UNMC received fourth quarter grant awards totaling $15.1 million, bringing the year-end total to $50.8 million — its best year ever. The $50 million milestone represents a 23 percent increase in funding over last year’s $41.3 million total.
“There are three key contributing factors for the university’s outstanding performance last year,” said Thomas Rosenquist, Ph.D., vice chancellor for research. “First, based in large part upon the excellent leadership of Dr. Ken Cowan, Dr. John Gollan, Dr. Carl Camras, Dr. Bruce Buehler and Dr. Byers Shaw, we have increased our ability to strategically recruit well-funded investigators. Second, we have increased success by UNMC investigators in winning larger grants, especially multi-disciplinary program-type grants. Third, we have improved our infrastructure permitting new and exciting kinds of research — for example, the production and use of genetically modified mice in the UNMC Transgenic Mouse facility headed by Dr. Michael Salbaum.”
Ken Cowan, M.D., Ph.D., is director of the UNMC Eppley Cancer Center; John Gollan, M.D., is chairman of the UNMC College of Medicine internal medicine department; Carl Camras, M.D., is professor and chairman of the department of ophthalmology; Byers Shaw, M.D., is professor and chairman of the department of surgery; Bruce Buehler, M.D., is director of the Munroe-Meyer Institute and chairman of the department of pediatrics; and Michael Salbaum, Ph.D., is a scientist at the Munroe-Meyer Institute’s Hattie B. Munroe Center for Human Molecular Genetics.
Record-breaking year
Dr. Rosenquist said UNMC’s record-breaking year owes much to the strategic contributions of Howard Gendelman, M.D., director of the Center for Neurovirology and Neurodegenerative Disorders (CNND), whose department realized explosive growth in funding from the National Institutes of Health (from $1.38 million in FY 2001 to $3.6 million in FY 2002); and James Turpen, Ph.D., professor and interim chairman of genetics, cell biology and anatomy, principal investigator for a NIH grant that is $2 million per year and expected to increase to $3 million per year in 2003.
The department of genetics, cell biology and anatomy is the College of Medicine’s most successful department in NIH funding, now ranked 32nd nationally out of 124 medical centers. No other UNMC College of Medicine department is ranked this high. This department is tied in national rankings with Yale University and is ranked higher than its counterparts at such major research universities as the University of Oregon, University of Wisconsin, Emory University, University of Alabama-Birmingham and University of Southern California.
On the road to $100 million
Dr. Rosenquist said that the university’s $50 million milestone means it’s half way to $100 million in annual research funding. He also believes UNMC can reach the $100 million benchmark in three more years.
“As good as it feels to surpass $50 million in research funding, the more important goal is $100 million,” Dr. Rosenquist said. “That is the point at which a medical center has achieved a durable momentum that helps assure continuing research funding success. At our current rate of growth, UNMC should meet the $100 million goal in 2005.
“The completion of the Research Center of Excellence in the fall of 2003 will be a tremendous boost to our research growth momentum. We also have a critical need for continued access to the tobacco settlement funds — funds that permitted a number of strategic faculty recruitments.”
Fourth quarter success
The fourth quarter represents the months of April, May and June. The following investigators are some of those who received grants of $100,000 or more during the fourth quarter:
- Michael (Tony) Hollingsworth, Ph.D., professor at the UNMC Eppley Cancer Center, received $1.5 million for research on gastrointestinal cancer;
- Nancy Waltman, Ph.D., associate professor in the UNMC College of Nursing-Lincoln division, received $644,478 for research on prevention of osteoporosis in breast cancer survivors;
- Susan Walker, Ed.D., professor and chairperson of the department of gerontological, psychosocial and community health nursing in the College of Nursing, received $413,818 for research on promoting healthy eating and activity in rural women;
- Dr. Gendelman, received $366,705; and CNND investigators Yuri Persidsky, M.D., Ph.D., Jialin Zheng, M.D., Anuja Ghorpade, Ph.D., and Huangui Xiong, M.D., Ph.D., also assistant professors in the department of pathology and microbiology, received $294,250, $257,323, $209,653, and $184,375, respectively, for research on HIV-related dementia.