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| 15106 | Unexpectedly Following a Translational Science Path | February 22, 2022Former NCATS postbaccalaureate (postbac) fellow Rosita Asawa knew she wanted to be a scientist by middle school.“I loved reading science books as a child,” said Asawa, now 25, standing in front of her scientific poster on display in the atrium of the Natcher Building on NIH’s Bethesda campus last spring. “I decided somewhere around 7th or 8th grade that I was going to be a scientist.”After completing an NCATS summer internship in 2016, followed by three years as a fellow, she realized that translational science combines her interests in both medicine and basic research.“Translational science is the perfect area to be in because I want to have a direct impact both on patients and also on the process of getting treatments to patients,” explained Asawa.Training and Research Opportunities AboundNCATS supports training and career development programs that provide important skills, knowledge, perspectives and experiences that are critical for building the translational science workforce. The NCATS postbac program includes a seminar series, professional development opportunities and a strong network of peers and mentors. Interest in NCATS postbac (and postdoctoral) opportunities is growing: The number of NCATS’ postbac fellows has increased from 15 in 2012 to 24 in 2019. Asawa was among 20 fellows who took part in this year’s NCATS Postbac Poster Day.“Part of the reason I have loved this postbac experience is that it provided the opportunity to talk to so many experts in different fields,” Asawa said. “I’ve asked people about their career paths. I’ve shadowed people, including physician-scientists.”Asawa’s research interests are wide-ranging. In one project, she investigated new uses of medicines already approved by the U.S. Food and Drug Administration. Many research projects at NCATS focus on studying the use of old drugs in new ways. Asawa worked with researchers at The University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill to identify pediatric drugs that also might be repurposed to treat pediatric cancers. Likewise, in another project (the subject of her poster presentation), she collaborated with scientists at the University of California, Davis, to repurpose compounds for polycystic kidney disease.In her most recent research project, Asawa and her NCATS colleagues further developed a technique to measure how small molecules or drugs interact with an intended target inside a cell. She spearheaded efforts in the laboratory to determine whether the technology could be useful against a set of proteins with implications for cancer. She was grateful for the opportunity to play an active role in making decisions and moving a project forward.A New Field to ExploreThe translational science spectrum represents each stage of research along the path from the biological basis of health and disease to interventions that improve the health of individuals and the public. (NCATS)Asawa grew up in Steubenville, Ohio, a small blue-collar town at the Pennsylvania border. Her father is a construction worker, and her mother works in their home. A professor at Asawa’s college, Franciscan University of Steubenville, helped connect Asawa to opportunities at the NIH, including summer internships.Asawa wasn’t aware of translational science as a field until she came to NCATS and the Division of Preclinical Innovation, which focuses on finding ways to make science faster and more efficient, including speeding up the development of treatments to patients. Asawa recalled, “I hit the ground running and was exposed to technologies at NCATS I had never seen before,” such as high-throughput screening, which entails testing thousands of compounds at once for their biological activity and potential use in therapy.As she spent more time at NCATS, she wanted to learn more about the entire translational process—not only the preclinical aspects of research. She wanted to see where the process ultimately led and how the work could help patients.Prolific, Focused and DeterminedNCATS research scientist Natalia Martinez, Ph.D., mentored Asawa throughout her three years as a postbac fellow.