Profession Notes

Collaborating on Russia's Microbial Diversity In an effort to control the propagation of biological warfare expertise, the Department of Energy (DOE) Initiative for Proliferation Prevention (IPP) program has launched a collaborative effort with four Russian biological institutes and a U.S. corporation to create a Russian Ecological Biotrade Center in Puschino. The goal is to use biomolecular techniques to evaluate the range, extent, and potential value of Russia's microbial diversity. DOE will provide $1 million towards this two-year project. Diversa Corp. of San Diego has signed a cooperative research and development agreement that gives the company rights to discover genes from samples and commercialize resulting products for markets such as the pharmaceutical, agricultural, chemical processing, and industrial sectors. Diversa will pay royalties to Russia on these products. Idaho National Engineering and Environmental Laboratory (INEEL) of Idaho Falls and Diversa will collaborate with the State Research Center for Applied Microbiology, the All Russian Institute of Phytopathology, the Institute of Biochemistry and Physiology of Microorganisms, and the Research Center of Toxicology and Hygienic Regulation of Biopreparations. "The advantage of the collaboration is that it aligns three institutes formerly involved in biological warfare with an academic institute involved in collection and speciation to form a nongovernmental company for product commercialization purposes," explains Rob Rogers, INEEL principal project investigator. "DOE's role is to make sure there is a sustainable basis for the center to service many companies." Stephanie Ghetti, IPP manager of biological engagement, adds, "The intent of the IPP program is to create sustainable, commercial opportunities between former Soviet weapons scientists and U.S. scientists with industry investment. Essentially, the IPP program provides the seed money and structure to initiate the collaboration and provides access to former Soviet expertise that U.S. industry may not have otherwise. The desired outcome is for the company to continue a profitable, long-term relationship with the former Soviet scientists that will result in sustainable income and job stability for the scientists." --Kate Devine Agencies to Study Healthcare Inequities The Department of Health and Human Services' Agency for Healthcare Research and Quality (AHRQ) is partnering with the Office of Research on Minority Health and the National Cancer Institute on a five-year, $45 million study to determine the factors underlying ethnic and racial inequities in healthcare. With funding in place in September 2000, the EXCEED (Excellence Centers to Eliminate Ethnic/Racial Disparities) initiative will encompass research projects at Baylor College of Medicine in Houston; University of North Carolina, Chapel Hill; Mount Sinai School of Medicine in New York; University of Colorado Health Sciences Center in Denver; Morehouse School of Medicine in Atlanta; University of Pittsburgh; University of California, Los Angeles; Medical University of South Carolina in Charleston; and University of California, San Francisco. "The initiative is intended to go beyond the mere documentation of disparities to improve our understanding of why they exist and how they can be reduced or eliminated," says Daniel Stryer, of the Center for Outcomes and Effectiveness Research, AHRQ. "I expect that some of the information will point towards physiologic differences and will identify new questions for basic science work. We expect to be able to document increased capacity for minority health services research. In terms of [centers'] outputs, we want to go beyond just counting the number of publications that each center produces." --Kate Devine

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Kate Devine

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December 2000

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