ARTICLE: Med school begins home for brain studies

[Murray Charters <mcharters@xxxxxxxxxxxxxx>]

Med school begins home for brain studies
$3-million facility will house research efforts on neurodegenerative disorders
By David Dodds
Herald Staff Writer

Posted on Fri, Sep. 26, 2003

A failed search for a new chair of the UND School of Medicine and Health 
Sciences Pharmacology Department a few years
ago nearly thwarted the school's plans to become a bigger player in brain 
research.

Medical school Dean H. David Wilson said that had one persistent and talented 
University of Nebraska professor not re-
applied for the job during a second round of searches, things might be 
different today.

Wilson said the search panel almost passed over him the second time around. The 
dean asked why the Nebraska scientist,
with his impressive credentials, national awards and major grant-luring 
history, was not being considered.

"They said, 'He's too good, and he would never come to North Dakota,'" Wilson 
recalled.

But Wilson invited him for an interview anyway, and the scientist, Mike Ebadi, 
did take the job.

Ebadi brought UND expertise in the field of neurodegenerative diseases, and 
also a team of young researchers who Wilson
has dubbed the "Wunderkinds," because of their talent and their youth.

He also brought a reason to push for a new neuroscience research center on 
campus to study disorders, such as
Parkinson's, Lou Gehrig's, Alzheimer's and multiple sclerosis, as well as how 
the brain becomes addicted.

That dream became more of a reality Thursday as ground was broken on a $3 
million, 14,000 square-foot neuroscience
research facility just west of the medical school headquarters.

The new building will house eight laboratories, a conference room and an 
extensive neuroscience library.

"It really is another milestone day for the UND School of Medicine and Health 
Sciences," Wilson told a gathering of
about 80 people before the ceremonial groundbreaking.

Wilson also thanked U.S. Sen. Byron Dorgan, D-N.D., for his efforts to secure 
funding to help make the new center
possible.

UND President Charles Kupchella commended the medical school for its efforts 
under Wilson's leadership to grow from one
of the school's biggest research magnets, and much of that growth has been 
helped by its recent work in neuroscience.

Kupchella said, just a few years ago, the medical school raked in about $3 
million a year in external research funding.
Today, it's pushing a research budget eight times that, and aiming for more.

"We see this enterprise as part of our mission to discover new knowledge, as 
well as transmit new knowledge as it's
acquired over the ages," Kupchella said. "It also helps us fulfill a new role 
... in economic development."

North Dakota Gov. John Hoeven, who also was on hand Thursday, agreed.

He said that what's going on at the medical school is a good example of what 
the state Legislature intended two years
ago when it granted flexibility to state schools to use their money as they see 
fit to become economic engines for the
state.

"We are very focused on combining higher education and economic development to 
create higher paying jobs in the state,"
Hoeven said, "and that's exactly what's going on here."

SOURCE: The Grand Forks Herald, ND


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