the Global School in Empirical Research Methods at the University of St. Gallen, Switzerland. He has also served as faculty at the annual Qualitative Research Summer Intensive and as a mentor at ResearchTalk’s Qualitative Data Analysis Camps. Mihas is a co-author with Ray Maietta on Sort and Sift, Think and Shift (forthcoming, Routledge). His interests include mixed methods and incorporating memo writing in analysis; his current research focuses on cancer survivors and identities of survivorship.

Register

This course will be offered over two afternoons (3/7 and 3/9) from 12pm – 4pm via Zoom only. Attendance is required as the course will not be recorded.

Cognitive interviewing in survey research is a methodology researchers use to gain a better understanding of how respondents think when answering specific survey items. Data gathered using the cognitive interview approach help researchers identify and remedy issues with their questionnaires. This short course is designed to provide participants with fundamentals on how to design, conduct, and analyze cognitive interviews. Participants will have the opportunity to practice specific cognitive interviewing techniques, including think-alouds, probing, and observation. Participants will also learn about revising survey questions based on interpreting cognitive interview results.

By the end of the course, participants will be able to:
- Recognize components of the survey response process
- Describe elements of the cognitive interview process and techniques
- Understand how to use cognitive interviews across various survey modes
- Complete recruitment and facilitate cognitive interview logistics
- Design and implement a cognitive interview protocol
- Identify ways to improve survey questionnaires and items based on cognitive interview data

Register

In this session, participants will have the opportunity to ask questions and seek feedback on their qualitative analysis from facilitators and other attendees. This session serves as a workshop in which participants get a chance to discuss and review qualitative analysis techniques while also learning from others.

To attend, participants must be working on a qualitative data analysis project and can seek feedback on any step in the process (e.g., coding, creating matrices/diagrams/other products, developing categories or themes, summarizing data). One does not need to have attended previous qualitative analysis training sessions administered by NC TraCS. However, participants should come with some knowledge of qualitative data analysis techniques.

Please note: We will not be presenting information about qualitative analysis in this session; instead, we will ask participants to share where they are in their analysis process, ask questions about their analyses, and collectively discuss strategies for moving our analyses forward.

Facilitators:
MaryBeth Grewe, MPH, Engagement and Qualitative Research Specialist
Simone Frank, MPH, Community Engagement and Outreach Specialist
Milenka Jean-Baptiste, MPH, Qualitative Research Specialist
Courtney Canter, MA, Qualitative Research Specialist

Eligibility Screener

This course will take place over three mornings (3/6/23, 3/8/23, 3/10/23), 2.5 hours per morning, and will be offered via Zoom. Attendance is required as the course will not be recorded.

This course introduces participants to constructivist grounded theory (CGT). Grounded theory (GT) methods consist of flexible guidelines to fit particular research problems, not to apply mechanically. With these guidelines, you expedite and systematize data collection and analysis. GT methods can assist researchers in making their work more analytic, precise, and compelling.

In this course, following an exploration of the history and development of GT, we examine GT basic guidelines and major strategies, including initial line-by-line and focused coding, the use of gerunds, memoing, diagramming, theoretical sampling, and categorising. Throughout the sessions, there is an emphasis on CGT's epistemological foundation and resultant adaptations to the research process, including regarding the literature review, researcher positionality/ies and reflexivity, and participant involvement.

The course will include a number of hands-on exercises to exemplify, and give participants an opportunity to practice, the strategies being discussed. For the coding exercise, you may bring and use some of your own qualitative data, or if you do not have data yet, some will be supplied. Clear guidelines and support are provided to course participants with regard to all aspects of CGT.

The sessions will utilise CGT readings and resources from Kathy Charmaz, Robert Thornberg, Adele Clarke, and myself, and will draw on the extensive scholarship of Barney Glaser and Anselm Strauss. A pack of materials will be shared with participants in advance of the course. This course will be of interest to those doing full CGT studies but also to those who may be interested in learning about and potentially using some of the powerful GT strategies (such as coding) in studies with a different overall methodological approach.

Register

The NIH is hosting a series of listening sessions to hear from the community about their experiences with and perspectives on current infrastructure and share input on potential promising solutions to the fundamental challenges faced by the postdoctoral trainee community.

Listening sessions will take place throughout March 2023, and each session will focus on a specific theme:

Register

The NIH also announced a Request for Information (RFI) inviting the research community to give input on the state of postdoctoral research training and career progression infrastructure in biomedical science. The RFI is open through April 14, 2023.

The insights from the listening sessions and RFI will assist NIH in hearing the voices of postdoctoral trainees along with others impacted by this unique and skilled training position, and in exploring ways to address some of the fundamental challenges faced by the postdoctoral trainee community.

This course will be offered over two afternoons (3/7 and 3/9) from 12pm – 4pm via Zoom only. Attendance is required as the course will not be recorded.

