Dear Friends & Colleagues,

WE’RE AN INSTITUTE!

I am pleased to announce that the Institute for Modeling Collaboration and Innovation (IMCI) has been granted Tier III status at the University of Idaho effective September 1. IMCI builds on the success of the Center for Modeling Complex Interactions (CMCI), originally funded by a Center of Biomedical Research Excellence (COBRE) grant from the National Institutes of Health.  Level III allows us to expand our modeling efforts beyond our original biomedical mission.

Our personnel and budgetary management now resided in the Office of Research and Economic Development.   IMCI continue to focus on interdisciplinary, collaborative research with modeling as a unifying feature. As you know, modeling improves research at every stage: making predictions, generating hypotheses, exploring scenarios, and guiding empirical work.

CMCI DOESN’T GO AWAY

CMCI is not going away; it is taking its place under the IMCI umbrella along with other grants and initiatives.  We are currently preparing a resubmission of the CMCI Phase II proposal. Because we were funded off-cycle in Phase I, our initial Phase II proposal was submitted early, so we are well positioned financially to remain fully functional during this resubmission cycle.

POSTDOCTORAL RESOURCES EXPANDING

The Postdoctoral Fellows in the Modeling Core have broad expertise including molecular modeling, genomics, mathematical modeling, population genetics, and machine learning. We will soon be adding expertise in geospatial modeling and statistical modeling.  On Monday, a new postdoc Hui (William) Wang joined IMCI and will be working on the EPSCoR GEM3 project. Please make William welcome to our community.

THANK YOU, UNIVERSITY LEADERSHIP

I want to acknowledge the University leadership for their strong support of CMCI/IMCI. Vice President for Research & Economic Development Janet Nelson, Provost and Executive Vice President John Wiencek, and President Scott Green have all been extremely positive and supportive during our transition. Dean of the College of Science Ginger Carney has been especially generous in allowing CoS personnel to continue to support us through this changeover.   Finally, I want to say that I am enthusiastic and optimistic as President Green assumes leadership and to assure him that I remain ready to support his efforts and the University of Idaho.

Let’s have a great semester!

Go Vandals!
Holly

P.S. TAKE THE SURVEY

PS If you haven’t already, please fill complete the CMCI Participation Survey. It should only take you a minute and will help us know how to better serve our CMCI / IMCI participants.