NIH Funds Top $300 Million U-M Medical School ranks seventh in nation

For the first time in Medical School history, the total annual amount of National Institutes of Health grant funding awarded to the school’s clinical researchers and biomedical scientists exceeds $300 million.

When the final numbers for fiscal year 2008 were tallied, Medical School researchers had received 712 grant awards and brought in more than $301 million in NIH grant funding. As a result, the U-M moved from 11th-place to seventh in NIH grants awarded to all U.S. medical schools and placed second among medical schools affiliated with public universities.

Breaking the $300-million barrier was particularly significant, because it happened while the federal NIH budget was essentially flat and not even keeping up with inflation, according to Steve Kunkel, Ph.D., a professor of pathology and the school’s senior associate dean for research.

“Historically, the Medical School has ranged from ninth to 11th in NIH rankings,” says Kunkel. “We were never able to break the barrier before. It took a lot of hard work by many investigators to make it happen.”

The total amount of fiscal year 2008 research funding received from other sources — including other federal agencies, industry, state or local governments and private and foundation support — exceeded $412 million.

“Continued expansion of research funding is necessary to maintain our national prominence,” says Dean James Woolliscroft, M.D. “Research funding, faculty growth and access to quality research space are all connected. Our current lack of available high-quality research space is a limiting factor holding us back.”

In December, University Regents took a first step toward possible resolution of the research space issue by approving the U-M’s offer to purchase the former Pfizer Global Research and Development facility in Ann Arbor, with nearly 2 million square feet of additional laboratory and office space. If everything goes as planned, researchers could begin moving into new lab space as soon as late 2009.

“Now that we’ve passed the $300-million milestone and soon could be acquiring more research space, this is the perfect time to step back and review our entire research portfolio,” says Kunkel. “It gives us an opportunity to align related research efforts, expand ongoing university-wide research collaborations, and determine where we want to be five to 10 years in the future.”

As part of the strategic planning process, U-M faculty teams will develop recommendations for the future research strategy, according to Kunkel. “Our goal is to develop a strategy for one unified campus that will maximize future growth by leveraging our existing research strengths into new areas. The plan must be fiscally sound to ensure we have the resources required to attract more research investigators.”

“We will be investing in people who can be leaders in science and medicine,” says Woolliscroft. “This has the potential to be transformative for U-M.”
—SALLY POBOJEWSKI

Michigan OKs Stem Cell Research

Michigan voters have approved Proposal 2 — a constitutional amendment that eases restrictions on embryonic stem cell research conducted in the state. The amendment makes it legal for Michigan scientists to derive new embryonic stem cell lines from human embryos created for use in fertility treatment that otherwise would be discarded. Before passage of Proposal 2, Michigan was one of the most restrictive states in the country for human embryonic stem cell research. “The citizens of Michigan voiced their hope for the future of biomedical research, and their desire for our state to be known as a welcoming environment for life sciences discovery and industry,” says Robert Kelch (M.D. 1967, Residency 1970), U-M executive vice president for medical affairs.
—SP

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Parasite Imprisoned by Protein Mutation

Up to 23 percent of Americans are unwitting hosts for a common parasite called Toxoplasma gondii, which causes toxoplasmosis. After the initial infection, the parasite goes dormant, lurking in central nervous system cells, where it can reactivate and damage the brain, eyes and other organs. Scientists in the Department of Microbiology and Immunology have identified a protein called TgPLP1, which creates pores in infected cell membranes allowing the parasite to break out and infect other cells. Mutant forms of the parasite without TgPLP1 were unable to escape from host cells to spread the infection. The discovery could help scientists develop drugs or vaccines to prevent toxoplasmosis and related diseases, including malaria.
—SP

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Kuhl Receives Japan Prize

David E. Kuhl, M.D., a U-M professor of radiology whose research was fundamental to the development of medical imaging, has won the 2009 Japan Prize — one of the world’s most prestigious science and technology awards.

Kuhl often is called the “father” of emission tomography. His research led to the development of advanced computed tomographic imaging technology, including PET and SPECT scanners being used today in clinics and hospitals around the world.

“Too frequently, we don’t realize the impact one individual can make to the future of medicine,” says Dean James Woolliscroft, M.D. “The groundbreaking work that David Kuhl began in the 1950s is now a vital part of modern diagnostic and clinical medicine.”

From the late 1950s through the 1970s, Kuhl and his colleagues at the University of Pennsylvania resolved many technical barriers to create the first cross-sectional images of radioactive tracers within the human body. In the early 1970s, Kuhl was the first to measure regional blood volume in the brain using 3-D SPECT imaging of radioactive tracers, which opened the field of nuclear medicine to new kinds of scientific research.

In 1986, Kuhl moved to the U-M to serve as chief of nuclear medicine. In his current research, Kuhl is developing advanced emission computed tomography technology that could make early diagnosis possible for patients with Alzheimer’s and Parkinson’s disease.
—SP