Cognitive interviewing in survey research is a methodology researchers use to gain a better understanding of how respondents think when answering specific survey items. Data gathered using the cognitive interview approach help researchers identify and remedy issues with their questionnaires. This short course is designed to provide participants with fundamentals on how to design, conduct, and analyze cognitive interviews. Participants will have the opportunity to practice specific cognitive interviewing techniques, including think-alouds, probing, and observation. Participants will also learn about revising survey questions based on interpreting cognitive interview results.

By the end of the course, participants will be able to:
- Recognize components of the survey response process
- Describe elements of the cognitive interview process and techniques
- Understand how to use cognitive interviews across various survey modes
- Complete recruitment and facilitate cognitive interview logistics
- Design and implement a cognitive interview protocol
- Identify ways to improve survey questionnaires and items based on cognitive interview data

Register

This course will take place over three mornings (3/6/23, 3/8/23, 3/10/23), 2.5 hours per morning, and will be offered via Zoom. Attendance is required as the course will not be recorded.

This course introduces participants to constructivist grounded theory (CGT). Grounded theory (GT) methods consist of flexible guidelines to fit particular research problems, not to apply mechanically. With these guidelines, you expedite and systematize data collection and analysis. GT methods can assist researchers in making their work more analytic, precise, and compelling.

In this course, following an exploration of the history and development of GT, we examine GT basic guidelines and major strategies, including initial line-by-line and focused coding, the use of gerunds, memoing, diagramming, theoretical sampling, and categorising. Throughout the sessions, there is an emphasis on CGT's epistemological foundation and resultant adaptations to the research process, including regarding the literature review, researcher positionality/ies and reflexivity, and participant involvement.

The course will include a number of hands-on exercises to exemplify, and give participants an opportunity to practice, the strategies being discussed. For the coding exercise, you may bring and use some of your own qualitative data, or if you do not have data yet, some will be supplied. Clear guidelines and support are provided to course participants with regard to all aspects of CGT.

The sessions will utilise CGT readings and resources from Kathy Charmaz, Robert Thornberg, Adele Clarke, and myself, and will draw on the extensive scholarship of Barney Glaser and Anselm Strauss. A pack of materials will be shared with participants in advance of the course. This course will be of interest to those doing full CGT studies but also to those who may be interested in learning about and potentially using some of the powerful GT strategies (such as coding) in studies with a different overall methodological approach.

Register

Estimands in Cluster-Randomized Trials: Choosing Analyses that Answer the Right Question

This NIH Collaboratory Rethinking Clinical Trials Grand Rounds features:

Brennan Kahan, PhD
MRC Clinical Trials Unit
University College London (UCL)

Learn More

The NIH is hosting a series of listening sessions to hear from the community about their experiences with and perspectives on current infrastructure and share input on potential promising solutions to the fundamental challenges faced by the postdoctoral trainee community.

Listening sessions will take place throughout March 2023, and each session will focus on a specific theme:

Register

The NIH also announced a Request for Information (RFI) inviting the research community to give input on the state of postdoctoral research training and career progression infrastructure in biomedical science. The RFI is open through April 14, 2023.

The insights from the listening sessions and RFI will assist NIH in hearing the voices of postdoctoral trainees along with others impacted by this unique and skilled training position, and in exploring ways to address some of the fundamental challenges faced by the postdoctoral trainee community.

Data Matters: Spring Ahead 2023

Data Matters™ is a week-long series of one and two-day courses aimed at students and professionals in business, research, and government. The short course series is sponsored by the Odum Institute for Research in Social Science at UNC-Chapel Hill, the National Consortium for Data Science, and RENCI.

Our first-ever springtime series, Data Matters: Spring Ahead, will feature a selection of our most popular two-day courses. The traditional Data Matters series will return in August 2023.

Held virtually via Zoom, Data Matters gives students the chance to learn about a wide range of topics in data science, analytics, visualization, curation, and more from expert instructors.

Courses

Introduction to Effective Information Visualization
Basics of R for Data Science and Statistics
Introduction to Programming in R
Introduction to Programming Using Python

View course descriptions

View the course schedule

Register

The Finding Funding module of the TraCS Professional Development Seminar Series focuses on what you need to know before applying for funding for biomedical research.

Seminars in the Finding Funding module (March 13-31, 2023) are presented in-person on Mondays from 12 - 2 p.m. ET in room 219 of the Brinkhous-Bullitt building (in the NC TraCS Institute suite on the 2nd floor), and repeated via Zoom on Fridays from 12 - 2 p.m ET.