“The NCATS postbac program provides students with an incredible opportunity and experience,” she explained. “They are getting exposed to translational science and a research environment—it’s a win for us to have such talented students and a win for them, as it helps their applications to graduate or medical school.”The numbers indicate the NCATS postbac program has prepared fellows to be successful with their applications to a wide variety of programs. This year, seven fellows are pursuing Ph.D. degrees ranging from organic chemistry to biomedical science to plant pathology. Two fellows are pursuing joint M.D.-Ph.D. programs, while others are attending dental school, medical school and a physician assistant program.Asawa started an M.D.-Ph.D. program at the University of Maryland this fall. She’s happy with her decision to postpone graduate school until this fall. “One of the main reasons I wanted a postbac was to make sure I still loved science after doing it 40 hours a week. It turned out that I still do.”Asawa already is a published author, including two papers on which she is first author—a significant honor for any scientist, let alone a postbac fellow. She plans to continue writing research manuscripts from her group’s work at NCATS, even while in school.Asawa’s advice to others applying to internships or postbac programs? “Try as many different paths as possible and talk to as many people as you can. Take advantage of the opportunity while you are at NIH to explore and ask questions. You never know where your curiosity will take you.” | Postbac Profile on Rosita Asawa E-Newsletter Blurb and Promo Content | Postbac Profile on Rosita Asawa E-Newsletter Blurb and Promo Content | ||||||
| 15079 | Artificial/Machine Intelligence | * { box-sizing: border-box; } .row { display: -ms-flexbox; /* IE10 */ display: flex; -ms-flex-wrap: wrap; /* IE10 */ flex-wrap: wrap; padding: 0 2px; } /* Create two equal columns that sits next to each other */ .column { -ms-flex: 50%; flex: 50%; max-width: 50%; padding: 0 4px; } .column img { margin-top: 4px; vertical-align: middle; width: 100%; } /* Responsive layout - makes a two column-layout instead of four columns */ @media screen and (max-width: 800px) { .column { -ms-flex: 50%; flex: 50%; max-width: 50%; } } /* Responsive layout - makes the two columns stack on top of each other instead of next to each other */ @media screen and (max-width: 600px) { .column { -ms-flex: 100%; flex: 100%; max-width: 100%; } } #photos { position: relative; } #photos a { margin: 0 auto; padding: 0; text-decoration: none; color: #fff; } #photos img { position: relative; float: left; width: 100%; } #photos p { padding: 3% 0 0 10%; position: absolute; max-width: 100%; font-family: "Dancing Script",cursive; color: #fff; font-size: 24px; } /*.border:after { content: ''; display: block; background: url('/files/MI_Header_1100x420.png') center center no-repeat; width:100%; height:258px; position: absolute; bottom: -258px; }*/ (function ($) { $( ".border" ).after( "" ); })(jQuery); Artificial/Machine Intelligence (A/MI) is rapidly becoming an important data science-based analytic tool across biomedical discovery, clinical research, medical diagnostics and devices, and precision medicine. Such tools and systems can uncover new possibilities for researchers, physicians, and patients, allowing them to make more informed decisions and achieve better outcomes. When deployed, these systems have the potential to enhance efficiency of the health research and care system. NIH Workshop: Machine Intelligence in Healthcare: Perspectives on Trustworthiness, Explainability, Usability and Transparency In the context of this workshop, MI was defined as the ability of a trained computer system to provide rational, unbiased guidance to humans in such a way that achieves optimal outcomes in a range of environments and circumstances. With such promise for applications of MI tools in the healthcare system, the challenges are: how do we trust that what the computer tells us is correct when we don’t understand how it arrived at the output/answer? How do we ensure that these outputs are safe and beneficial for human health? And, if we change the data or environment, how does this affect the output? These questions are especially relevant to clinical care decision making – are the risks of using such tools understood and how can the technology be deployed for maximal benefit? This workshop was sponsored by the National Institutes of Health (NIH) National Center for Advancing Translational Sciences (NCATS) and organized jointly with the National Cancer Institute (NCI) and the National Institute of Biomedical Imaging and Bioengineering (NIBIB). For more information, please contact Karlie Sharma (Karlie.sharma@nih.gov) or Christine Cutillo (cutilloc@mail.nih.gov). Goal To provide experts and the community the opportunity to share their perspectives on current issues associated with incorporation of MI systems into healthcare settings. Meeting outputs were used to develop a white paper on translating MI for clinical applications and the associated process improvement needed when implementing MI systems in healthcare environments. Agenda and Slides Workshop Breakdown Speaker Biographies Videocast link | /sites/default/files/AI_banner_media_1.png | Artificial/Machine Intelligence | /sites/default/files/AI_banner_media_0.png | Artificial/Machine Intelligence | ||||
