Discoveries in genomics will bring about enormous changes in the scientific community, but these changes have "caught many sectors of the biomedical academic community off guard," cautions Allen W. Cowley Jr., professor of medicine at the Medical College of Wisconsin.
Cowley calls "scientific manpower preparedness" a hurdle science must overcome to fully benefit from the Human Genome Project. A shortage of scientists appropriately trained to define the physiological function of genes and expressed proteins by linking genes to cell replication, development, metabolic function, intracellular signaling pathways, signal transduction, tissue and organ function, and whole organism functioning exists, he maintains. "It is imperative that institutions recognize the need for training programs for scientists who are scientifically multilingual," Cowley says. "Life scientists must be trained to utilize the genome infrastructure, define model systems, use mathematical models, and use technology if they are to apply genomics to the prevention and treatment of complex ...