In-person | Brinkhous-Bullitt, room 219
Monday, March 13: Vocabulary, different types of sponsored research, NIH 101 and the anatomy of an RFA
Monday, March 20: Grant scoring, peer review process, pilot studies
Monday, March 27: Tools to find funding, working with different types of sponsors

Virtual | Zoom
Friday, March 17: Vocabulary, different types of sponsored research, NIH 101 and the anatomy of an RFA
Friday, March 24: Grant scoring, peer review process, pilot studies
Friday, March 31: Tools to find funding, working with different types of sponsors

Join for the topics that interest you and on the days that work for you. Once registered for this module you will receive a separate invite to the Canvas site for this module of the seminar series.

Register

Data Matters: Spring Ahead 2023

Data Matters™ is a week-long series of one and two-day courses aimed at students and professionals in business, research, and government. The short course series is sponsored by the Odum Institute for Research in Social Science at UNC-Chapel Hill, the National Consortium for Data Science, and RENCI.

Our first-ever springtime series, Data Matters: Spring Ahead, will feature a selection of our most popular two-day courses. The traditional Data Matters series will return in August 2023.

Held virtually via Zoom, Data Matters gives students the chance to learn about a wide range of topics in data science, analytics, visualization, curation, and more from expert instructors.

Courses

Introduction to Effective Information Visualization
Basics of R for Data Science and Statistics
Introduction to Programming in R
Introduction to Programming Using Python

View course descriptions

View the course schedule

Register

Data Matters: Spring Ahead 2023

Data Matters™ is a week-long series of one and two-day courses aimed at students and professionals in business, research, and government. The short course series is sponsored by the Odum Institute for Research in Social Science at UNC-Chapel Hill, the National Consortium for Data Science, and RENCI.

Our first-ever springtime series, Data Matters: Spring Ahead, will feature a selection of our most popular two-day courses. The traditional Data Matters series will return in August 2023.

Held virtually via Zoom, Data Matters gives students the chance to learn about a wide range of topics in data science, analytics, visualization, curation, and more from expert instructors.

Courses

Introduction to Effective Information Visualization
Basics of R for Data Science and Statistics
Introduction to Programming in R
Introduction to Programming Using Python

View course descriptions

View the course schedule

Register

Joint NC BERD Seminar: Meta-analysis: Overview and Comparison with Integrative Data Analysis

This session provides an overview of meta-analysis, a method to integrate information from multiple studies such as those extracted from systematic review, and discusses the pros and cons of meta-analysis and integrative data analysis.

This event is hosted by Wake Forest and being cross-promoted by the NC BERD Consortium, a collaboration of the CTSA-funded BERD cores at UNC-Chapel Hill, Wake Forest University School of Medicine, and Duke University School of Medicine.

Presenter: Edward Ip, PhD

Data Matters: Spring Ahead 2023

Data Matters™ is a week-long series of one and two-day courses aimed at students and professionals in business, research, and government. The short course series is sponsored by the Odum Institute for Research in Social Science at UNC-Chapel Hill, the National Consortium for Data Science, and RENCI.

Our first-ever springtime series, Data Matters: Spring Ahead, will feature a selection of our most popular two-day courses. The traditional Data Matters series will return in August 2023.

Held virtually via Zoom, Data Matters gives students the chance to learn about a wide range of topics in data science, analytics, visualization, curation, and more from expert instructors.

Courses

Introduction to Effective Information Visualization
Basics of R for Data Science and Statistics
Introduction to Programming in R
Introduction to Programming Using Python

View course descriptions

View the course schedule

Register

COVID-19: What's Next?

Please join the UNC Network of Research Professionals and Myron Cohen, MD, Director, Institute for Global Health and Infectious Diseases, for a discussion of the progress we have made since 2020 regarding the COVID-19 pandemic, and the work we still have left to do.

- Provide latest updates and strategies to protect yourself and your communities

- Describe approved, and next stage investigational treatments and trials

- Current and future impact of COVID-19 on the research agenda

Register

NC BERD Consortium: Rethinking Race-Ethnicity: Introducing Novel Survey-Based Measures of Lifetime Experience of Discrimination and Stress

Though race-ethnicity is not a biological variable, race-ethnicity is included in nearly every medical study and often very statistically & meaningfully significant. New measures are critically needed that will allow biomedical researchers to disentangle race-ethnicity from the true individual, interpersonal, and structural causes of health disparities. In this talk, we introduce novel measures using simple survey items to capture self-reported experience of discrimination and stress spanning the life course, agnostic to source. Early results from an employee survey will presented.

Speaker:
Felicity Enders, PhD, MPH
Professor of Biostatistics
Consultant, Department of Quantitative Health Sciences
Mayo Clinic College of Medicine & Science

This event is sponsored by the North Carolina BERD Consortium (Duke University School of Medicine, University of North Carolina-Chapel Hill, and Wake Forest School of Medicine) and the Wake Forest Department of Biostatistics & Data Science.

