By J. Michael Bishop, MD, Chancellor and Arthur and Toni Rembe Rock Distinguished Professor at the University of California, San Francisco
In 1999, UCSF broke ground for a new campus in San Francisco. The intent was to alleviate space restrictions on its primary campus, UCSF Parnassus Heights, and allow UCSF, world-renowned for its basic science research, clinical training and patient care, to stretch in ways that would allow it to enhance its performance.
The opportunity to expand within the city was the result of far-thinking community leaders who orchestrated the donation to UCSF of 43 acres - an astoundingly large parcel within a modern city - in the formerly neglected and under-used Mission Bay section of the city, near China Basin, just south of what is now AT&T Park.
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"The development of UCSF Mission Bay, and the ongoing transformation of UCSF Parnassus Heights… is enabling UCSF to undergo a significant step in its evolution."
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Today, that site is known as UCSF Mission Bay. It is the anchor of the Mission Bay redevelopment project, the largest urban development effort in the city since the building of Golden Gate Park. It is also the largest academic biomedical research expansion taking place in the United States today. At full build out, expected in 15 years, the campus will double the teaching and research capacity of UCSF.
With the first phase of construction completed, the campus is already teeming with activity. Some 1,700 faculty, scholars, students and staff now work, study, and play there.
The story of how a group of people came together to make this development a reality - the community leaders, the UCSF faculty leadership that developed the plan for the campus and the extraordinarily generous philanthropists who have supported much of the actual construction to date - is remarkable. The fruits are equally so.
But perhaps of greatest significance to the future of medicine is the fact that the development of UCSF Mission Bay, and the ongoing transformation of UCSF Parnassus Heights in the wake of space released by the departure of many labs to the new campus, is enabling UCSF to undergo a significant step in its evolution.
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"We intend to apply what we discover."
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UCSF, best known for its research into the molecular, genetic and cellular underpinnings of cancer, cardiovascular disease, neurological and neurodegenerative diseases, immunological diseases, infectious diseases and myriad other conditions, is undertaking to make itself into a leading center for translational research: in other words, we intend to apply what we discover.
Translational research is recognized as the critical weak link in medical science today. It involves moving the discoveries made at the lab bench through the process of animal studies, animal testing and small-scale human trials in order to determine whether a discovery warrants examination, on a large scale, by a biotechnology or pharmaceutical company.
It is a daunting process, requiring an elaborate infrastructure that academic medical centers - the primary engines of biomedical research discovery in the United States - traditionally have not had. Given these circumstances, while there have been explosive gains of knowledge in the basic sciences in recent decades, the path to the patient bedside has often been slow.
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"It has been a challenge to translate the discovery of, for instance, a faulty gene or protein implicated in prostate cancer to a new diagnostic technique or drug to arrest or correct the gene or protein's malfunction in the patient."
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Progress has been hindered on several fronts. Most basic researchers, who carry out studies in cell culture and animals, do not have the training to design the particular types of animal model studies needed to test the safety and efficacy of experimental therapeutic strategies they may have developed. Likewise, most clinical researchers, who carry out their studies in patients, do not have seamless access to findings that have come out of the research lab. Finally, there has not been the administrative infrastructure in place to facilitate an effective continuum from bench to bedside.
Thus, it has been a challenge to translate the discovery of, for instance, a faulty gene or protein implicated in prostate cancer to a new diagnostic technique or drug to arrest or correct the gene or protein's malfunction in the patient.
UCSF is now developing an infrastructure to support this type of translation. A primary component of the design is the development of robust, well-integrated, academic-research campuses with the space to support translational and clinical research. The urgent need to do this is one of the reasons we felt obliged to expand.
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"Translational research is recognized as the critical weak link in medical science today."
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Components of the plan include the development of information technology services to support the gathering and assessment of that data; regulatory services related to Food and Drug Administration and U.S. Department of Agriculture research policies; additional programs for training basic scientists and clinical researchers in translational research; faculty leadership responsible for identifying promising discoveries throughout UCSF; and administrative support for the design and implantation of translational research and clinical investigation.
