CHAPEL
HILL – University of North Carolina at Chapel
Hill health scientists have garnered more grants – eight – from
the National Institutes of Health's highly competitive
Roadmap program than any other university in the
nation. They also have secured funding for a center
to combat cancer through the latest in basic science
technology. In 2004 – the inaugural year of the NIH
Roadmap grant program – six grants were awarded to
Carolina researchers.
Most of the new grants are part of the agency's “Roadmap
for Medical Research,” a series of initiatives designed
to transform the nation's medical research capabilities
and speed the movement of research discoveries from
the bench to the bedside. The program provides a
framework for NIH funding priorities and represents
an attempt to make the country's medical research
system more efficient and productive.
UNC will receive $11.6 million under the program
and another $3.9 million to fund the first year of
the newly established Carolina Center of
Nanotechnology Excellence. That center will marry
the University's expertise in nanotechnology with
patient-oriented research taking place at the Lineberger
Comprehensive Cancer Center .
The National Cancer Institute will fund the nanotechnology
center, and the NIH director's office will fund the
rest to pay for much cutting-edge research and professional
training at UNC.
"One of Carolina 's great strengths is its commitment
to interdisciplinary research focused on real-world
problems," said Dr. Tony Waldrop, vice chancellor
for research and economic development at UNC. “That
commitment and the excellence of our faculty put
us in a great position to compete for these awards."
The wide variety of topics represented in the awards
exemplifies the breadth and diversity of the university's
faculty and programs, Waldrop said.
The next-most successful institutions in securing
such support were Vanderbilt and Columbia universities,
both with six, and Memorial Sloan-Kettering Cancer
Center with five. Johns Hopkins University had four,
Harvard and Stanford universities won three and Duke
University won two.
Dr. Rudy Juliano, professor of pharmacology at the
UNC School of Medicine and chair of the Carolina
Roadmap Executive Committee, agreed that interdisciplinary
collaboration has been a long-time hallmark of research
at Carolina and a key to success in attracting outside
funding.
“Our schools and colleges are all located in close
proximity to each other, and investigators from different
schools have worked productively together for many
decades,” Juliano said. “That is a tradition here.
Last year, because of this close cooperation and
sharing, Carolina faculty members won six large Roadmap
grants.”
With the emphasis the university has placed on supporting
Roadmap and Roadmap-like efforts, it's no surprise
that UNC investigators have done even better this
year, he said. “To our knowledge, no other university
has dedicated so much infrastructure to supporting
interdisciplinary collaboration within the federal
Roadmap initiative.”
The new funding will range from one year to five
years, said Juliano, who will lead the new nanotechnology
center.
Besides him, new Roadmap grant recipients are Drs.
Bruce D. Cuevas, research assistant professor of
pharmacology in the School of Medicine; Michael Jarstfer,
assistant professor in the School of Pharmacy; Kuo-Hsiung
Lee, Kenan professor of pharmacy and director of
the School of Pharmacy's Natural Products Laboratory;
Eugene Orringer, professor of medicine and executive
associate dean in the School of Medicine; Barry Popkin,
professor of nutrition in the schools of public health
and medicine and director of the UNC Interdisciplinary
Obesity Program; David P. Siderovski, associate professor
of pharmacology in the School of Medicine; and Alexander
Tropsha, professor in the School of Pharmacy.
“It's worth noting how different the successful
Carolina applications are, the wide variety in interests
represented by our new projects,” Juliano said. “Dr.Orringer
continues and diversifies his longstanding program
in multidisciplinary clinical training, one of the
bedrocks of the School of Medicine . Dr. Lee
of the School of Pharmacy will create chemical diversity
libraries of compounds derived from medicinal plants.
“Dr. Popkin and I both will be training postdoctoral
fellows,” he said. “His program, which will benefit
scores of future scientists, clinicians and others
in interdisciplinary obesity efforts, and mine will
complement each other in taking on the challenges
of clinical medicine. Drs. Siderovski, Jarstfer,
Cuevas and Tropsha will build on Carolina 's strength
in basic science investigation with their new programs
to develop better biomedical assays and to boost
understanding of complex molecular interactions.”
More on UNC's 2005 Roadmap grants: http://www.med.unc.edu/roadmap/successes.htm
Background on UNC's 2004 Roadmap grants : http://www.unc.edu/news/archives/sept04/waldrop09304.html
Note: Contact Juliano at (919) 966-4383, 966-9431
or rudy_juliano@med.unc.edu .
News Services contact: David Williamson, (919) 962-8596
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