In a year of severe economic turmoil, Johns Hopkins never wavered from the vigorous pace of discovery for which it is known, expending over $1 billion in research funds between the University’s academic research divisions and the Applied Physics Laboratory. Every University division increased its funding, for both research projects and evolution of the kind of academic programs that have earned Johns Hopkins its distinction as the nation’s first research university. The School of Medicine retained its decade-long standing as first in the nation in receipt of federal research dollars and ranked second among top U.S. medical schools in training grants. The cross-disciplinary nature of the inquiry needed for much of the work multiplies the value of these funds to the University.

One of Hopkins’ major strengths is the resolve of its investigators to solve the problems of our daily existence, which translates into large, multiyear research projects. The matter of hazardous substances in the environment is an important case in point. The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) provided to Hopkins, as lead institution, a $5.2 million award from its Hazardous Substance Research Centers (HSRC) Program to establish the Center for Hazardous Substances in Urban Environments. Scientists and environmental engineers from Hopkins’ Whiting School of Engineering and four other institutions (University of Maryland, Morgan State University, University of Connecticut, and New Jersey Institute of Technology) are studying the biological processes and associated risks of hazardous wastes in urban settings, where about 80% of the population resides. Nearly one-third of the budget is committed to outreach and assistance to affected populations, industry, and environmental regulators in the Northeast; this regional data, however, will have global applications. Scientists have found that the prescription drugs taken by millions to combat illness do not pass benignly through the digestive system but find their way back to our waterways. A group of engineers received a three-year $525,000 grant, also from the EPA, specifically to study prescription drug pollution in drinking water, sewage treatment plants, and coastal waters. Environmental engineers have also won a highly competitive National Science Foundation equipment grant of $2.5 million for instrumentation to measure the emission and transport of biological aerosols into the atmosphere linking across minute and large scales.

The potential consequences of chemicals in the environment is a natural catalyst for medical research. Environmental health scientists in the Bloomberg School of Public Health received a grant of $2 million over five years from the National Cancer Institute to study the biochemical and molecular mechanisms involved when cancer is triggered by chemicals. The findings will serve as a basis for the prevention, interruption, or reversal of these processes in humans. This group is currently investigating how a molecular process known as enzyme induction may be a useful strategy for cancer prevention.

Cancer research grew overall this year with a gift to the University of $150 million from Sidney Kimmel, founder and chairman of Jones Apparel Group, for research and patient care. Working within the newly renamed Sidney Kimmel Comprehensive Cancer Center at Johns Hopkins, Oncology researchers received funding for projects ranging from laboratory investigations to the more systematic inclusion of underrepresented populations in cancer research and care. At the basic science level, the National Cancer Institute (NCI) funded a five-year grant of $2 million for research using the tools and techniques of molecular biology to study and find new detection methods and treatments for cancer. A $3.9 million grant, also from NCI, supports the Howard/Hopkins Cancer Center Partnership for five years. This alliance encourages the enhancement of cancer research abilities at the Howard University Cancer Center (HUCC), a largely minority-serving institution, with Hopkins collaboration. Halfway through this grant, HUCC will be able to obtain its own peer-reviewed funding for independent research in the target areas, paving the way for the beneficial inclusion of more African-Americans as health care providers, researchers, educators, and patients.

Magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) has given a boost to oncology and become invaluable for research and interventions into other chronic illnesses, such as heart disease and neurological disorders. Hopkins researchers are on the front lines of progress in MRI capabilities, techniques, and services. Pioneering researchers in the School of Medicine Department of Radiology were awarded $4.2 million over five years from the National Institutes of Health (NIH) for the further development of innovative MRI technology. The results of these studies could lead to regular clinical applications for some of the most serious health problems, including heart disease and cancer. On the functional side, Hopkins radiologists received a five-year grant of $5 million from the NCI to establish a molecular imaging center for cancer research focusing on small animal imaging.

