NIH turbocharged?

Looks like the NIH is adopting some new initiatives to push research out the door faster in deliverable interventions in health. They have developed a “master plan” that targets more specific areas of research. Some quotes:

…the institutes will provide training in clinical research to community doctors, who can help test treatments and disseminate the findings of biomedical research.

One goal of the institutes’ plan is to catalog the intricate networks that transmit information among genes, molecules and cells. Scientists believe that disturbances in these “biological pathways” can cause disease.

More precise knowledge of the molecular events that lead to health or disease can “revolutionize the practice of medicine”…

Another goal is to create a picture gallery showing the three-dimensional structure of all the proteins in the body.

The future…will require much more “team science” conducted by interdisciplinary groups of molecular biologists, chemists, physicists, mathematicians, behavioral scientists, pharmacologists and epidemiologists.

I think NIH is leading the way here, especially in recognizing that team, multidisciplinary research is where the future of life science is. I think the ACS should support this direction too.