Peter Dorhout believes that the academic sector shares the responsibility of fostering entrepreneurship. That, he said, is going to take training. “We need to make [commercialization] a part of the reward process and we need to facilitate it.”

According to John Garretson, a large number of junior faculty are way out in front of their institutions on the issue of commercialization. “They want to do this regardless of whether there are well-characterized rewards at stake,” said Garretson. “They’ve grown up with the expectation that their work is going to have long-term impact and is really going to end up in the marketplace.”

Bioinformatics

Bioinformatics, in its essence, refers to the application of computer science and information technology to the field of biology and medicine. As Joe Heppert explained, bioinformatics means many different things to many different constituencies, from medical informatics, as at Cerner Corp., to molecule drug discoveries and protein-to-protein interactions. “Our ability to move beyond where we are right now in terms of discovery,” he said, “is going to be driven over the next 10 years only by our ability to innovate and new computations.”

Although there is a significant range and variety of challenges to be overcome, said Peter Dorhout, bioinformatics “opens doors for serious collaborations that are interdisciplinary, multidisciplinary.”

Robert Casillas of MRIGlobal spoke to the importance of translational research in areas like food surveillance, bio surveillance, and health surveillance. “The more that the discipline of bioinformatics grows,” said Casillas, “the more we can address emerging surveillance concerns whether in this country or globally.”

Joe Heppert emphasized the potential of bioinformatics in the development of personalized medical care. Jeff Reene strongly agreed. “Based on studying the biomarkers and the data,” he said, “we’re now able to target therapies to individuals to be much more effective.”

Advances in bioinformatics, John Norton suggested, could offer small-town doctors the ability to practice the kind of medicine heretofore done only in cutting-edge facilities. “The possibilities are really staggering,” Norton said, “and we don’t know which ones are going to work. All we know is that we need to rethink the way data are manipulated, the way data are approached, combined and dealt with.”

An advantage for the Kansas City area, Woolley observed, was Google’s selection of the area for the installation of an ultra-high-speed network that will allow for Internet access more than 100 times faster than what most Americans have today. “It’s a big pipe,” said Wooley. “It’s fast. You let people run with it. You have small grants, and you see where it takes you.”

Henry Randall, director of transplantation and hepatobiliary surgery at Saint Luke’s Health System, has high hopes for applied bioinformatics. “Cancer is also a part of what I do,” said Randall. “So developing bioinformatics, expanding that arena for transplant, for cancer care, is something very personal to me.”

Work-Force Training

Kevin Sweeney asked his colleagues whether they were “moving the needle” on the quality of the regional biotech work force. “I think the best measure of that is going to have to come from industry that is telling us we’re doing the right things,” said Peter Dorhout. In launching a training program with Manhattan Area Technical College, K-State is now working with students from the associate degrees all the way up to the graduate level.