A Non-Traditional Center

a non-traditional center

New Approaches to Funding New Research. Although support for exciting new research is available to investigators from a variety of sources, the process is slow. One to two or more years may be required for an idea to go from conception to funding. The intent of the Center is to provide a ready source of support for novel and promising ideas so that early research and development can move ahead far more rapidly.

The Center brings together investigators with disparate skills and common interests in an environment that supports rapid integration and development of ideas. As an early testing ground for these ideas, the Center is able to direct projects relating to long-term development of new knowledge towards various funding agencies, while projects ready for product development are guided toward seeking support through interaction with industry.

Independent and Interdependent Research. The Center's scientists channel their investigations in two directions: (1) pursuing independent lines of research, essential to their individual roles as leaders in a thriving academic environment; and (2) carrying out interdependent research, so that the various areas of expertise represented at the Center are combined to successfully promote the advancement of medical care.

Center members participate actively in their own departments, as well as representing them in Center activities. In addition to their individual research grants, from the NIH and other sources, they share responsibilities for Training Grants, Program Project grants, and industry-supported research that are focused on achieving the Center's primary goals.

Flexibility and Diversity. As promising new ideas materialize and advances are imminent, the Center is able to shift emphasis and research goals and to move personnel and operations beyond the fixed laboratory construct to accomplish this objective. The importance of such flexibility is illustrated in current research, such as that on the relation of caveolin in the heart to specific aspects of cardiomyopathy and sudden death. Caveolin also appears to be involved in limb girdle muscular dystrophy and in the inhibition of tumor development (as in breast cancer), offering two possibilities for rapid extension of this research.

The diversity of the Center for Molecular Therapeutics promotes interaction with scientists at Columbia and at other institutions. For example, studies on pacemaker currents in the heart are undertaken in a collaboration among scientists at Columbia, SUNY Stony Brook, and the University of Milan. This consortium comprises the world's leading laboratories in research on pacemaker function, ensuring a far more broad-based and rapid approach to success than work limited to the resources of one institution could hope to achieve

Center Participants And Their Research | A Non-Traditional Center | Looking Forward Five Years | Supporting, Nurturing & Applying the Most Promising Ideas