| 15076 | Machine Intelligence in Healthcare – Agenda | .agendaHighlight{ background-color:#cbebe8; font-weight: bold; padding:5px;} table tr td {border:0px; vertical-align:top;} table tr th {border:0px; width:10%; vertical-align:top;} Goal To provide experts and the community the opportunity to share their perspectives on current issues associated with incorporation of MI systems into healthcare settings. Meeting outputs will be used to develop a whitepaper on translating MI for clinical applications and the associated process improvement needed when implementing MI systems in healthcare environments. Agenda (to download Speaker Bios and Presentations please click the underlined links below) 8:00 AM: REGISTRATION 8:30 AM: WELCOME AND WORKSHOP OVERVIEW Joni Rutter, PhD, Deputy Director, National Center for Advancing Translational Sciences, National Institutes of Health Bruce J. Tromberg, PhD, Director, National Institute of Biomedical Imaging and Bioengineering (NIBIB), National Institutes of Health 8:45 AM: SESSION 1: TRUSTWORTHINESS 8:45 AM: Introduction to Session 8:50 AM: Trustworthiness of Patient Generated Health Data Session Chair: Luca Foschini, PhD, Co-founder and Chief Data Scientist, Evidation Health 9:00 AM: How Can We Trust Intelligence (Human or Machine) for Guiding Healthcare Decisions? Brian Alper, MD, MSPH, FAAFP, Founder of DynaMed and Vice President of Innovations and Evidence-Based Medicine Development for EBSCO Health 9:10 AM: An Evaluation of Machine Intelligence Tools to Diagnose Genetic Diseases in Critically Ill Infants Michelle Clark, PhD, Statistical Scientist, Rady Children’s Insitute for Genomic Medicine 9:20 AM: How to Trust, but Verify, in Healthcare Nigam Shah, MBBS, PhD, Associate Professor of Medicine (Biomedical Informatics) and of Biomedical Data Science, Stanford University 9:30 AM: Panel Discussion 10:15 AM: BREAK 10:30 AM: SESSION 2: EXPLAINABILITY 10:30 AM: Introduction to Session 10:35 AM: A Roadmap for AI in Healthcare Session Chair: Shinjini Kundu, MD, PhD, Medical Researcher and Resident Physician, Department of Radiology at The Johns Hopkins Hospital 10:45 AM: Approaches for Explainability of AI-enabled Systems in Medical Imaging Berkman Sahiner, PhD, Senior Biomedical Research Scientist at the US Food and Drug Administration (FDA) 10:55 AM: Explainability and Understanding for Deep Learning Models Sanji Fernando, Senior Vice President of Artificial Intelligence and Analytics Platforms, OptumHealth 11:05 AM: The Importance of Algorithmic Explainability in Behavioral Health Colin Walsh, MD, MA, Assistant Professor of Biomedical Informatics, Medicine and Psychiatry, Vanderbilt University Medical Center 11:15 AM: Panel Discussion 12:00 PM: LUNCH 1:15 PM: SESSION 3: USABILITY 1:15 PM: Introduction to Session 1:20 PM: Moving AI to the Point of Care Session Chair: Kenneth Mandl, MD, MPH, Donald A.B. Lindberg Professor of Pediatrics and Biomedical Informatics, Harvard Medical School 1:30 PM: Usability Lessons Applicable to MI Chris Dymek, EdD, Director, Division of Health Information Technology, Agency for Healthcare Research and Quality 1:40 PM: Deep Care Management at Duke, Lessons in Using MI in a Medicare Population Erich Senin Huang, MD, PhD, Assistant Professor in Biostatistics and Bioinformatics, Duke University 1:50 PM: Zero-Overhead Contactless Sensors for Health Monitoring Dina Katabi, PhD, Andrew and Ema Viterbi Professor of Electrical Engineering and Computer Science, Massachusetts Institute of Technology 2:00 PM: Panel Discussion 2:45 PM: BREAK 3:00 PM: SESSION 4: TRANSPARENCY AND FAIRNESS 3:00 PM: Introduction to Session 3:05 PM: Machine Intelligence in Healthcare – Precision Medicine Analytics Platform Sezin Palmer, Mission Area Executive for National Health, Johns Hopkins University Applied Physics Laboratory 3:15 PM: Learning Healthy Models for Healthcare - What Transparency is Needed to Deploy Models in Healthcare? Marzyeh Ghassemi, PhD, Assistant Professor of Computer Science and Medicine, University of Toronto 3:25 PM: Vulnerabilities in Machine Learning S. Matthew Liao, AB, Dphil, Director of the Center for Bioethics, College of Global Public Health, New York University 3:35 PM: Thinking About Transparency and Fairness at Scale: The Workforce, Providers and Suppliers Session Chair: Maxine Mackintosh, Researcher, Alan Turing Institute and Co-Founder, One HealthTech 3:45 PM: Panel Discussion 4:30 PM: WRAP-UP AND CONCLUSIONS Session 1 – Session Chair Luca Foschini Session 2 – Session Chair Shinjini Kundu Session 3 – Session Chair Kenneth Mandl Session 4 – Session Chair Maxine Mackintosh 5:00 PM: ADJOURN | Machine intelligence in Healthcare - Agenda | Machine intelligence in Healthcare - Agenda | ||||||
| 15202 | ASPIRE Funding | Current Opportunities There are no open funding opportunities at this time. Expired Funding Announcements NOT-TR-18-301: HEAL Initiative: Announcement of the NCATS ASPIRE Design Challenges to Develop Innovative and Catalytic Approaches Towards Solving the Opioid Crisis The goal of the inaugural NCATS ASPIRE Design Challenges is to develop innovative and catalytic approaches toward solving the opioid crisis through development of (1) novel chemistries; (2) data-mining and analysis tools and technologies; and (3) biological assays that will revolutionize discovery, development and preclinical testing of the next-generation, safer and non-addictive analgesics to treat pain, as well as new treatments for opioid use disorder and overdose. The total prize purse for each challenge is $500,000. Learn more about the challenges. The NCATS ASPIRE Challenges are part of The Helping to End Addiction Long-termSM Initiative to speed scientific solutions to the national opioid public health crisis. | Funding | Funding | ||||||
| 15208 | A Specialized Platform for Innovative Research Exploration (ASPIRE) | #featured-stories > #secondary-image > .img-responsive { min-height: 312px; } By addressing long-standing challenges in the field of chemistry, including lack of standardization, low reproducibility and inability to predict how new chemicals will behave, ASPIRE is designed to bring novel, safe and effective treatments to more patients more quickly at lower cost. Learn More. | ||||||||
| 14920 | NCATS-Supported Research Reduces Time to Diagnosis for Seriously Ill Children with Genetic Diseases | Dr. Stephen Kingsmore, President and CEO of Rady Children's Institute for Genomic MedicineCredit: Rady Children's Institute for Genomic MedicineMarch 11, 2022Seriously ill children with genetic diseases, particularly infants in intensive care units for whom every hour and day is critical, might now be diagnosed and treated far more quickly than in the past.In recent years, a technology called rapid whole-genome sequencing has been a successful first step to achieving faster diagnoses. The results of rapid whole-genome sequencing, however, must be interpreted by highly specialized individuals who are not always available when and where children need them. This has made it challenging to implement the technology at the point of care.A group of researchers led by Stephen F. Kingsmore at the Rady Children’s Institute for Genomic Medicine has developed a new automated machine-learning approach for diagnosing these children more quickly—combining rapid whole-genome sequencing with automated phenotyping and interpretation. This approach helps achieve a diagnosis by comparing a patient’s genomic results with clinical information from electronic health records and elsewhere, reducing the need for labor-intensive manual analysis of genomic data. Automating this step significantly decreases the time to diagnosis and, consequently, the time to initiating appropriate treatment. The researchers described their results in a paper published in the April 24, 2019, issue of Science Translational Medicine. This new approach to diagnosing genetic diseases speeds answers to physicians caring for seriously ill children, ultimately leading to better outcomes.This research was supported in part by an NCATS Clinical and Translational Science Award Program Collaborative Innovation Award. These awards are designed to support collaborative translational science innovations that benefit public health. | NCATS-Supported Research Reduces Time | NCATS-Supported Research Reduces Time | ||||||