The ability to “see” the origin of disease at the molecular level is complemented by considering the interaction of genetic susceptibility and other risk factors with a view toward modifying the course of disease. This is evident in the Department of Psychiatry and Behavioral Sciences, Division of Psychiatric Neuro-Imaging, which is dedicated to increasing the understanding of brain, behavior, and genetics and the connections among them via neuro-imaging research. A new five-year grant of $2 million from the National Institute of Child Health and Human Development to explore disability in Parkinson’s disease in this manner recognizes the soundness of this approach.

Genetics remains a vital element in understanding and easing the human condition. Investigators have found that although only one gene has been linked to cystic fibrosis (CF), other genes, called modifying genes, may influence the severity of disease symptoms. Coordinated by a Hopkins research team in Pediatrics and Medicine, physicians are gathering data on twins and siblings with CF because they furnish more precise information regarding genetics and environmental factors. Knowing which symptom and disease differences can be attributed to other genes and identifying those specific genes may help to mediate the course of CF and its symptoms. The study is being carried out with $5 million over five years from the National Heart, Lung and Blood Institute with additional support from the Cystic Fibrosis Foundation.

Retroviruses that infest the human genome have taken a huge toll on lives around the world. Using yeast to model the human genome, investigators in the Department of Molecular Biology and Genetics will create a yeast genetic interaction map to study the movement of these viruses within cells. As an experimental organism, yeast allows diverse genetic approaches as well as biochemical approaches, which, it is hoped, will lead to novel antiretroviral therapies. To move this work along, the NIH has pro-vided $5 million over three years to these researchers.

Center grants are an indispensable source of long-term funding. Several such grants were awarded this year throughout the University and the Medical Institutions. The Asthma and Allergy Center at Bayview received one of only eight Asthma and Allergic Diseases Research Center grants awarded in this cycle by the NIH. Funded at $3.7 million over four years, the center’s faculty will study tissue-specific mechanisms of allergic inflammation to gain new insights into how allergens attack the immune system. A team of epidemiologists in the Bloomberg School of Public Health was designated as a Center of Excellence for Autism and Other Developmental Disabilities Epidemiology by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. Initial funds exceeding $1 million are helping these researchers to make new inroads into documenting how autism spectrum disorders and other developmental disabilities are determined and distributed within the population.

Medical challenges at either end of the human life span are being met with funding from the NIH. Spurred on by the controversy over the need for cochlear ear implants in deaf children, otolaryngologists in the School of Medicine’s Listening Center are assessing the advantages of this procedure by following the development of children after their implants. An $8 million grant from the National Institute of Deaf and Other Disorders has allowed them to design a program unique to such children whereby previously non-hearing children can learn to identify auditory signals and integrate them into their world. The cost-benefit of fewer demands on special education and greater wage-earning opportunities should help overcome opposition to the implants.

Partnering with the older women of Baltimore has earned investigators in the Welch Center for Prevention, Epidemiology, and Clinical Research $4.1 million from the National Institute on Aging for a five-year initiative to study the pathogenesis of physical disability in aging women. The Welch Center transcends disciplinary boundaries as investigators from the schools of Medicine, Public Health, and Nursing, working together, employ epidemiologic and biostatistical methods for clinical research. As a result of this particular project, physicians caring for the elderly will have the tools and knowledge to focus on quality of life rather than merely treating symptoms.

Responsibly undertaking the obligation to interpret, prevent, and treat illness defines the culture of biomedical research at Johns Hopkins. But patient safety and research ethics have become sciences in their own right. Hopkins researchers are using systems and policy approaches to ensure success in these areas. Physician-scientists in critical care medicine received a $4.6 million grant from the NIH to develop the Intensive Care Unit Safety Reporting System (ICUSRS). Built upon an understanding of the relationship between system factors and medical errors, the ICUSRS is relying on specialized training and team communication to eliminate potential dangers in the ICU, where patients are most vulnerable. The Phoebe R. Berman Bioethics Institute, which serves both the University and Health System, received a three-year, $9.9 million award from the Pew Charitable Trusts to establish the Genetics and Public Policy Center in Washington, D.C. This new center will conjoin scientific facts and ethical considerations in debating issues relevant to the identity of the human species. The center’s first initiative will focus on ethical and public policy issues related to genetics and human reproduction, such as manipulating genes to select certain characteristics. Activities will include analysis of various arguments, both pro and con, assessing public attitudes and concerns, and creating a body of options for policy-makers and others.