Data Matters: Spring Ahead 2023

Data Matters™ is a week-long series of one and two-day courses aimed at students and professionals in business, research, and government. The short course series is sponsored by the Odum Institute for Research in Social Science at UNC-Chapel Hill, the National Consortium for Data Science, and RENCI.

Our first-ever springtime series, Data Matters: Spring Ahead, will feature a selection of our most popular two-day courses. The traditional Data Matters series will return in August 2023.

Held virtually via Zoom, Data Matters gives students the chance to learn about a wide range of topics in data science, analytics, visualization, curation, and more from expert instructors.

Courses

Introduction to Effective Information Visualization
Basics of R for Data Science and Statistics
Introduction to Programming in R
Introduction to Programming Using Python

View course descriptions

View the course schedule

Register

The Finding Funding module of the TraCS Professional Development Seminar Series focuses on what you need to know before applying for funding for biomedical research.

Seminars in the Finding Funding module (March 13-31, 2023) are presented in-person on Mondays from 12 - 2 p.m. ET in room 219 of the Brinkhous-Bullitt building (in the NC TraCS Institute suite on the 2nd floor), and repeated via Zoom on Fridays from 12 - 2 p.m ET.

In-person | Brinkhous-Bullitt, room 219
Monday, March 13: Vocabulary, different types of sponsored research, NIH 101 and the anatomy of an RFA
Monday, March 20: Grant scoring, peer review process, pilot studies
Monday, March 27: Tools to find funding, working with different types of sponsors

Virtual | Zoom
Friday, March 17: Vocabulary, different types of sponsored research, NIH 101 and the anatomy of an RFA
Friday, March 24: Grant scoring, peer review process, pilot studies
Friday, March 31: Tools to find funding, working with different types of sponsors

Join for the topics that interest you and on the days that work for you. Once registered for this module you will receive a separate invite to the Canvas site for this module of the seminar series.

Register

NC BERD Consortium: Hidden Curriculum: Expanding our toolbox to help diverse and majority trainees and junior faculty

Hidden curriculum encompasses the norms, values, and behaviors within a learning environment. These are typically not taught yet are critical for success. Navigating the hidden curriculum is crucial for all trainees and junior faculty, and it's especially important for those from underrepresented backgrounds. In this talk, we will explore hidden curriculum topics and their perceived level of importance for majority and diverse trainees and their mentors.

Speaker:
Felicity Enders, PhD, MPH
Professor of Biostatistics
Consultant, Department of Quantitative Health Sciences
Mayo Clinic College of Medicine & Science

This event is sponsored by the North Carolina BERD Consortium (Duke University School of Medicine, University of North Carolina-Chapel Hill, and Wake Forest School of Medicine),the Duke Department of Biostatistics & Bioinformatics, and the Duke Department of Population Health Sciences.

The NIH is hosting a series of listening sessions to hear from the community about their experiences with and perspectives on current infrastructure and share input on potential promising solutions to the fundamental challenges faced by the postdoctoral trainee community.

Listening sessions will take place throughout March 2023, and each session will focus on a specific theme:

Register

The NIH also announced a Request for Information (RFI) inviting the research community to give input on the state of postdoctoral research training and career progression infrastructure in biomedical science. The RFI is open through April 14, 2023.

The insights from the listening sessions and RFI will assist NIH in hearing the voices of postdoctoral trainees along with others impacted by this unique and skilled training position, and in exploring ways to address some of the fundamental challenges faced by the postdoctoral trainee community.

Patient-Reported Outcomes for Symptom and Adverse Event Monitoring in Oncology

This NIH Collaboratory Rethinking Clinical Trials Grand Rounds features:

Ethan Basch, MD, MSc
Professor and Chief of Oncology
UNC School of Medicine

Learn More

Introduction to Career Development and NIH K Awards for Biomedical Researchers

Join the NC TraCS Institute for an introduction to mentored career development funding opportunities from the NIH and foundations. The information presented will include examples of different types of awards, the structure of the application, assessing readiness to apply, strategies for grant preparation, and additional resources.

You can participate in this session in-person in room 219 of the Brinkhous-Bullitt building (in the NC TraCS Institute suite on the 2nd floor) or via Zoom. This introduction is offered twice to accommodate different schedules. The information is the same in both sessions.

Presenter
Susan Pusek, DRSc
Director, Education Programs
NC TraCS Institute

Register

Introduction to NIH R Awards for Biomedical Researchers

Join the NC TraCS Institute for an introduction to NIH R grant mechanisms. The information presented in this session will include examples of different types of R awards, the structure of the application, assessing readiness to apply, grant preparation strategies, and additional resources.

You can participate in this session in-person in room 219 of the Brinkhous-Bullitt building (in the NC TraCS Institute suite on the 2nd floor) or via Zoom. This introduction is offered twice to accommodate different schedules. The information is the same in both sessions.

