UB's high-tech, high profile center for bioinformatics is on schedule for completion next semester as the new bioinformatics major also nears the end of its development, according to UB officials.
The downtown New York State Center of Excellence in Bioinformatics and Life Sciences Complex, which has been under construction since 2002, has received over $200 million in funding.
According to Bruce Holm, executive director of the center, all construction should be completed "sometime this fall." One of the three buildings that make up the complex, the newest Hauptmann-Woodward Medical Research Institute, is already completed and a ribbon-cutting ceremony is scheduled for May 12.
"A whole lot of progress is being made, which I am really excited about," said James Willis, chief of staff to President John Simpson. "A year ago, we had one or two faculty associated with the center, a now we have a broad-based planning effort with UB2020, and about 30 or 40 affiliated with it."
According to Bruce Pitman, associate dean of research for the college of Arts and Sciences, the new major will not have a department. Instead, it will be a cooperative program of study among the biology, math, computer and biophysics and physiology departments.
Students will choose one department as their "home department" and treat that as their specialization, Pitman said. A student could specialize in computer science while still taking the required courses in the other departments.
UB isn't the only organization invested in the center. The Roswell Park Cancer Institute and the Hauptmann-Woodward Medical Research Institute round off the partnership of the three Buffalo groups leading the new program.
Along with funding from federal, state and local governments, private corporations such as Pfizer, General Electric and Bristol-Myers Squibb have also invested heavily in the center.
Bioinformatics, according to officials, is an emerging field that merges many different disciplines, from biology to computer sciences, in order to analyze and make advances on cutting-edge research like the genome project.
The center's supporters say such research could lead to important advances in disease control and drug development.
Pitman, who is overseeing UB's academic component of the center, said the potential for developing new medicines is what makes bioinformatics "so hot."
"There's the potential for quick turnaround from scientific breakthrough to medicine," he said. "Pharmaceutical companies are very interested in breakthroughs that could lead to the next big drug."
Holm stressed that the center hopes to be on the cutting edge in more areas than just pharmaceuticals.
"Our mission is not just the discovery of new pharmaceuticals, but also to develop algorithms and new areas of discovery, as well as patient management," he said. "We want to be involved from the laboratory bench to the bedside."
Pitman said the bioinformatics major would also better prepare students for jobs in the biotech industry.
"Pharmaceutical companies can't hire enough employees with this type of background," he said.
With the center's opening on the horizon, UB officials have also been working to hire employees and assemble a staff for the program.
"Everybody who has been named to the Center of Excellence is there because they are at the top of what they do," Holm said. "From veterans who are already leaders in their fields to junior people who are rising young stars."
Holm also highlighted the hope that the center will impact the job market in Western New York.
"The center has already saved about 500 jobs and will create about 200 more," he said. "We estimate this should create about 1,000 new life science jobs in the private sector."
Pitman said he sees the Center for Excellence as a continuation of Buffalo's longstanding tradition in biological industry.
"The Buffalo area has a wonderful history of breakthroughs in biological technology," he said. "Nicorette gum was invented here, a surfactant for premature babies' lungs, and of course the pacemaker."
Although the project is not yet in its final stages, Holm said he is pleased with the progress.
"Things will be easier once the facilities are up, but we're not waiting until then to get started," he said. "If we can keep up the same pace, I'll be happy. If we can increase it I'll be ecstatic."
