Erlanger Health System. In Knoxville, the University of Tennessee Medical Center is home to the UT Graduate School of Medicine, the largest of the nine (AAMC) Graduate Regional Medical Centers in the Southeast United States. Nashville UTHSC affiliates include Saint Thomas West, Saint Thomas Midtown and Saint Thomas Rutherford Hospitals. Saint Thomas Midtown Hospital is the home of the Internal Medicine Residency Program. An Emergency Medicine Residency Program and a Family Medicine Residency Program are both based at Saint Thomas Rutherford Hospital. UT medical students spend their first two years in Memphis completing basic science coursework prior to taking the USMLE Step 1. Students then perform clinical rotations at these facilities on the Chattanooga, Knoxville, Memphis and Nashville campuses for third and fourth year clerkships. Research The College of Medicine boasts three centers of excellence for connective tissue diseases, genomics and bioinformatics, and vascular biology. These departments collaborate significantly with St. Jude Children's Research Hospital, Oak Ridge National Laboratory, Le Bonheur Children's Medical Center, and other research centers. The UTHSC Level III Regional Biocontainment Laboratory (RBL-3) is one of 13 nationally funded RBL-3 complexes that investigate infectious diseases and pathogens. Funded in 2003 by a $18 million grant from the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Disease (NIAID), the Regional Biocontainment Laboratory anchors the UT-Baptist Research Park in downtown Memphis. The Cancer Research Building (CRB) houses research laboratories which investigate molecular bases of disease, cancer therapeutics, metastasis mechanisms, cancer genetics, viral gene therapy and other fields. Constructed in 2007, the $25.2 million CRB represents the interdisciplinary nature of cancer research conducted by College of Medicine and other UTHSC faculty. The College of Medicine affords many medical students research opportunities through the NIH-sponsored Medical Student Research Fellowship (MSRF). This allows medical students to pursue research in the basic and clinical sciences under preceptors during the summer after their first year. The Emergency Medicine Residency Program, Family Medicine Residency Program and Internal Medicine Residency Program at UTHSC affiliate hospitals incorporate clinical research education and training into each curriculum. The Saint Thomas Health Research Institute (STRI) supports research in the Nashville area. Research projects in individual locations place an emphasis on community collaboration that benefits local patient populations. Residency programs The College of Medicine offers several Accreditation Council for Graduate Medical Education residency programs located at four fully integrated statewide campuses: College of Medicine – Memphis: allergy and immunology, emergency medicine, dermatology, family