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Human resources

Researchers focus on life sciences projects

By Terry Rombeck (Contact)

Saturday, August 14, 2004

Val Smith wants to change the way the hospital industry administers IVs for patients.

Smith, a Kansas University professor of ecology and evolutionary biology, is part of a six-member research team that is studying how nutrients affect various disease agents, including HIV and cancer. The results could lead to nutrient mixes that would be added to the glucose and saline patients traditionally receive when they can't eat.

"My goal is to reason out a way to create a formula you could put in IV bags in the hospital, so that instead of just glucose and saline a bag would have other things as well," Smith said. "In the best of all future possible worlds, it would be a mix in a bag that was tailored to the pathogen, so it would be the best possible nutrition for the (patient) and the worse possible nutrition for the disease agent."

Smith's project, done with scientists from Arizona State University, is the type of research KU officials are hoping to pursue more of in upcoming years: interdisciplinary research that improves the lives of humans.

Now more than ever, it appears the resources to pursue those types of life sciences projects may be coming in place. And the results likely will have implications throughout Lawrence -- not just at KU.

"We must get started to focus or mobilize on something of this type or we'll be left out of much of the 21st century economy," said Ted Haggart, president of Douglas County Bank and co-chairman of Lawrence's Life Science Task Force. "It won't happen if we don't put these extra efforts and focus our energies behind it."

Legislative action

Sparking the new bio-optimism is the Kansas Economic Growth Act, which was approved by the 2004 Kansas Legislature. The act promises to pump $500 million into the life science industry in Kansas in the next 10 years, through 60 university faculty positions, research building space and money for start-up companies and other economic development.

David Shulenburger, KU's provost and executive vice chancellor, said he expected university resources from the act to be split roughly in thirds among Kansas State University, KU's main campus and the KU Medical Center.

"We ought to be a strong competitor for those resources," he said. "It's an investment that will pay off for the state."

Even without the Economic Growth Act, KU has increased the share of bioscience research it conducts. The university's total research expenditures increased 15 percent -- from $224 million to $257.9 million -- between fiscal years 2001 and 2003, the most recent year data is available.

Plan of attack

The next few months will be used to plan KU's research future in more than one way.

Jim Roberts, vice provost for research and president of the KU Center for Research, said he will begin soliciting input for KU's proposal to the Kansas Bioscience Authority, which will allocate funds from the Economic Growth Act. Proposals from the Lawrence and Medical Center campuses will be combined into a single report for the authority, which Roberts said he expects to submit by the first of the year.

"They're moving fast to appoint the board," he said. "There's consensus within KU that we need to have something done. They're moving fast."

Any plan will require mapping out how KU will turn university research into start-up companies and how the research will help the Kansas economy That's why the university is working closely with the Chamber of Commerce's Life Sciences Task Force.

In addition to the Bioscience Authority proposal, Roberts said he's also expecting KU officials to create a five-year strategic plan for research. The last plan was completed in 1998.

"It's good to sit back and figure out where you are," he said.

Space issues

Expanding KU's research enterprise also will mean planning for future building use. Current research space is full.

The Structural Biology Center, under construction on west campus near the Higuchi Biosciences Center, will add two large pieces of equipment for protein research. Roberts said another project soon will start to remodel part of Malott Hall into a transgenic animal facility, where researchers will add and remove genes in mice and examine the effects.

Roberts said he'd like to add two more 100,000-square-foot research buildings on campus in the next five years. KU's acquisition of additional research space in the former Oread Labs facility near 15th and Wakarusa helped researchers land several large grants, and having more than enough space for now could lead to similar large projects.

"We'd like to be in a leadership mode on space," he said. "We're finding the power of being out ahead in going after these big proposals."

The plan for expansion sounds logical to Rob Ward, a microbiologist who came to KU last year.

Ward studies the way proteins and genes affect development in fruit flies, with hopes of applying the research to humans. He said increasing the size and quality of the faculty would prompt more top researchers to consider coming to Kansas.

"Kansas is somewhat an out-of-the-way place, but having stellar faculty will put them on the map," he said. "By bringing in the good senior faculty, that will start things. I think we're on our way."