Congratulations, Melanie for being honored for your work with the Promoting Underrepresented Minorities Advancing in the Sciences (PUMAS) internship program by the California Life Sciences Association (CLSA). PUMAS supports educational activities that enhance diversity in biomedical research. Established in 2014 by Melanie Ott and Kathy Ivey at the Gladstone Institutes, the program encourages students from historically underrepresented backgrounds, who are currently attending a community college, to pursue undergraduate and graduate degrees in science, technology, engineering, or mathematics (STEM).
Each summer, qualified students are matched with a scientific mentor to gain hands-on biomedical research experience in a Gladstone laboratory. To date, 24 interns have gone through the PUMAS program, and three have since returned to Gladstone as research associates.
The PUMAS program is funded by the National Heart, Lung, and Blood Institute of the National Institutes of Health.
Gladstone is an independent, nonprofit life science research organization that uses visionary science and technology to overcome disease. To ensure their work does the greatest good, Gladstone researchers focus on conditions with profound medical, economic, and social impact—unsolved diseases. Gladstone has an academic affiliation with the University of California, San Francisco.