|
Boston, Mass. - The Immune Disease Institute (formerly the Center for Blood Research) and Children's Hospital Boston have entered into an affiliation which is expected to be completed in early 2009. IDI will become Children's sixth multidisciplinary research program and will be called the Program in Cellular and Molecular Medicine. IDI will benefit from being part of a larger research enterprise, including funding for the recruitment of additional researchers, enhanced management of its endowment, additional support for fundraising and the ability to more closely collaborate with Children's researchers. Children's will benefit from the addition of 19 outstanding researchers and increased collaboration with them. The public will benefit by greater scientific integration and synergies.
IDI is a non-profit research and educational institution, affiliated with Harvard Medical School whose faculty includes four members of the National Academy of Science. Children's has nine members of the National Academy of Science and 13 Howard Hughes Medical Institute investigators. IDI receives approximately $38 million in annual research support. Children's receives approximately $225 million.
"We are delighted at this opportunity to join forces with such a high-caliber team of researchers who share our interest in finding answers to some of the most vexing diseases, from lupus to diabetes to various cancers," says James Mandell, MD, chief executive officer, of Children's Hospital Boston.
The 200 research staff at IDI pursue four primary areas of research: adhesion molecules and inflammation; autoimmunity and allergy; genetics of immunodeficiency and cancer; and immune defenses against infectious disease, virus and tumors. Milestones include the: fractionation of blood plasma into its component parts; identification of the receptor for the common cold rhinovirus, discovery of adhesion molecules that direct white cell migration to areas of infection, genetics of antibody development, and mapping, cloning of immunodeficiency genes and development of RNAi as a therapeutic.
|
