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RSNA News - November 2004Imaging is Prominent in Year One of NIH Roadmap
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| Elias Zerhouni, M.D. |
| NIH Director |
One year after National Institutes of Health (NIH) Director Elias Zerhouni, M.D., unveiled his innovative NIH Roadmap, several research initiatives are under way.
Dr. Zerhouni, a radiologist, developed the Roadmap as a way to accelerate bench-to-bedside developments. Extramural grants and intramural programs following the Roadmap stress interdisciplinary efforts and innovative, high-risk, high-impact, groundbreaking research.
Under the Roadmap, funding is divided into three themed research areas:
| Theme Research Area | Funding in Fiscal Year 2004 |
|---|---|
| New Pathways to Discovery | $64 million |
| Research Teams of the Future | $27 million |
| Re-Engineering the Clinical Research Enterprise | $38 million |
Molecular Libraries and Imaging
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| Roderic I. Pettigrew, Ph.D., M.D. |
| NIBIB Director |
New Pathways includes areas of most interest to radiologists—molecular libraries and imaging.
Roderic I. Pettigrew, Ph.D., M.D., director of the National Institute of Biomedical Imaging and Bioengineering (NIBIB), is one of the three co-chairs of the molecular libraries and imaging implementation group. Through molecular imaging, it is hoped that personalized profiles of cell and tissue function can be developed leading to individualized approaches to diagnosing and treating disease.
Belinda Seto, Ph.D., deputy director of NIBIB, says the molecular libraries and imaging implementation group received the most funding in FY 2004. Major initiatives in this area are:
- Developing high-specificity/high-sensitivity molecular imaging probes. They are highly specific agents that report on a single molecular event. Molecular imaging probes are also referred to as beacons, reports, tracers, nanoparticles, smart probes and contrast agents. The goal is to improve probe detection sensitivity 10- to 100-fold within five years.
- Creating an imaging probe database describing the specificities, activities and applications of imaging probes for a wide range of diseases and biological functions.
- Opening an imaging probe development center that will produce known imaging probes for the research community in cases where there is no viable commercial supplier. The center will also generate novel imaging probes for biomedical research and clinical applications.
"From our perspective, the Roadmap is a positive development," says Ed Nagy, executive director of the Academy of Radiology Research. "Imaging will be competitive for a large number of Roadmap awards, and innovative imaging techniques and technologies will be essential to progress in the broad range of multidisciplinary research supported by the Roadmap. Taking advantage of these opportunities should be a high priority for the radiology and imaging science communities."
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| Belinda Seto, Ph.D. |
| NIBIB Deputy Director |
Some radiologists are doing just that. The first round of grants for the development of imaging probes for in vitro use was awarded last summer. Applications for the second round are due this month. The second-round research projects will focus on the development of novel and untested "high-risk" approaches to molecular probes.
"We want to fund research that none of the individual NIH institutes would be able to fund on their own," explains Dr. Seto. "The Roadmap creates opportunities for researchers to think outside the box."
This summer, the initial work began on the establishment of a probe database. This is a common database of literature and experimental data through PubChem, which is freely available to scientists in the public and private sectors.
Initial work is also under way to develop an intramural center dedicated
to producing the probes. "We now have located a building and
we are going to lease space in Rockville, Md.," says Dr. Seto.
Other Imaging Projects
Roadmap WebcastOn October 14, NIH Director Elias Zerhouni, M.D., and senior NIH staff held a press conference on the progress of the Roadmap over the past year. The press conference has been archived and is available as a Webcast at http://videocast.nih.gov/PastEvents.asp?c=998. Scroll down to Thursday, October 14 and click on the globe next to Roadmap for Medical Research Briefing. The total running time of the Webcast is 1:12:28. |
Radiology has followed the Roadmap's direction into other research areas. For example, in September, the University of Texas (UT) Southwestern Medical Center at Dallas was awarded a planning grant to study the causes of obesity and associated metabolic diseases within an interdisciplinary research center.
The team is lead by Jay D. Horton, M.D., from the Departments of Internal Medicine and Molecular Genetics. Radiologists are among the 24 UT Southwestern team members participating in the study.
"We will use MR methods to quantify fat distribution, particularly in the liver, because liver fat may play a role in causing diabetes," explains Craig R. Malloy, M.D., a professor of radiology and internal medicine at UT Southwestern. He is trained in cardiology with research interests in diabetes, he says. "Ultrasound and CT give qualitative estimates of liver fat, but MR allows radiologists to quantify fat content. This is important because standard MR scanners can be used for these measurements. Now that MR technology is widely-available, it is important to understand if fat measurements predict the development of type II diabetes or can be used to monitor drug therapy targeting liver fat."
Imaging will also play a role in at least one of the four newly funded National Centers for Biomedical Computing. These centers will create innovative software programs and other tools that will permit researchers to integrate and analyze data of different types and sources, opening new pathways for understanding biological processes and human diseases. The National Alliance for Medical Image Computing will develop software programs that integrate analysis and imaging data.
"We know that today's scientific landscape demands new ways of thinking, and we know we need to introduce new paradigms for the conduct of medical research," says Dr. Zerhouni. "That's what the Roadmap is all about—creating a supportive funding environment for scientists and their ideas to come together in ways we've never seen before."
Future initiatives include regional centers for translational research and specialized nanomedicine facilities. In addition, several of the currently funded Roadmap initiatives will be reannounced so that researchers who missed the first opportunity can apply for the next round of Roadmap funds.
For more information on the NIH Roadmap, go to nihroadmap.nih.gov.
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