A film noir detective story, a casting call and an oceanic treasure hunt… who says science can’t be entertaining?

UF Health Communications created three short videos for a National Institutes of Health video contest inviting fun, engaging ways of explaining science funded by the NIH Common Fund. The UF videos represent collaborative health research funded by three NIH grants totaling more than $35 million and touching nearly all of the university’s 16 colleges.

The contest ended Friday, May 9. Thanks to a strong Gator rally, two UF videos – “Some Cells Know How to Keep Their Secrets” and “In Search of Treasures from the Sea” – are among the top five winners, with “Translational Science Casting Call” close behind at number six. Winning videos were selected based on the number of likes on YouTube and were recognized by NIH Director Francis Collins and NIH media outlets as part of the NIH Common Fund 10-Year Commemoration. Thanks to everyone who voted in support of NIH-funded health research at UF!

For more about the contest, visit http://commonfund.nih.gov/contests/videos.

Related Links & Resources

• Washington Post, Sept. 15, 2014: New ‘cool videos’ from NIH look at Alzheimer’s, heart attacks, MS, coral reefs
• NIH Director’s Blog, August 21, 2014: Cool Videos: Diving for Drugs
• NIH Director’s Blog, August 14, 2014: Cool Videos: Metabolomics
• CTSI news post, June 11, 2014: UF CTSI engages campus community and Florida science teachers for NIH video contest
• What Florida Science Teachers Are Saying
• Translational Science Casting Call: Visit ctsi.ufl.edu/castingcall for resources on how you can get involved in translational science.
• Some Cells Know How to Keep Their Secrets: Visit secim.ufl.edu/casefiles to sleuth through real metabolomics cases.
• In Search of Treasures from the Sea: Visit the UF Center for Natural Products, Drug Discovery & Development to learn more about this research.