Delivering new and effective treatments and disease prevention approaches to improve the nation’s health depends on a research continuum to quickly and efficiently translate basic biomedical research findings into clinical practice and health care decision-making (see figure below). The National Center for Research Resources (NCRR), part of the National Institutes of Health (NIH), develops strategies for bringing basic research discoveries to human studies, optimizing the conduct of clinical research, and facilitating the transfer of new knowledge into clinical and community practice. NCRR is unique within NIH in that its programs align and reinforce the entire continuum by providing scientists with research tools and connections to other researchers and communities.
Animal models are the bridge between
basic science and human medicine. NCRR
provides such models through specialized
laboratory animals and research facilities.
For example, NCRR supports eight National Primate
Research Centers (NPRCs) to facilitate the
translation of laboratory findings to clinical trials.
NCRR provides NIH-supported laboratory
and clinical researchers with the
infrastructure, tools, and training they
need to understand, detect, treat, and prevent
a wide range of diseases. For example, it funds
the Biomedical Informatics Research Network (BIRN), a consortium that leverages and shares
distributed tools, software, data, and expertise.
BIRN and NPRC researchers are working together
to apply the BIRN model for data storage and
sharing to establish a nonhuman primate pathology
database.
NCRR helps build partnerships and networks
among grantees to create a matrix
of research support in which the whole
is much greater than the sum of the individual
programs. The Clinical and Translational
Science Award (CTSA) initiative has launched
a consortium spanning basic, translational, and
clinical research to bring effective prevention and
treatment strategies more quickly into practice.
Additionally, the collaborations fostered by the
Research Centers in Minority Institutions (RCMI)
and Institutional Development Award (IDeA) programs
are building capacity at minority institutions
and in underserved states to ensure that when
research results are translated into practice they
reach the many diverse communities that populate
the United States. These programs and others
include educational and career development
components to help better prepare a cadre of
biomedical investigators to carry out the nation’s
research agenda.
Translational research drives progress along the continuum and encompasses two separate processes. NCRR is fully involved in both translational steps. The first involves applying discoveries generated during research in the laboratory to the development of studies in humans. Such preclinical translational investigations are often carried out using animal models, cultures, samples of human or animal cells, or experimental systems, such as gene arrays, to study biological molecules, including DNA, RNA, and proteins. The second translational process takes results from studies in humans and applies them in clinical practice to improve people’s health and jump-start the adoption of best practices in the community. NCRR’s translational efforts often focus on overcoming roadblocks that impede the progress of clinical research by enabling more than 30,000 NIH-funded investigators to access its rich portfolio of research tools and facilities.
Clinical research encompasses human subjects research—studies that involve direct interaction between investigators and human participants or use of material of human origin, such as tissues, specimens, and data that retain participant identity information. Examples include clinical trials and studies of mechanisms of human disease, disease prevalence, and new technologies. Research networks and collaborations sponsored by NCRR help investigators quickly recruit participants for studies; provide the public with the widest possible access to clinical studies; and address the special health concerns of high-risk populations, minorities, rural communities, and individuals with rare or understudied conditions.
In response to significant changes within NIH and throughout the research community, NCRR is increasingly engaged in fostering collaborative, cross-institutional research partnerships and building capacity for clinical and translational research. Not only does NCRR bring together innovative research teams, but it also equips them with essential tools, such as scientific resources, facilities, technologies, and training, needed to tackle the nation’s complex health problems.
For example, at a time when many researchers, deans, and professional societies cautioned that the current clinical research system needed a new direction, NCRR became the leader of an NIH effort to re-engineer the clinical research enterprise. The resulting Clinical and Translational Science Award (CTSA) program is forging a consortium of new partnerships among research institutions and sparking innovative approaches to build on and strengthen NCRR’s long-standing investments in basic, translational, and clinical research. As the consortium matures, NCRR will encourage and facilitate partnerships among grantees from all its programs, forming a synergistic matrix of research resources and expertise.
As such, NCRR programs are accelerating and enhancing research across the full spectrum of human disease. The following sections describe NCRR resources and activities in the setting of strategic planning to continue and expand biomedical research along the entire continuum spanning basic research to community practice.