The Research Evangelist

It’s difficult for the general public to understand how hard it is for the scientific community to make profound discoveries in the laboratory.   Sure, it’s easy to be excited when an announcement is made about some game changing breakthrough.   But it’s not so easy to see how hard it is to get there.   We hear a lot now about the genetics of cancer, the genetics of resistance, and the genomics of a patient that is leading us to “precision medicine”.     It’s bold, and holds so much promise, exactly what we all hope for.   But of course, the boldest ideas have the longest road to travel.   The out-there science is slow to translate into real-life cures for patients.    As I discussed in my last post, there is a real crisis in the cancer research field and in science in general, because young scientists and those who want to be scientists, are finding it difficult to get financial support. The U.S. must recognize that if there are no young scientists, there will be no pipeline, there

This past week, I had the pleasure of meeting Massachusetts Senator Ed Markey and Harvard Medical School Professor of Genetics, Dr. Fred Alt. They were both in Washington, DC for the presentation of the 2015 NFCR Szent-Györgyi Prize for Progress in Cancer Research, which was awarded to Dr. Alt and keynoted by Sen. Markey.   The common theme I heard from both of these distinguished leaders was captured in a Huffington Post article written by Sam Stein , who attended the event . Stein succinctly wrote that “U.S. Science has never been more imperiled”. He noted that the lack of funding for basic scientific research not only prevents new discoveries, but it also means that we are losing promising scientists whose work can’t get funded.    10 years ago, nearly a third of qualified research was funded by NIH.   Now that number is only 14% (actually even lower for oncology, near 9%).   As Sen. Markey said, “sadly, support for scientific research in our country is fragile”.   And whe