NIH grants $52 million to UC San Diego for treatment research

The NIH’s National Center for Advancing Translational Science has awarded The Clinical and Translational Research Institute at the University of California, San Diego, a 5-year, $52 million Clinical and Translational Science Award.

“The first five years transformed our research environment and the way discoveries move from the lab to the clinic. The next five will be about accelerating that process, expanding training programs and improving information systems tools for research,” Gary S. Firestein, MD, director of The Clinical and Translational Research Institute (CTRI), said in the release. “Rather than rely upon the traditional methods of studying large numbers of patients, we’re moving toward massive data collection on individual patients. The goal is to integrate diverse approaches and disciplines to find new drugs and therapies and advance individualized treatments.”

CTRI was developed to advance research in both causes and cures of diseases, and according to the release, the new grant recognizes the program’s success in doing that since its 2010 inception.

Moreover, the CTRI aims to build the framework and support for translational and clinical research, along with providing training and education for up and coming researchers.

This is the second award that has been granted to the CTRI from the NIH, with the initial award of $37.2 million being received in 2010.

The new NIH grant will fund expansion of mentored career development programs, research experiences for pharmacy and medical students, development of a phase I unit at the Center for Clinical Research, expansion of biocomputational capacity, development of ideas to speed up the processes involved in review of research and new informatics solutions for clinical trial recruitment.

Additionally, the CTRI will now be able to establish the Center for Lifespan Research. The center will focus on lifespan transitions and will focus on research efforts that affect the more vulnerable, special and diverse population of all ages, according to the release.

“It’s not just about drug development and testing. We’re investigating the full breadth of human health and disease, which includes understanding how behavior, the environment and risk factors play roles. Our research encompasses the human lifespan, from infants to seniors and all of the transitional points in between,” Firestein said in the release.