Presenter

David Carroll, PhD
Director, Research Funding Development
NC TraCS Institute

Register

The Finding Funding module of the TraCS Professional Development Seminar Series focuses on what you need to know before applying for funding for biomedical research.

Seminars in the Finding Funding module (March 13-31, 2023) are presented in-person on Mondays from 12 - 2 p.m. ET in room 219 of the Brinkhous-Bullitt building (in the NC TraCS Institute suite on the 2nd floor), and repeated via Zoom on Fridays from 12 - 2 p.m ET.

In-person | Brinkhous-Bullitt, room 219
Monday, March 13: Vocabulary, different types of sponsored research, NIH 101 and the anatomy of an RFA
Monday, March 20: Grant scoring, peer review process, pilot studies
Monday, March 27: Tools to find funding, working with different types of sponsors

Virtual | Zoom
Friday, March 17: Vocabulary, different types of sponsored research, NIH 101 and the anatomy of an RFA
Friday, March 24: Grant scoring, peer review process, pilot studies
Friday, March 31: Tools to find funding, working with different types of sponsors

Join for the topics that interest you and on the days that work for you. Once registered for this module you will receive a separate invite to the Canvas site for this module of the seminar series.

Register

The NIH is hosting a series of listening sessions to hear from the community about their experiences with and perspectives on current infrastructure and share input on potential promising solutions to the fundamental challenges faced by the postdoctoral trainee community.

Listening sessions will take place throughout March 2023, and each session will focus on a specific theme:

Register

The NIH also announced a Request for Information (RFI) inviting the research community to give input on the state of postdoctoral research training and career progression infrastructure in biomedical science. The RFI is open through April 14, 2023.

The insights from the listening sessions and RFI will assist NIH in hearing the voices of postdoctoral trainees along with others impacted by this unique and skilled training position, and in exploring ways to address some of the fundamental challenges faced by the postdoctoral trainee community.

Introduction to NIH R Awards for Biomedical Researchers

Join the NC TraCS Institute for an introduction to NIH R grant mechanisms. The information presented in this session will include examples of different types of R awards, the structure of the application, assessing readiness to apply, grant preparation strategies, and additional resources.

You can participate in this session in-person in room 219 of the Brinkhous-Bullitt building (in the NC TraCS Institute suite on the 2nd floor) or via Zoom. This introduction is offered twice to accommodate different schedules. The information is the same in both sessions.

Presenter

David Carroll, PhD
Director, Research Funding Development
NC TraCS Institute

Register

This course will be offered via Zoom, over two mornings. Attendance is required as the course will not be recorded.

Course Summary:

In this course, participants will learn how to keep track of the code they use in their research using the version control system Git and the collaboration platform GitHub. Git allows you to keep track of changes to your code, easily revert to previous versions, and “tag” versions of code used in publications so that the exact code used can be retrieved at a later date. GitHub allows Git users to collaborate with each other on projects by managing simultaneous changes to the same files and allowing users to review and discuss each others’ code. Git and Github are applicable to any text-based programming or analysis language, including R, Python, Stata, Julia, and others.

Register

Introduction to Career Development and NIH K Awards for Biomedical Researchers

Join the NC TraCS Institute for an introduction to mentored career development funding opportunities from the NIH and foundations. The information presented will include examples of different types of awards, the structure of the application, assessing readiness to apply, strategies for grant preparation, and additional resources.

You can participate in this session in-person in room 219 of the Brinkhous-Bullitt building (in the NC TraCS Institute suite on the 2nd floor) or via Zoom. This introduction is offered twice to accommodate different schedules. The information is the same in both sessions.

Presenter
Susan Pusek, DRSc
Director, Education Programs
NC TraCS Institute

Register

Housing insecurity is a prevalent public health concern associated with a multitude of adverse health outcomes. Join Aarti Bhat, MS, a PhD candidate in the Demography Dual Degree Program within the Penn State College of Human Development & Family Studies, for a discussion on health implications of housing insecurity across the lifespan.

Midlife and older adults in the U.S. are increasingly entering these phases of life cost-burdened. Bhat's unique research addresses the physical and biological health implications of a range of housing insecurity experiences for these populations. Her work also has implications for policy measures to reduce disparities in housing issues for vulnerable populations-resulting in improved public health.

The CTSA Visiting Trainee Program brings clinical and translational trainees from across the CTSA Consortium to NC TraCS Institute for research seminars and virtual campus visits.

Register

Engagement in Research 101: Introduction to Engaging Patient & Community Partners in Research

Are you interested in learning about patient and community engagement and how it can benefit your research? Excited by the idea of engaging patient, community, or other partners in your research, but unsure about where to start? Want to know more about how to engage partners at different points throughout your study?