We expect the program will build on itself. An enlivened clinical research community will be perpetually asking "what's next" of basic researchers.
UCSF has already demonstrated its capacity for translational research in dramatic, if discrete, terms: UCSF and Stanford University scientists co-discovered the techniques of genetic engineering in the 1970s, and pioneered the use of these techniques to create medically useful drugs, such as insulin, spawning the biotechnology industry.
A UCSF scientist discovered the protein surfactant, essential for keeping the lung inflated, in the 1960s, and developed a synthetic form of the protein to treat premature babies whose immature lungs do not produce it. Infant mortality dropped 50 percent in regions of the world where surfactant became available. These insights into the lung led to the development of a particular form of mechanical ventilation, and contributed to the development of neonatal intensive care nurseries.
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"UCSF has already demonstrated its capacity for translational research in dramatic terms."
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Numerous translational efforts are also under way today throughout UCSF. They hint at what could be seen on a broader scale. Basic scientists and clinical scientists at each of UCSF's campuses - UCSF Mission Bay, UCSF Parnassus Heights, UCSF Medical Center at Mount Zion, and UCSF-affiliates San Francisco General Hospital Medical Center, San Francisco Veterans Affairs Medical Center and the J. David Gladstones Institutes - are participating in a major Alzheimer's Disease Research Center (ADRC) endeavor, supported by the National Institutes of Health, that is intended to accelerate the pace of discovery regarding dementing diseases.
Under this structure, clinician-scientists pioneering novel strategies for diagnosing and treating patients with dementia, and basic researchers studying the diseases in cell and animal models, now have the infrastructure to significantly increase their ability to share data and collaborate on studies regarding the clinical, neuroimaging, neuropathological and molecular features of Alzheimer's disease and non-Alzheimer's disease dementias.
The UCSF Comprehensive Cancer Center (CCC), an interdisciplinary program that combines basic science, clinical research, epidemiology/cancer control and patient care throughout UCSF, epitomizes the capacity for translational research. No where is it illuminated more clearly than in the CCC's prostate, breast cancer and brain tumor Specialized Program of Research Excellence (SPORE) programs, highly competitive NIH-funded initiatives designed to drive a cross pollination of ideas between leading basic scientists and clinical researchers to improve cancer treatment, early detection and prevention.
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"The goal is to incorporate translational research into UCSF's very fabric."
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The UCSF Institute for Regeneration Medicine, one of the premier such institutes in the United States, is building its entire program on the concept of translational research. Basic researchers and clinical researchers studying cell differentiation and tissue regeneration are organizing themselves along project lines, or "pipelines," designed to drive new discoveries toward therapies.
UCSF's three NIH-supported General Clinical Research Centers, including one focused on clinical research in the pediatric population, also exemplify translational research. These centers ultimately will be reorganized under UCSF's overall translational research infrastructure.
UCSF's commitment to building a base for translational research is also seen in its world-class training programs, ranging from the Medical Scientist Training Programs for MD-PhD students to several NIH-funded training programs for clinical investigators.
The goal, now, is to incorporate translational research into UCSF's very fabric.
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From Health Care and Biotech in the Bay Area, a publication of the San Francisco Chamber of Commerce. |
We needed to expand to UCSF Mission Bay to address significant space limitations at UCSF Parnassus Heights. But the larger imperative was to add vital initiatives to UCSF's portfolio. The vision of a remarkable group of people - faculty leaders, public officials, corporate leaders and generous philanthropists - laid the groundwork for this effort.
Now, from the windswept vista of Parnassus Heights to the sunny flats of Mission Bay, UCSF is undertaking to make itself into a major site for translational research.
Related Links:
UCSF Set to Transform Itself into Engine of Translational Research
Studies in Transformational Research: Bench to Bedside
UCSF Leaders Reflect on Significance of Clinical and Translational Science Institute
Professor Describes Goals of Clinical and Translational Science Institute
The UCSF Clinical and Translational Science Institute: A View to the Future of Research
NIH Launches National Consortium to Transform Clinical Research
Clinical and Translational Science Awards to Transform Clinical Research
