Given that Vanderbilt has been talking about its grant funding wins from the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act recently, we thought it was a good time to take a look at the university's research machine — where the money comes from, where it goes and what comes out the other side.

 

As of Sept. 30, Vanderbilt had lured $74 million in Recovery Act funds, a full 45 percent of the grants from the National Institutes of Health and National Science Foundation to that point. For the full 2009 fiscal year, the university and medical center received $520 million in external research funding – with the largest portion coming from the NIH to fund medical center research.

 

Among the diverse subjects medical center faculty are researching are ways to predict adverse drug reactions from a patient's DNA, creating stem cell therapies that could regenerate heart tissue and finding a way to prevent or reverse the onset of Type 1 diabetes.

 

Of course, the goal of these projects is to advance science and improve medical care. But for all the discoveries that lead to patented technologies and commercially viable products, Vandy's Office of Tech Transfer and Enterprise Development is there to make sure the innovations reach the outside world — through licensing agreements, assistance with start-up companies, and more. Those efforts helped Vanderbilt bring in $11 million in licensing revenue in fiscal 2009.

 

Meanwhile, one of the medical center's tech transfer champions – former vice chancellor for health affairs Harry Jacobson – has been cooking up some new business ventures. His venture capital fund Tri-Star Technology Fund was one of six chosen for Tennessee's TNInvestco program, which will provide $120 million to early-stage companies in the state.

 

Fresh off the announcement of Tri-Star's selection, Jacobson said he's also planning a larger fund for later-stage healthcare companies. But all's hush on the details — who will be involved, how much money they'll raise — until Jacobson transitions out of Vanderbilt in 2010.

 

Erin Lawley is a reporter for NashvillePost.com, a sister publication of the Medical News. erin.lawley@nashvillepost.com