Engaging with patient and community partners who are impacted by your research can be instrumental to the success of your study. This online training will provide an overview of engagement in research, highlighting that engagement is not "all or nothing" or "one-size-fits-all", but instead encompasses a wide variety of low touch to high touch approaches that could be right for your study.

The session will cover common myths/misconceptions about engagement in research, benefits of and key considerations for engaging patient and community partners in research, and initial steps/existing resources you can leverage to begin engaging partners in your research.

Register

The Engaging Patient, Community, and Other Partners in Your Research: Online Training Series is a 3-part online training series about engaging patient, community, and other partners in research. You may register for the entire series OR any single training session.

Part 1 will focus on the basics of research engagement, providing an overview of patient and community engagement and its benefits, debunking common myths and misconceptions, and providing considerations and next steps for incorporating engagement approaches into your research.

Part 2 will cover specific engagement methods, including consultative community feedback sessions, advisory boards, and working with patient and community partners as members of a research team.

Part 3 will focus on the nuances of building and maintaining partnerships, outlining best practices for developing and strengthening mutually beneficial partnerships and discussing common partnership challenges and solutions.

This training series was developed collaboratively with patient, community, and researcher partners and is co-sponsored by the UNC Lineberger Comprehensive Cancer Center and NC TraCS Institute.

Current Research in Traumatic Brain Injury

Please join the Department of Health Sciences Interprofessional Education & Practice and Office of Research & Scholarship for a research forum featuring current research in traumatic brain injury.

The hybrid forum will take place in person (MacNider 321, LUNCH provided) and via Zoom. Please register to attend.

Presenters:

Karen McCulloch, PT, PhD, MS, FAPTA, FACRM
Division of Physical Therapy
Department of Health Sciences
American Congress of Rehabilitation Medicine Updated Mild Traumatic Brain Injury (mTBI) Definition: An Interdisciplinary Delphi Process to Improve mTBI Diagnosis

Lindsey Byom, PhD, CCC-SLP
Division of Speech & Hearing Sciences
Department of Health Sciences
A Roadmap to Person-Centered Cognitive-Communication Rehabilitation after TBI

Questions? Contact the Department of Health Sciences Office of Research & Scholarship at This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it..

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Visual imagery has an expanding role in social science research methods. Traditionally, visual data in social sciences has related to light capture, lens-based cameras with the researcher consciously or unconsciously framing the recorded image. These images were assumed to be true. More recently, social scientists, using participatory method to put cameras in the hands of their research participants to escape the researcher’s bracketing subjectivity. Recently, visual inquiry has expanded beyond the camera and embraced multiple forms of visual making that include image creation and manipulation. With these changes, there is a greater recognition that an image is not a passive record of an external reality. Instead, the researcher and research participants actively make images in the process of inquiry. Furthermore, new materialisms theory expands a conception of a research participant. The materials that comprise a visual image have their own agency and directly affect how an audience interprets the image. The materiality of an image can render meaning that is different from the creator’s intention.

Keeping in mind the needs of a researcher who has little or no formal training in the visual art, but who is nevertheless interested in applying the visual imagery that today’s ubiquitous digital technology readily affords, this course will offer criteria for the use of visual methods in qualitative inquiry that will help researchers sharpen their analytical skills. Analyzing images requires an understanding of tacit knowledge: sensory, pre-linguistic embodied empirical evidence.

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Gordon H. DeFriese Distinguished Lecture on Health Services Research and Health Policy: Turning Digital Fumes into a Breath of Fresh Air

The Sheps Center is excited to once again host the Gordon H. DeFriese Distinguished Lecture on Health Services Research and Health Policy, which has been a pinnacle event for the Center over the years. This lecture is a wonderful opportunity to hear from leading health services researchers and connect with colleagues across campus. This free event is open to all faculty, staff, students, and the public.

The hybrid lecture will take place in person in the Reeves Auditorium at the NC Botanical Garden AND via Zoom. The presentation will also be recorded for those who cannot attend live.

Speaker: Julia Adler-Milstein, PhD

Julia Adler-Milstein, PhD, is a Professor of Medicine and Director of the Center for Clinical Informatics and Improvement Research (CLIIR). Adler-Milstein is a leading researcher in health IT policy, with a specific focus on electronic health records and interoperability. She has examined policies and organizational strategies that enable effective use of electronic health records and promote interoperability. She is also an expert in EHR audit log data and its application to studying clinician behavior. Her research – used by researchers, health systems, and policymakers – identifies obstacles to progress and ways to overcome them.

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Join the UNC Program for Precision Medicine in Health Care (PPMH) for Precision Nutrition: Connections Between Food, Environment, & Health, a free virtual mini-symposium.

Precision nutrition is an emerging personalized approach to nutrition that takes into account an individual's unique dietary needs, lifestyle factors, and genetic makeup. This approach recognizes the intricate relationship between diet, environment, and health, acknowledging that what we eat and how we live can significantly impact our wellbeing.

