New Biomed Labs To Explore Oceans In Pursuit Of Knowledge And Profit

SAN DIEGO—The University of California, San Diego, and its affiliate, the Scripps Institute of Oceanography, are planning a new center that will combine the basic research skills of Scripps investigators with the medical talents of the university’s school of medicine to unlock the secrets of sea life. The UCSD-Scripps project—details of which are still being worked out—is the latest of several efforts in recent months by institutions intent on forging ahead with new marine biomedical research centers in the hope of broadening their knowledge of the sea as well as discovering substances that will improve the human condition and, where possible, prove commercially viable. The Marine Biological Laboratory (MBL) at Woods Hole, Mass., for example, is preparing to break ground for a new laboratory to expand its scientific program and a second facility to culture sea life.. Its emphasis, as befits its 102-year history, is to promote scientific inquiry. But another private, nonprofit research facility, the Harbor Branch Oceanographic Institution in Fort Pierce, Ha., has embarked on work that it hopes also will have long-term commercial applications. “We feel that somewhere in this whole area is some extremely interesting research that might be very promising [commercially],” says Scripps Director Edward Frieman. A committee of marine scientists, physicians, and pharmacologists at Scripps, in nearby La Jolla, and UCSD are plotting the future of the marine center. By next year, they hope to have developed a structure and hired a scientist to run it. The physiology laboratory at Scripps, which now investigates the biological and behavioral aspects of marine life, is seen as a major component of the new center. Its long-time head, Fred White, retired last year, and officials say his position may be enlarged to encompass the new center. “You need both the physical and clinical settings to make progress in this area,” says William Fenical, an organic chemist at UCSD who has done extensive work on marine substances. “With a first-class medical school next door to a first-class marine center, we think we have a unique opportunity.” While optimistic, Fenical knows that the job won’t be easy. Seapharm Inc., a commercial venture with the goal of producing a new drug within five years, went bankrupt last year. Fenical attributes some of its problems to an unwillingness to work more closely with the scientific community to understand the state of the science. But the idea behind the project is not dead. A team of scientists from that ill-fated venture have reassembled at Harbor Branch, and are taking a more cautious and longterm approach to the problem. In fact, the Harbor Branch researchers are completing a $650,000 contract with the National Cancer Institute to survey shallow-water organisms for possible antitumor compounds. The same desire to succeed in the short term proved fatal to a marine biomedical center in Australia that Hoffmann-LaRoche closed in 1981 after several years of productive scientific work. “It was set up with a oonscientious, 10-year plan,” recalls Fenical. “But in the sixth year the facility was closed,” he says, after the company decided to put the funds into another area. Even so, the researchers generated more than 100 publications describing many new natural marine products. MEL officials have kept the need for long-term research clearly in sight as they launch their two new centers. Construction is expected to begin late next year, says MBL asso ciate director Ray Epstein, once additional funds are raised to meet the $20 million cost of the project. The first building, the Advanced Studies Center, will allow MBL to expand its year-round basic research program. The program involves some 80 scientists a number that increases 10-fold during the summer months. "We want a larger year-round program with departments,” says Epstein, “and we’re looking at areas like neurobiology and cell development.” Last year a molecular biology center was completed at the nearby Woods Hole Oceanographic Institute, and MBL scientists will be working there to expand the frontiers of molecular biology. The second MBL building will be a place where predictable strains of marine creatures can be bred in a way similar to what is done for mice and other land-based laboratory animals. “Sea slugs are used for memory and learning studies,” says lab spokesman George Liles. “Our people are growing slugs to understand more about their genetic history, including such factors as which are the fastest learners. Then, better testing models can be devised.” Sitting on the nation’s other coast, the UCSD-Scripps collaboration hopes to build on the work of others in its search for potentially useful products. Officials cite a new anti-inflammatory agent known as manoalide as one example. Manoalide is derived from a type of sponge discovered by Hawaiian scientists near the island of Palau in the South Pacific. John Faukner of Scripps and Robert Jacobs of UC-Santa Barbara discovered its potential after painting the organic compound on a laboratory mouse whose ear had become inflamed. Allergan Pharmaceuticals of Irvine, Calif., is now conducting clinical trials of the compound. Another drug being tested, although not as far along as manoalide, is a potential painkiller derived from a sea whip, a type of blue coral. The substance, called pseudopterosin, is thought to work by blocking naturally produced substances in the body that carry pain messages throughout the nervous system. Scientists believe that the substance lacks the addictive qualities of existing painkillers. In one of the more novel apapproaches toward genectic research, a a group of Italian scientists led by molecular biologist Carrado Spadafora has reported that the head of sperm from a sea urchin (xenopus) is capable of transferring DNA into the cells of mice by simple mixing. If substantiated, this discovery could have many potential applications as a much simpler way to achieve the transfer of genetic material. Gerard Burrow, dean of the UCSD School of Medicine, points to rumors of even better capabilities in Zebra fish sperm as one of several questions the new center could explore. Another important mission for the center, Burrow says, is the development of less costly and more humane models for testing drugs and experimenting on spineless sea creatures rather than the vertebrate species now used. “Doctors are caring and compassionate people, too,” he says. “We don’t enjoy using animals for experiments.” Existing work at Scripps to find invertebrate models as a substitute, says UCSD’s Fenical, is essential to blunt the objections of animal rights activists to the use of mice, dogs, and cats. Otherwise, he warns, “we are concerned that medical research may come to a standstill.” Rex Dalton is a reporter for the San Diego Union.

New Biomed Labs To Explore Oceans In Pursuit Of Knowledge And Profit

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