| 14938 | Ask an Astronaut: Biomedical Science Edition | NCATS collaborated with The Children's Inn at NIH, the Amateur Radio on the International Space Station (ARISS) and the International Space Station U.S. National Laboratory (ISS National Lab) to host Ask an Astronaut: Biomedical Science Edition. The event took place Monday, September 23, 2019, at The Children’s Inn on the NIH Campus in Bethesda, Maryland. This unique experience provided children receiving care at NIH the opportunity to talk to an astronaut in space. Participants learned about the importance of conducting biomedical research in a microgravity environment, including NCATS' Tissue Chips in Space projects that recently completed their first mission to the ISS. NASA astronaut Nick Hague, currently living aboard the International Space Station, was chosen to share his experience in space and answer questions from children residing at The Children’s Inn at NIH. Colonel Hague was selected by the NASA astronaut program in 2013. He is a graduate of the U.S. Air Force Academy and the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. Prior to his selection to NASA’s 21st group of astronauts, Col. Hague was deployed to Iraq and taught classes at the U.S. Air Force Academy, including introductory astronautics and scuba diving. He is married to Lieutenant. Col. Catie Hague of the United States Air Force; has two children; and considers Hoxie, Kansas, his hometown. He was launched in March 2019 and will serve aboard the International Space Station as a flight engineer for Expeditions 59 and 60. How "Ask an Astronaut" Worked Children, or parents on their behalf, submitted questions for the astronaut in advance. Approximately 20 questions were preselected for children to ask the day of the event. When the event began, ARISS connected with the ISS to The Children’s Inn via ham radio. Once the connection was established, the children began asking questions, and the astronaut responded to each one. The ISS needed to be in the proper orbit with the connecting ham radio station on Earth, which means the transmission lasted no more than 10 minutes. Once the transmission was complete, the children asked additional questions of NCATS, The Children’s Inn and ARISS representatives in attendance. About the NCATS Tissue Chips in Space Program Image courtesy of NASA NCATS has partnered with the ISS National Lab to collaborate on refining tissue chip technology for biomedical research use on the space station. Translational research at the ISS National Lab provides unprecedented opportunities to study the effects of a microgravity environment on the human body. Tissue chip applications at the laboratory will enable studies of organs at the cell and tissue levels under reduced gravity, will contribute to our understanding of the process of aging and could reveal molecular targets that can slow that process. In December 2018, NCATS worked with NASA to launch the first NIH-supported tissue chips into space for research. In May 2019, four additional NCATS-funded tissue chip projects took their first mission to the ISS. About the ARISS Program Image courtesy of ARISS Through this ARISS program, the community becomes more aware of the substantial benefits of human spaceflight and the exploration and discovery that occur on spaceflight journeys. Participants learn about space technologies and the technologies involved with space communications through exploration of amateur radio. Amateur radio organizations and space agencies around the world sponsor this opportunity by providing the equipment and operational support to enable direct communication with crew on the ISS via amateur radio. Hundreds of amateur radio operators around the world work behind the scenes to make these educational experiences possible. About the ISS National Lab For more than 17 years, humans have lived and worked continuously onboard the ISS, advancing scientific knowledge, demonstrating new technologies and making research breakthroughs not possible on Earth that will enable long-duration exploration into deep space and benefit life here on our planet. A global endeavor, more than 230 people from 18 countries have visited the unique microgravity laboratory that has hosted more than 2,400 research investigations from researchers in more than 103 countries. Image courtesy of NASA | Ask an Astronaut: Biomedical Science Edition | Ask an Astronaut: Biomedical Science Edition | ||||||