Presentations

Blending Precision Nutrition and Precision Public Health Approaches: "Neighborhood-omics"
Alice Ammerman, DrPH
Mildred Kaufman Distinguished Professor, Department of Nutrition, School of Public Health
Director, Center for Health Promotion & Disease Prevention, School of Medicine

Metabolic Individuality and Nutrition for Precision Health
Susan Sumner, PhD
Professor, Department of Nutrition, School of Public Health

How to Use Precision Nutrition in Current Clinical Practice
Martin Kohlmeier, MD, PhD
Professor, Department of Nutrition, School of Public Health

For more information, visit www.med.unc.edu.

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Contact This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it. with any questions.

This course will be offered via Zoom, over two mornings. Attendance is required as the course will not be recorded.

Course Summary:

In this course, participants will learn how to keep track of the code they use in their research using the version control system Git and the collaboration platform GitHub. Git allows you to keep track of changes to your code, easily revert to previous versions, and “tag” versions of code used in publications so that the exact code used can be retrieved at a later date. GitHub allows Git users to collaborate with each other on projects by managing simultaneous changes to the same files and allowing users to review and discuss each others’ code. Git and Github are applicable to any text-based programming or analysis language, including R, Python, Stata, Julia, and others.

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The theme of the next Carolina Data Science Now seminar is Libraries, Literature, and Learning.

The event will feature three lightning talks by professors and researchers in UNC-Chapel Hill’s academic community, entered around how data science is used to enhance research methodology and techniques in projects involving bibliographic data, literary texts, and virtual makerspaces. The event will be moderated by Matt Jansen, and speakers include Michelle Cawley, Grant Glass, and Maggie Melo. These talks will be followed by a guided panel, an opportunity for questions and answers with the speakers, and a discussion with the data science community at UNC-Chapel Hill.

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More than 95 million infections each year are caused by non-typhoidal Salmonella spread through contaminated food and water. Despite the prevalence of these infections, there are no FDA-approved vaccines to combat non-typhoidal Salmonella infections in humans.

Join Lisa Emerson, MSPH, a PhD student in the Department of Microbiology and Cell Science at the University of Florida, for a discussion on a promising vaccine strategy that takes advantage of antigen-containing extracellular vesicles produced by Salmonella-infected immune cells. Preliminary studies suggest that these vesicles could be used to boost immunity against Salmonella infection.

The CTSA Visiting Trainee Program brings clinical and translational trainees from across the CTSA Consortium to NC TraCS Institute for research seminars and virtual campus visits.

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The Finding Funding module of the TraCS Professional Development Seminar Series focuses on what you need to know before applying for funding for biomedical research.

Seminars in the Finding Funding module (March 13-31, 2023) are presented in-person on Mondays from 12 - 2 p.m. ET in room 219 of the Brinkhous-Bullitt building (in the NC TraCS Institute suite on the 2nd floor), and repeated via Zoom on Fridays from 12 - 2 p.m ET.

In-person | Brinkhous-Bullitt, room 219
Monday, March 13: Vocabulary, different types of sponsored research, NIH 101 and the anatomy of an RFA
Monday, March 20: Grant scoring, peer review process, pilot studies
Monday, March 27: Tools to find funding, working with different types of sponsors

Virtual | Zoom
Friday, March 17: Vocabulary, different types of sponsored research, NIH 101 and the anatomy of an RFA
Friday, March 24: Grant scoring, peer review process, pilot studies
Friday, March 31: Tools to find funding, working with different types of sponsors

Join for the topics that interest you and on the days that work for you. Once registered for this module you will receive a separate invite to the Canvas site for this module of the seminar series.

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From Observational Studies to Pragmatic Clinical Trials: (Almost) A Decade of Research in PCORnet®

This NIH Collaboratory Rethinking Clinical Trials Grand Rounds features:

Erin Holve, PhD, MPH, MPP
Chief Research Infrastructure Officer
Patient-Centered Outcomes Research Institute (PCORI)

Russell Rothman, MD, MPP
Director, Institute for Medicine and Public Health
Senior Vice President, Population and Public Health
Vanderbilt University Medical Center

Schuyler Jones, MD
Associate Professor
Duke Clinical Research Institute and Population Health Sciences
Duke University School of Medicine

Neha Pagidipati, MD, MPH
Associate Professor
Duke Clinical Research Institute
Duke University School of Medicine

Learn More

The Finding Funding module of the TraCS Professional Development Seminar Series focuses on what you need to know before applying for funding for biomedical research.

Seminars in the Finding Funding module (March 13-31, 2023) are presented in-person on Mondays from 12 - 2 p.m. ET in room 219 of the Brinkhous-Bullitt building (in the NC TraCS Institute suite on the 2nd floor), and repeated via Zoom on Fridays from 12 - 2 p.m ET.

