Dear Alumni of MDTP and the Bact and MMI PhD programs:

We hope you are doing well! Your research productivity and contributions to the university while you were here are remembered and appreciated. The Microbiology Doctoral Training Program arose from the merger of the Bact and MMI departmental PhD programs in the late 1990s. This large interdepartmental program, based in those 2 core departments, continues to enjoy an outstanding reputation, attract outstanding new students, and generate outstanding graduates to enlarge your ranks every year. These features are directly linked to you, both your work as graduate students here, and your subsequent accomplishments and career development as alumni .

You may be aware of exciting new developments on campus that intersect with the MDTP. Both of the core departments of Bact and MMI have added new faculty in the past few years, including several as part of the Chancellor's Cluster Hire initiatives in Symbiosis, Food Safety, and Women's Health. The trainer pool outside of the two core departments is dynamic, with frequent addition of new faculty. These include both junior faculty newly arriving on campus in other departments and more senior faculty who have developed or recognized alignment of their research programs with MDTP and are interested in recruiting MDTP students to their labs. We are very excited about the construction of a new, >$100 million, state-of-the-art Microbial Sciences Building, although there is simultaneous poignancy about the loss of historic Fred Hall (same site, but the new building is much larger). The MSB is scheduled for occupancy in 2007 by the two core departments of Bact and MMI and also the Dept. of Food Microbiology & Toxicology. You can learn more about the MSB at http://www.bact.wisc.edu/MSB/index.html and get webcam views of the site at http://www.bact.wisc.edu/MSB/webcam.html.

We hope you will always feel allegiance with your alma mater university and program. Feel free to browse this website for information that may interest you. Contact program director Heidi Goodrich-Blair (hgblair@bact.wisc.edu) or program coordinator Kathy Holtgraver (micro@bact.wisc.edu) if you have questions or any ideas, suggestions, or information you'd like to share. You are great examples and a great resource for our current students who are following in your footsteps! We'd also be happy to develop an historical section with photos or anecdotes from your experiences here, or post updates on things that have happened in your life that you'd like to share.

If you are interested in making financial contributions to the MDTP (for student support or recruiting or operating expenses, etc.), or to the 2 core departments, or to overlapping endeavours such as the Microbial Sciences Building, please contact program coordinator Kathy Holtgraver (micro@bact.wisc.edu) for UW Foundation account information or referral to departmental or university representatives.

Thank you, keep in touch, and good luck!

Heidi Goodrich-Blair, MDTP director