Stimulus funding at work at UT
There was a great story in Monday’s Blade about all the research grants The University of Toledo has received, many from the National Institutes of Health. (UT has had 24 grants funded, 17 from the College of Medicine.) Most prominently featured was Dr. Akira Takashima, chair of the Department of Medical Microbiology and Immunology in the College of Medicine.
Now whether your personal politics cause you to love February’s federal stimulus package or hate it, the $9.1 million in stimulus projects that have come to UT so far this year are primary examples of what will ultimately lift this regional economy – high-tech industry.
For instance, $1 million (of the $2.4 million Takashima was awarded) will go to developing a way to test the effects of chemical compounds on skin. Traditionally, these tests have been done on animals, however Takashima explained that the European Union several years back made testing on animals illegal. Lots of companies still want to sell to Europe, so new options were needed.
You don’t need to have your heart flutter when a kitten yawns to appreciate the value of this. Think of all of the lotions, soaps, make-up, clothes, cleaning products, etc. that do or can touch your skin. Companies need to know the effect of their products on skin. And frankly, even companies indifferent to puppies cuddling would probably love to jettison the billions spent world-wide each year to feed, care for and breed laboratory animals.
By using different types of cells to essentially create a 3-D model of skin in a test-tube, Takashima will be able to develop a process that can test thousands of chemical compounds’ toxicity in a short period of time. This process will employ highly educated lab technicians and researchers and build on ever-growing bio-science expertise in the region.
And the same pattern holds true for most all of the $70 million in research UT conducted last fiscal year and the stimulus money coming in today. If businesses in the future can develop new, safe chemicals to improve products without the financial and humanitarian (animalitarian?) cost of testing on animals, surely that is worth a $1 million investment today.
It says a great deal about the people at UT that increasingly, the government, state agencies and private organizations are looking to make those investments with UT researchers.
Also worth noting: UT Law associate professor Geoffrey C. Rapp continues his national prominence commenting on sports law issues with a quote in the Washington Times about a college football playoff.
Also, UT’s Department of Physics and Astronomy gets some national attention from an AP story circulating about doctoral student Lesley Simanton and UT professor Rupali Chandar studying the sky at reknown observatories in Chile. The story is in the Chicago Tribune here.
Jon Strunk is UT’s media relations manager, a graduate of UT’s College of Arts and Sciences, a student in its College of Business Administration and a man constantly wary of his cell phone ringing. With the media having only so much space and so much time to tell a story, Jon has reserved this space on the World Wide Web to highlight, analyze, complain, lobby, beg, apologize and comment on media coverage of UT, higher education and, from time to time, his half-hearted quest to replace his ’96 Mercury Sable.