| 14917 | NCATS BioPlanet: A Resource for Discovery | An example of pathways involved in autism in the BioPlanet database. When clicked, the interactive BioPlanet globe provides the name of specific pathways and its relationship to similar pathways.To better understand – and ultimately predict – how compounds and drugs affect the body or impact a disease, scientists examine biological pathways, complex cellular thoroughfares of chemical signals, chemical reactions and other processes that occur within and among cells. They can design assays, or tests, to determine what happens to a pathway when it is disrupted or altered, and how it matters to cells. But knowing which individual pathways to focus on can be challenging.To meet this challenge, NCATS scientists and their colleagues have created a one-of-a-kind database that details the body’s biological pathways. The new resource promises to help bridge a translational science gap by enabling researchers to more readily study gene activity, gather insights on disease mechanisms, shed light on when and how compounds are toxic to cells and more.“BioPlanet is a single collection of all known biological pathways operating in human cells. It is a general, comprehensive resource for the entire biological research community to use,” said NCATS scientist Ruili Huang, Ph.D. “Previously, researchers would have to go to different databases and not everyone had the skills to link data from those different sources.”BioPlanet is the first attempt to fill this void, and it took more than five years to build. The brainchild of former NCATS Director Christopher P. Austin, M.D., it combines data from seven pathway databases and incorporates 1,658 human pathways. The database is searchable by keywords, such as those that appear in a gene or pathway name or by disease. Scientists can visualize pathways on a three-dimensional globe, which inspired the name BioPlanet.Biological pathways frequently overlap and interact. BioPlanet allows researchers to study and analyze human pathways and how they connect. They can use the resource as a starting point for generating hypotheses and designing experiments to better understand how biological systems function and work together.For example, a researcher studying a set of disease-related genes can search the BioPlanet database for the corresponding biological pathways, then use that information to identify places, or targets, in a pathway that could be affected by a drug. Scientists can design assays to screen thousands of compounds to find those that work against such targets, and possibly, the disease. Similarly, scientists can use BioPlanet to create a set of assays to determine and predict the toxicity of compounds to cells.NCATS plans to continually expand and update BioPlanet. Because the resource currently includes only human pathways, there also are plans to add pathways for nonhuman species. Austin, Huang and their colleagues recently described BioPlanet in Frontiers in Pharmacology. | NCATS BioPlanet: A Resource for Discovery | NCATS BioPlanet: A Resource for Discovery | ||||||
| 14860 | NIH-NASA Activities | NCATS is the home for collaborations on biomedical research and public health with the National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA). The agencies work together to coordinate funding and collaboration opportunities, workshops and conferences, special interest groups and other activities across agencies. For more information, contact Danilo A. Tagle, Ph.D., NIH-NASA liaison point of contact. Meetings and Other Events 2021 NIH Space Chat with Astronaut Kate Rubins (March 26) 2020 BIO Convention (June 8–11) 2019 ISS R&D Conference (August 3–6) Ask an Astronaut: Biomedical Science Edition (September 23) International Astronautical Congress (October 21–25) Space Summit 2019 (October 14–15) American Society for Gravitational and Space Research Annual Meeting (November 19–23) 2018 Organs- and Tissues-on-Chips (D1) (April 8–12) NIH-NASA Projects Tissue Chips in Space (launched on SpX 16, 17, 20, 21 and 24) NCI NeXT program (launched on SpX 17) NCI RAS program (launched on SpX16) News 2020 Tissue Chip Trio to Orbit Earth for Answers to Osteoarthritis and Muscle Diseases (NCATS, December 2) Media Advisory: To Improve Health on Earth, NIH-Funded Tissue Chips Push New Boundaries in Space (NCATS, NIBIB, NIH) (March 2) 2019 NCATS-Supported Scientists Model Aging-Related Conditions in Space to Improve Human Health on Earth (NCATS) (April 24) 2018 NIH-Funded Tissue Chips Rocket to International Space Station (NCATS) (December 4) A Giant Leap Forward for