Develop a model for a sustainable and diverse U.S. biomedical research workforce that can inform decisions about training of the optimal number of people for the appropriate types of positions that will advance science and promote health. Developing the model will include an analysis of the current composition and size of the workforce to understand the consequences of current funding policies on the research framework. The model should include an assessment of present and future needs in the academic research arena, but also current and future needs in industry, science policy, education, communication, and other pathways. The model will also require an assessment of current and future availability of trainees from the domestic and international communities.

Based on this analysis and input from the extramural community, using appropriate expertise from NIH and external sources,and recognizing that there are limits to NIH's ability to control many aspects of the training pipeline, the committee will make recommendations for actions that NIH should take to support a future sustainable biomedical infrastructure.

The Working Group will be chaired by Shirley M. Tilghman, president and professor of molecular biology at Princeton University (shown).  Dr. Tilghman is no stranger to thinking about the biomedical workforce.  Among other activities, she served as chair of the committee that authored the 1998 National Research Council (NRC) report Trends in the Early Careers of Life Scientists and as co-chair of the committee that authored the 1994 NRC report The Funding of Young Investigators in the Biological and Biomedical Sciences.