Researchers in all fields share the requirement of being able to find information quickly and accurately. Hopkins engineers are making substantial advances toward increasing this capability. They are part of a multi-institution team, including IBM and the University of Maryland, that received a $7.5 million grant to be disbursed over five years by the National Science Foundation (NSF) through the Survivors of the Shoah Visual History Foundation. Hopkins’ contribution is the development of a speech recognition system that will be a key component of an innovative “audio search engine.” Improvements in this technology will be applied to the Shoah Foundation’s archive of more than 51,000 video interviews with Holocaust survivors and witnesses in languages other than English to help historians quickly sift through them to find specific accounts.

Efficient data retrieval is a must for astronomers and physical scientists as the information from space missions and satellites reaches enormous proportions. Hopkins astronomers in the Krieger School of Arts and Sciences are among those in the international astronomical community offering these scientists enhanced research opportunities by turning current and future astronomical data repositories into virtual observatories. As part of a total investment by NSF of $24 million over the next three to five years, Hopkins received $2 million this year toward creation of the National Virtual Observatory (NVO). The NVO encompasses technologies which will allow scientists to make important new discoveries in the backlog of data without ever having to look up at the sky.

A Hopkins student group working on the project placed in a Microsoft-sponsored event for a service they developed and named SkyQuery. Using a new programming technique called web services, the team found a way to search three different astronomy databases seamlessly and simultaneously via the World Wide Web as if they were a single database—and cut the time to do it down to two months from an anticipated year or more. As the second place winners, the students received $10,000 for the team and a $10,000 scholarship for Hopkins.

The Applied Physics Laboratory (APL) will continue adding to the collection of astronomical data for years to come, and it couldn’t be at a more opportune time. Work on a new NASA contract worth up to $600 million over 12 years will begin just as the work in some of the currently active programs, such as CONTOUR (Comet Nucleus Tour), MESSENGER (Mercury Surface, Space Environment, Geochemistry and Ranging), and STEREO (Solar Terrestrial Relations Observatory) is nearing an end. Under this contract, the APL will design, develop, and operate some of the missions involving multiple spacecraft for NASA’s Living With a Star and Solar Terrestrial Probes programs, two key focuses of which are effects on satellite systems and human radiation exposure. NASA has also selected a team led by APL and Southwest Research Institute in San Antonio, Texas, to head the New Horizons: Shedding Light on Frontier Worlds mission to explore Pluto, the remotest planet in our solar system, and the Kuiper Belt region beyond. So far, $30 million has been provided to begin project development.

It is certainly not uncommon for Hopkins faculty to claim their share of special honors and awards. But this was no ordinary year in terms of the rarity of the awards given. A Hopkins economist was recognized for his work on the possible relationship between welfare and out-of-wedlock childbearing with a National Institutes of Health MERIT Award. Less than 5% of the legion of NIH investigators have received a MERIT (an acronym for Method to Extend Research in Time) Award since the beginning of the program 16 years ago, and even fewer have gone to researchers outside the hard sciences. Through this award, the researcher is guaranteed approximately $1.5 million in funding over the next 10 years.

Having not been awarded at Hopkins since 1989, two of this year’s 23 MacArthur Fellowships— also known as Genius Awards—went to Hopkins researchers. The John D. and Catherine T. MacArthur Foundation awards the $500,000 fellowships with no strings attached, and at the end of the five-year award period, recipients don’t even have to write a report. Both awards went to School of Medicine investigators, one in Psychiatry and the other in Molecular Biology and Genetics for their prime contributions to knowledge. They join three other Hopkins faculty who have won MacArthur Fellowships previously.