Tissue Chip Research in Space (NASA) (November 8) 2017 CASIS, NCATS, and the NIBIB Announce International Space Station Funding Opportunity Focused on Human Physiology (CASIS) (December 4) CASIS and NCATS Announce Five Projects Selected from International Space Station Funding Opportunity Focused on Human Physiology Research (ISS/CASIS) (June 22) Astronaut Describes Experiences Aboard ISS, Sequencing DNA in Space (PDF - 1,848KB) (NIH) (June 2) 2016 SpaceChat Checks in on Science in the ‘Final Frontier’ (PDF - 2,146KB) (NIH) (November 4) NCATS, CASIS Announce Funding Opportunity to Conduct Tissue Chip Research in Space (NCATS) (October 5) NIBIB-Funded Space Experiment on Bone Health Successfully Launched Into Orbit (NIBIB) (July 19) The ISS National Lab and NCATS Collaborate to Promote Human Physiology Research on the International Space Station (Center for the Advancement of Science in Space) (July 12) 2015 Health Research Off the Earth, for the Earth (NASA) (April 17) Scientists Make No Bones about First Study of Osteocyte Cultures on Space Station (NASA) (April 10) Research with Space Explorers May One Day Heal Earth’s Warriors (NASA) (February 17) T-cell Activation in Aging — Studying Immune Function in Microgravity (NIA video) (January 26) Related Links NASA Human Research Program Research Opportunities How to Get Your Research onto and Operated on the ISS ISS National Laboratory Research Opportunities Funding and Information for Prospective Researchers Center for the Advancement of Science in Space Aerospace Medical Association | NIH-NASA Activities | NIH-NASA Activities | ||||||
| 14863 | History of NIH and NASA Collaborations | NIH and NASA have collaborated since the Project Gemini era in the early 1960s. NASA has identified 33 medical health risks to humans who will engage in deep space travel and is interested in research in these areas. In 2017, NIH Director Francis S. Collins, M.D., Ph.D., and former NASA Deputy Administrator Dava J. Newman, Ph.D., signed a second NIH-NASA Memorandum of Understanding (MOU) (PDF - 410KB). The MOU enabled NIH and NASA to develop processes by which NIH grantees could access the International Space Station U.S. National Laboratory as well as NASA facilities for biomedical research projects designed to improve human health on Earth. As outlined in the MOU, NIH and NASA efforts include establishing a framework of cooperation to encourage interaction between NIH and NASA research communities and integrating results from that research into improved understanding of human physiology and health. In early 2018, Collins appointed NCATS’ director, Christopher P. Austin, M.D., as the new NIH liaison to NASA. This role was previously held by the directors of NIH’s National Institute of Arthritis and Musculoskeletal and Skin Diseases and NIH’s National Institute of Biomedical Imaging and Bioengineering. An integral part of this NIH-NASA collaboration includes the representation from over 20 of the 27 NIH Institutes and Centers on the NIH-NASA Scientific Potential/Actual Collaborative Efforts (SPACE) group. The SPACE Group meets quarterly to discuss, share and brainstorm biomedical research activities that are of relevance to human and astronaut heath. The goals of the group are to: Explore areas of potential synergy for biomedical scientific research that fulfills the mandates of both NIH and NASA. Facilitate communications among researchers to instigate and support collaborative efforts. Explore possibilities for joint efforts between NIH and NASA to support research into synergistic biomedical interest areas and implement appropriate joint exercises. In December 2018, Deputy Secretary of the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services (HHS), Eric. D. Hargan appointed Austin to lead the advancement of human health research between HHS agencies and NASA. An interagency agreement (PDF - 273KB) was signed with the objectives to: Share innovative ideas for addressing science and tech challenges. Promote collaboration and cooperation in research and development related to human and public health. Leverage shared resources including expertise, access to facilities and scientific resources. The HHS-NASA team has engaged with a number of HHS components to help build collaborative efforts. For more information, email Danilo A. Tagle, Ph.D., NIH-NASA liaison point of contact. | History of NIH and NASA Collaborations | History of NIH and NASA Collaborations |
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