CPLC summer school offers immersive learning in leading-edge biophysics research

Each summer for the past five years, outstanding up-and-coming scientific researchers from near and far have convened at The Center for the Physics of Living Cells (CPLC) at the U. of I. Department of Physics. They are graduate students, postdoctoral researchers and higher level scientists who come from universities and research institutions around the globe to advance their training in biophysics research by studying under leading experts in the field.

A six-day intensive program, the Physics of Living Cells Summer School, exposes these talented young scholars to a wide set of research topics in biophysics, teaches them new laboratory skills and methods through hands-on experience, and provides them with an exceptional opportunity to develop their professional networks.

CPLC Director of Education and Outreach Jaya Yodh has organized the summer school since its inception in 2009.

“Our summer program is recognized among the international biological physics community as an excellent venue for upper-level researchers to gain hands-on, intensive training in cutting-edge experimental single-molecule, live-cell, and computational and theoretical biophysics,” comments Yodh. “It’s an outstanding professional-development opportunity, and the participants who take advantage of it each year are truly top caliber. The program itself strongly reflects the CPLC’s educational mission, to foster collaborations and training of the next generation of scientists who will shape the field of biological physics.”

Each day of the program is packed with new information and experiences. “Basic training” in the early part of the week includes several mini-courses that introduce fundamental techniques and software, including TIRF microscopy optics and Visual Molecular Dynamics (VMD), MATLAB and LabView software. The students then move on to an advanced laboratory module of their own choosing. Starting on day three, the participants work in small groups in one of the laboratories of the participating professors. Summer school students also participate in faculty lectures, poster sessions focusing on both participants’ and CPLC research.

In 2013, 40 participants from a variety of fields—biophysics, physics, chemistry, biochemistry molecular biology, pharmacology, computer engineering—had the opportunity to study under one of 12 participating professors, including visiting professors Aaron Hoskins from the University of Wisconsin-Madison, Ido Golding and Anna Sokac from Baylor College of Medicine and new CPLC and U. of I. physics faculty member Tom Kuhlman.

A near one-to-one ratio of students to teaching assistants contributes to the intensive program’s success. In 2013, 35 CPLC grad students and postdocs developed and taught mini-courses and advanced modules.

Patrick Mears, a sixth-year graduate student in physics at the U. of I., has served as a workshop TA each of the five years it’s been offered. Mears, who aspires to work in the medical industry developing new tools and diagnostic methods, said preparing for and teaching during the summer school program has been hard work, but well worth it.

“They come to learn new research skills. Some come to learn a specific technique that borders on what they are already doing,” observes Mears. “The experiments end up being very time consuming, but this is where the students are most strongly motivated. Many of them will start in the morning and stay as late as 9 p.m.—some going as late as midnight.”

Nick Horan, a graduate student at the University of Wollongong in Australia, studying the structure and function of bacterial DNA replication machinery, participated in 2013.

“I applied for the CPLC Summer School to learn the latest techniques and be exposed to exciting current research from a top-class single-molecule biophysics research center,” states Horan. “The program was interesting and informative—well worth the trip. I am looking forward to discussing aspects of the course with my supervisor and colleagues when I return home.”

David Jacobson, a graduate student in physics at the University of California, Santa Barbara, said he took part in the 2013 program to expand his exposure to many different aspects of biophysics research.

“The summer school offers a great opportunity to get to know big names in the field, as well as their students and other researchers from around the world, all in a fun and informal setting,” Jacobson observes. “I signed up for an advanced module that is pretty far removed from my own research: I study the conformation of RNA using force spectroscopy, but this week I am studying the locomotion of baby zebrafish with Martin Gruebele and his student, Kiran Girdhar. Earlier in the week, I was introduced to a fantastic software package, Visual Molecular Dynamics (VMD), which is developed at the U. of I. I had previously never even heard of it, but can now definitely see ways of applying it to my research,” he added.

Thayaparan Paramanathan, a postdoctoral fellow in biochemistry and biophysics at Brandeis University in Massachusetts, said the hands-on course modules proved most useful to him: “There is no better way of learning than finding out for ourselves, and I will never forget what I learned at the CPLC. It was a great experience where we gained new knowledge and friends that will last a lifetime."

To date, the Physics of Living Cells Summer School has advanced the training of 164 scientists from 79 institutions in the U.S. and abroad.

The CPLC is a National Science Foundation Physics Frontiers Center at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, co-directed by Taekjip Ha and Klaus Schulten in the Department of Physics.  It comprises 13 faculty from U. of I. physics, chemistry, biochemistry, bioengineering and Baylor College of Medicine who pioneer new directions in collaborative research applying the latest technical advances.