Director's Message »
Our mission »
What's the MBI? »
History »
Employment »
Contact Info »

Published in The Gainesville Sun
October 18, 1998

UF's Brain Institute is a truly global collaboration

Brain and related disorders are the number one source of health problems in the United States.

WILLIAM LUTTGE

With the formal dedication this week of the University of Florida Brain Institute's new 210,000-square-foot, $60 million, "beyond" the state-of-the-art building, it is timely to reflect on why this investment was made and what it means to our community.

To provide perspective, I note that the human nervous system - including the brain, spinal cord, peripheral nerves, neurohormonal regulators and special senses - is our most complex organ system. It regulates our bodies and provides us with the ability to communicate, sense our internal and external environment, learn and solve problems.

Perhaps most importantly, it grants us the power to dream about future possibilities.

Unfortunately, because of this complexity and importance, developmental problems, disease or injury to the nervous system can have devastatingly profound consequences.

In hard economic terms, brain and related disorders are the number one source of health problems in the United States today, with one in five Americans affected at any one time, and a total cost to our nation of over half a trillion dollars each year.

In early 1992, the University of Florida, through its Health Science Center, College of Medicine and its teaching hospital, Shands at UF, made a strategic decision to respond to this challenge. We created a unique campus-wide program to harness and enhance the multidisciplinary research, clinical care and educational skills of the entire university to maximize our ability to confront the awesome challenges brought on by nervous-system disorders.

This program was named the University of Florida Brain Institute.

Today this collaborative spirit is alive and growing with over 250 UF faculty from more than 50 academic departments and eight colleges involved. Additional collaborators at more than 65 other universities in the United States and in at least 15 foreign countries expand this into being an international effort. There is no other academic program anywhere with this breadth and magnitude of multidisciplinary talent focused on the nervous system.

The funding for the new building was catalyzed in a dramatic fashion by the award in 1992 of a competitive, peer-reviewed grant for $18 million from the U.S. Department of Defense. Further funding for construction and infrastructure equipment was obtained through subsequent awards from the Departments of Defense and Veterans Affairs, and from matching funds from the UF College of Medicine, Shands Hospital at UF, private donors and the state of Florida.

Millions of additional dollars have been obtained for faculty and staff recruitment and retention and for research support. Included within the latter are more than $2.7 million per year in funding awarded to the institute from the state and more than $25 million per year awarded to individuals and groups of faculty from outside granting agencies such as the National Institutes of Health.

The new, six-story building is located on the southeast end of campus and is connected to the rest of the Health Science Center by a 245-foot air-conditioned bridge. The bridge enables neurosurgeons and other clinical faculty to have ready access to the clinics and operating rooms in Shands and, at the same time, have their offices and labs in close proximity with their basic-science colleagues.

The building is a focal point and catalyst for the institute's role as a campus-wide, international resource. The institute also is working with a growing number of corporations to use our human, building and technological resources to expedite the commercial application of research discoveries.

A few examples of these and other developments in the new building include:
 

•  A six million-electron volt linear accelerator-equipped radiosurgery/biology core for use in cerebrovascular, cancer and fundamental cell and molecular research and clinical teaching.  In addition to improvements in computer-assisted, image-guided radiosurgery, the new facility will permit fundamental studies on the use of targeted radiation to control gene expression and the regulation of anti-cancer drug treatments.  Because of the strength and commitment of the institute's research team to applying this research to practical problems, the $750,000 machine used in this facility is being provided at no charge by the manufacturer.

•  As part of the advanced optical microscopy core, the new facility supports the development of unique laser-based imaging instruments to permit scientists and clinicians to visualize individual cells, or even single molecules, without damaging the living sample or subject. Improvements in the planning for and accuracy of traditional and laser-based micro- and endoscopic surgery are a few examples of the use of these techniques.

•  As part of the clinical skill-training core, the new facility houses several research and development labs and hands-on training facilities with life-like, computer-controlled patient simulators, as well as advanced human neurosurgical training suites equipped with the latest instrumentation including computer-assisted and image-guided surgical instrumentation.Some of these devices and surgical procedures will be the product of fundamental research conducted in the core facility and/or in collaboration with corporate partners.

• To meet the needs of a growing number of UF investigators working on transplantation and gene delivery for fundamental research and clinical treatments, the new building houses an FDA-regulated facility for the isolation and production of cellular material and viral and non-viral gene carriers (vectors) to be used in human treatment procedures.This facility will join roughly a half dozen similar sites in the country and is likely to work closely with a number of corporations interested in this technology.

• Expanding on the institute's strong ties with the National High Magnetic Field Lab, the new building has a specially constructed wing to house some of the world's most powerful research magnets.Compared to the one to two tesla magnets found in most clinical imaging centers, the five instruments in our facility range all the way to a 17.6 tesla magnet for studies on biochemicals, single cells, tissue samples and small living animals (primarily mice), and a 11.74 tesla magnet for studies with larger animals including primates.Both of the latter will be world's most powerful biomedical imaging systems produced at this time. The 11.74 tesla magnet is so powerful that it must be shielded with 320,000 pounds of steel plating.

By supporting a wide array of multidisciplinary research and educational programs aimed at reducing the frequency and personal, societal and fiscal consequences of brain-related disorders, the institute's new facilities and programs will aid in establishment of new partnerships with corporations.

These collaborations with industry are expected to speed the clinical application of our mutual discoveries and set the stage for establishing new research-related businesses in our community.

William G. Luttge, Ph.D., is director of the University of Florida Brain Institute and a professor in the Department of Neuroscience. The newly completed institute will have its public dedication at 3:30 p.m. on Thursday, Oct. 22. The institute will host an open house for the public on Friday from 3 to 7 p.m.