| VUMC gives boost to Middle Tennessee's economy thanks to NIH stimulus funding |
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| Written by Chris O'Neal | |||
| Friday, 24 July 2009 16:19 | |||
As of July 21, Vanderbilt University has received the lion’s share of National Institutes of Health NIH) stimulus grants in Tennessee - 49 of 88 grants, totaling nearly $14 million over two years. These grants are funding at least 50 new jobs at the Medical Center. The largest of the NIH stimulus grants received by Vanderbilt, $3 million, will be used to expand an international clinical research fellowship program coordinated through the Vanderbilt University Institute for Global Health. The grant will support a year of mentored clinical research training in the developing world for an additional 23 research fellows -- U.S. citizens with M.D. and/or Ph.D. degrees -- over the next 18 months. Ten fellows will be able to continue their projects for a second year. Marylyn Ritchie, Ph.D., will be able to accelerate her research at Vanderbilt University Medical Center and nearly double her lab staff, thanks to $923,000 in federal stimulus money she will receive over the next two years. Richie’s grant will add four or five new positions in her lab. “This is a huge grant,” said Ritchie, who directs the Computational Genomics Core. “There are a lot of people in Middle Tennessee who are unemployed statisticians." Ritchie’s funding is among the first stimulus grants awarded in Tennessee by the NIH under the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act, which was signed into law by President Obama in February. The NIH portion of the act, more than $10 billion, is designed “to help stimulate the U.S. economy through the support and advancement of scientific research,” federal officials said. Ritchie, an associate professor of molecular physiology and biophysics, seeks to determine the connections between genetic and environmental factors that contribute to common, complex diseases like diabetes. The goal of her project, which began July 1, “is to develop a way to integrate genetic data with other types of knowledge and with public databases,” she said. Although the sequencing of the human genome has generated a mountain of data, it’s not easy to extract meaningful information from it – even with the help of a supercomputer. Studying the genome is analogous to climbing a mountain. Having fast computers can provide the climber with strength, stamina and good tools. What’s required to reach the top, however, is a good route up the mountain - a strategy. Supercomputers must be programmed to analyze data in ways that reveal the greatest amount of significant information. But it’s going to take time to find the best route. “My approach to analysis is to look at the whole genome in an unbiased way,” said Ritchie, whose group is using the University’s supercomputer, ACCRE (Advanced Computing Center for Research and Education). For a complete list of NIH stimulus grants, go to http://report.nih.gov/recovery.
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| Last Updated on Friday, 24 July 2009 16:19 |
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