The National Institute of Biomedical Imaging and Bioengineering (NIBIB) is the latest addition to the National Institutes of Healths 27 institutes and centers. The institute, which opened last April, already has a staff of about 30 employees and has funded three research grants.
In contrast to most of the other institutes, which are devoted to diseases, organ systems, or populations, the new institute focuses on medical technology. "Dedicating an institute to medical technologies rather than to diseases may seem novel for the NIH, but it is a reflection of where science is today and where science will be taking us tomorrow," said Ruth Kirschstein, M.D., NIHs deputy director.
This past summer NIBIB held the first international symposium on biomedical imaging, and this month the institute is sponsoring a basic and clinical science research conference on interventional oncology. Next year the NIBIB will hold a workshop on image-guided interventions. At the same time, institute staff are weighing the need for some new kinds of training missions that may need to be initiated.
The new institute "represents the coming of age of biomedical engineering and imaging as a vital and valuable enterprise that contributes substantially to the infrastructure essential to research advances in the biomedical sciences," said William R. Hendee, Ph.D., vice president of the Medical College of Wisconsin in Milwaukee. Hendee was a leader among the forces that brought NIBIB into reality. "It is a reflection of the remarkable research advances in biomedical imaging and engineering and the potential of these disciplines to contribute to the fulfillment of the mission of NIH," Hendee and his colleagues wrote in January in the Annals of Biomedical Engineering.
NIBIB came into being only after a lengthy and tortuous debate (see News, Feb. 21, 2001, p. 256). Critics argued that improving imaging technology is not research, it is development. But the imaging and biomedical engineering community persisted. They supported legislative proposals to create an institute, and since 1996 Congress had considered a number of bills to create an imaging and biomedical engineering institute. None were acted upon.
Finally, in 2000, Congress took action on a bill drafted by U.S. Rep. Richard Burr (R-N.C.) at the urging of C. Douglas Maynard, M.D., professor of radiology at Wake Forest University School of Medicine, Winston-Salem, N.C. Maynard is president of the Academy of Radiology Research, a group of more than 20 imaging professional societies that formed in 1995 with the specific objective of establishing a new institute of imaging research at NIH.
After hearings before the House Commerce Committee, the bill received a favorable report from the committee. The House of Representatives passed the bill in September 2000, and the legislation was signed into law by President Clinton on Dec. 29, 2000, as one of his last acts before leaving office.
The Commerce Committees report pointed out that the NCI is only one of six institutes that use and develop imaging and bioengineering technologies. The National Institute of Neurological Disorders and Stroke and the National Institute of Mental Health are using bioimaging technologies to evaluate cognition, while the National Heart, Lung, and Blood Institute funds research into new cardiac magnetic resonance imaging and ultrasound techniques. (The other two institutes are the National Institute of General Medical Sciences and the National Center for Research Resources.)
So far, the NIBIB has funded three research grants. The institute awarded one grant to Yale University to study magnetic resonance and spectroscopic imaging techniques. Another grant was awarded to researchers at the University of California at San Francisco to develop new optical methods for imaging cellular architecture. A third grant was given to Tribofilm Research Inc., of Raleigh, N.C., to develop silicone-free coatings for syringesan alternative to the silicone-based lubricants used in medical devices.
"Early in the next fiscal year, which starts this October, we are planning to put out another research proposal on sensors in vivo. These are areas the NIH has not taken on as being within the mission of any particular institute," said NIBIB acting director Donna Dean, Ph.D., Dean will become the deputy director when the new director, Roderic Pettigrew, M.D., Ph.D., professor of radiology at Emory University in Atlanta, takes over.
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In short, the new institute is funding proposals to improve the technologies involved. But if the research proposal deals with the technology as it relates to a specific disease or organ, such as cancer or the heart, then the funding would be managed within the relevant institute.
The distinction is of some importance to those institutes, such as the National Cancer Institute, that already have considerable biomedical engineering and imaging programs. Under the legislation, a major portion of NIBIBs funding is coming from these programs, and institute directors are zealous guardians of their turf. The current NIBIB budget is made up of an appropriation of $112 million, with $67 million of that in grants made by other institutes that have imaging and bioengineering programs. "These grants were transferred to us," Dean said. "They had already been awarded and we are now managing them," said Dean.
In the coming fiscal year that starts this October, the presidents budget request for NIBIB calls for $121 million; in addition, six institutes will contribute $150 million.
NCI will provide the largest sum$60 million. The contributions to NIBIB from the other institutes are: $25 million from the National Institute of General Medical Sciences; $25 million from the National Center for Research Resources; $15 million from the National Heart, Lung and Blood Institute; $15 million from the National Institute of Neurological Disorders and Stroke; and $10 million from the National Institute of Mental Health.
Dean is eager to develop what she terms a spirit of collegiality between NIBIB and the other NIH institutes and centers. "We see ourselves as playing a role in developing new knowledge, fostering new technologies, nurturing new researchers, and facilitating cross-cutting capabilities," she said. "These are our goals as we build this new institute."
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