Moving Science Forward

UI Carver College of Medicine to break ground on Health Sciences Campus building

On September 28, the UI Carver College of Medicine will hold a groundbreaking ceremony to mark the beginning of construction of the Iowa Institute for Biomedical Discovery (IIBD). The Institute will be built on the health sciences campus next to the Medical Education and Research Facility and the Carver Biomedical Research Facility, with a target completion date of 2010.

The $120-million, 200 ,000-square-foot facility will house a unique blend of University scientists collaborating on shared research projects in the basic and life sciences. The investigators will conduct high-risk, high-reward research in areas such as aging, neuroscience, regenerative medicine, and cancer. Planning has been under way for months with campus faculty and staff members working to develop the best possible plan for the new space.

This spring, Michael Hogan, UI provost, established a 14-member task force, led by Michael Apicella, MD, professor and head of microbiology and interim senior associate dean for scientific affairs, to investigate how UI faculty members in the basic and life sciences currently are working together, which programs fit the concept of the new building and how to successfully implement a plan for the space.

To ensure the plan's success, the task force also is talking with faculty across the University and looking at UI collaborations that work well, such as, the combined recruiting efforts of the Carver College of Medicine and the UI College of Engineering. They have successfully worked together to hire faculty for joint imaging and bioinformatics projects.

'We need to provide the best environment to ensure that our faculty can continue to achieve. Our researchers are working on finding cures for illnesses that affect Iowans as well as others across the globe. We believe being in close proximity will improve their working relationships,' said Apicella. 'One of the most important factors is finding a plan that will work. Other universities have tried to organize life science and basic science faculty members together and it has been challenging for them. We're working on research themes for the building and figuring out how to remove the barriers that currently exist.'

Outside the University, there is another factor influencing the desire to move in the direction of cross partnerships. The National Institutes of Health (NIH) and other funding programs have made known that they support an interdisciplinary structure that combines the research of faculty members in the life and health sciences. The funding groups feel that research in this design will result in novel ideas for investigation, possible cures and therapies for disease and faster delivery of potential treatments to patients through clinical trials.

'We want to be able to offer new options to patients as quickly as possible. In the interest of moving science and health care forward, we're building a foundation to support the work of our biomedical researchers,' said Apicella. 'To encourage these efforts, there may be special reward mechanisms for faculty members who engage in interdisciplinary research.'

Another benefit of lifting the constraints imposed by separate research laboratories located on opposite sides of campus, is the opportunity for faculty within the Institute to work together on some of science's most challenging questions. As advances are made in the biological sciences, issues from legal and ethical to social and cultural are raised. Having an established group of investigators who share space will enable the University to meet these challenges and facilitate discussions and solutions more easily and efficiently.

'Not surprisingly, the task force is finding that UI faculty members are excited by the idea of working together and want the concept to work,' said Apicella. 'They believe by combining programs in the life and health sciences it will strengthen their work and put the University in a leadership position.'

It is hoped that the IIBD will provide opportunities for undergraduate and graduate students through available research positions and course development, and enhance the University's efforts to recruit scientists from top research laboratories.

The task force will likely wrap up its work in the fall, providing two to three sets of recommendations for consideration to a committee comprised of the University's leaders. After a set of recommendations has been selected, the leadership will pinpoint the researchers who will work in the new space.