In-person | Brinkhous-Bullitt, room 219
Monday, March 13: Vocabulary, different types of sponsored research, NIH 101 and the anatomy of an RFA
Monday, March 20: Grant scoring, peer review process, pilot studies
Monday, March 27: Tools to find funding, working with different types of sponsors

Virtual | Zoom
Friday, March 17: Vocabulary, different types of sponsored research, NIH 101 and the anatomy of an RFA
Friday, March 24: Grant scoring, peer review process, pilot studies
Friday, March 31: Tools to find funding, working with different types of sponsors

Join for the topics that interest you and on the days that work for you. Once registered for this module you will receive a separate invite to the Canvas site for this module of the seminar series.

Register

Engagement in Research Nuts & Bolts: Specific Approaches for Engaging Patient & Community Partners in Research

There is no "one-size-fits-all" approach to engaging patient, community, or other partners in your research. Rather, there are a variety of engagement methods to suit your study's needs, your research team's capacity, and your partners' interests.

This online training will describe three common approaches for working with patient, community, and other partners in your research: 1) consultative community feedback sessions; 2) advisory boards; and 3) sustained collaboration with partners as members of the research team.

The session will cover considerations for choosing these specific engagement methods, as well as concrete processes and steps for implementing each approach. Participation in our Engagement in Research 101 training is not required to attend this session; however, some knowledge of engagement, whether from prior training(s) or personal experience, may foster deeper understanding of the material in this session.

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The Engaging Patient, Community, and Other Partners in Your Research: Online Training Series is a 3-part online training series about engaging patient, community, and other partners in research. You may register for the entire series OR any single training session.

Part 1will focus on the basics of research engagement, providing an overview of patient and community engagement and its benefits, debunking common myths and misconceptions, and providing considerations and next steps for incorporating engagement approaches into your research.

Part 2 will cover specific engagement methods, including consultative community feedback sessions, advisory boards, and working with patient and community partners as members of a research team.

Part 3 will focus on the nuances of building and maintaining partnerships, outlining best practices for developing and strengthening mutually beneficial partnerships and discussing common partnership challenges and solutions.

This training series was developed collaboratively with patient, community, and researcher partners and is co-sponsored by the UNC Lineberger Comprehensive Cancer Center and NC TraCS Institute.

Do you want to standardize the data you collect so it can be easily shared with colleagues and other researchers? Have you been awarded a grant that requires the use of common data elements? Do you assist researchers with the data research management lifecycle? If any of these scenarios sound familiar, this course is for you!

Through live demonstrations and hands-on exercises, this course will introduce you to common data elements (CDEs) and the NIH Common Data Element Repository (CDE-R). The course begins with an in-depth introduction to what CDEs are and examples of how researchers are already using them. Then, you’ll see how to search the repository and practice searching on your own.

This is a Network of the National Library of Medicine (NNLM) class.

For more information about the event, please click here.

Register

The Finding Funding module of the TraCS Professional Development Seminar Series focuses on what you need to know before applying for funding for biomedical research.

Seminars in the Finding Funding module (March 13-31, 2023) are presented in-person on Mondays from 12 - 2 p.m. ET in room 219 of the Brinkhous-Bullitt building (in the NC TraCS Institute suite on the 2nd floor), and repeated via Zoom on Fridays from 12 - 2 p.m ET.

In-person | Brinkhous-Bullitt, room 219
Monday, March 13: Vocabulary, different types of sponsored research, NIH 101 and the anatomy of an RFA
Monday, March 20: Grant scoring, peer review process, pilot studies
Monday, March 27: Tools to find funding, working with different types of sponsors

Virtual | Zoom
Friday, March 17: Vocabulary, different types of sponsored research, NIH 101 and the anatomy of an RFA
Friday, March 24: Grant scoring, peer review process, pilot studies
Friday, March 31: Tools to find funding, working with different types of sponsors

Join for the topics that interest you and on the days that work for you. Once registered for this module you will receive a separate invite to the Canvas site for this module of the seminar series.

Register

Efficacy and Safety of a Quadruple Ultra-low-dose Treatment for Hypertension (QUARTET USA): Results From A Randomized Controlled Trial

This NIH Collaboratory Rethinking Clinical Trials Grand Rounds features:

Mark Huffman, MD, MPH
Professor of Medicine
Co-Director, Global Health Center
Washington University in St. Louis

Jody D. Ciolino, PhD
Associate Professor
Director, Master of Science in Biostatistics
Department of Preventive Medicine – Biostatistics
Biostatistics Collaboration Center (BCC) / Northwestern University Data Analysis and Coordinating Center (NUDACC)
Northwestern University Feinberg School of Medicine

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