A brief summary of the report of StrAU “7P Translational medicine”
The StrAU “Translational 7P medicine” was created in 2016 through the transformation of the priority area “Biomedicine and pharmaceutics”, which was one of the main drivers of the development of the University in the Program 5-100, the implementation of new academic interdisciplinary programs and the translation of the R&D results into the real sector of the economy. All four above-mentioned StrAUs were created at the University in the form of consortium. The consortium StrAU “Translational 7P medicine” includes 11 structural research and educational units of the University, including two translational platforms – the University Clinic (a multi-field hospital with 840 beds, which was merged with KFU in January 2016) and the Pharmaceutics Research and Educational Center (R&D center and the pilot KFU production line of medicines in partnership with JSC “Tatchempharmpreparaty”).
Infrastructural transformation. In 2016, the University initiated large-scale changes to the infrastructure of both the University Clinic and the campus of the Institute of Fundamental Medicine and Biology.
At the University Clinic in addition to the existing Clinical Research Centre, Biobank, Center of Biomedical Cell Technologies, Biochemical and Genetic Clinical laboratories (established in 2015), there was created the Transplantology Research and Educational Center. After the renovation of nine surgery rooms, University Clinic will be performing transplantation of kidney, liver, heart and lungs.
Reconstruction of three additional buildings allocated to the Institute of Fundamental Medicine and Biology is almost completed. These buildings will house the center of accreditation (licensing) of doctors and pharmacists, and entire research and educational process of the Neurotechnology Center of Excellence. In one of the renovated buildings, in addition to the existing simulation medicine center DryLab, one of the best in Europe, where new domestic medical simulators are being developed, also will be opened WetLab for large animals’ surgery and a vivarium for laboratory animals.
The University Clinic has become an important factor of the StrAU’s financial stability. In 2016 it provided services to the population within Compulsory Medical Insurance and high-tech medical care to the amount of 1 002 mln. rub., as well as commercial services to the amount exceeding 150 mln. rub., with 11,14 mln. rub. spent for medical examination of public servants and 17,42 mln. rub. for the Maternal Certificate program.
Education development. With interdisciplinary approach in mind, KFU has started creating a single transdisciplinary research and educational space for training of various professionals for the Health Care industry. Particularly, in addition to conventional academic programs in Medical care, Dentistry, Pharmacy, KFU started offering Medical Chemistry, Medical Physics, Biotechnical Systems and Technologies as well as Biomedical Engineering for Master and PhD students. According to the recommendations by RASA (Russian-speaking Academic Science Association), represented by scientists and academicians from University of Pennsylvania, the University of Washington, and the US National Institute of Health, new academic programs in Medical Biochemistry, Medical Biophysics and Medical Cybernetics have been developed and are now being implemented. Ten new medical residency programs and four PhD programs were developed and presented to Rosobrnadzor of Russia for licensing.
As part of advanced education development, the advanced training program “The world’s leading biomedical schools to students of Kazan Federal University” was run in collaboration with leading international research centers and universities (University of Pennsylvania School of Medicine, USA; Institute of Genetics, Molecular and Cellular Biology, Strasbourg, France; Fox Chase Cancer Center- FCCC, USA). Also, the Cochrane – KFU Center was established and the international school and workshop “Cochrane systematic reviews: first steps from registering the title to the protocol drafting” was held at KFU. Some new joint educational programs with “Big Pharma” companies (Toshiba Medical Systems Europe, Pfizer and Novartis) have been started. The specialist degree program in General Medicine (in English language) has been recognized by the Medical Council of India.
During 2016, 32 new international researchers from 12 countries held teaching positions at KFU to provide lectures for Master and PhD students.
Research, innovation and technology transfer. More than 40 visiting scholars with high scientometric values from the USA, Germany, Italy, Japan, Sweden, France, Hungary, Portugal, Poland, Greece, and Russia conducted research in 35 research laboratories within the StrAU “Translation 7P medicine”. These laboratories compose the following five centres of excellence: (1) Neurotechnology (2) Personalized Medicine, (3) Regenerative Medicine (4) Chemistry of Living Systems, (5) Biomedical Physics.
In 2016, the StrAU’s academic staff published 387 articles in the leading scholarly journals indexed in WoS and Scopus, out of which 12 publications appeared in the top 1% by IF.
KFU created the KFU-RASA Center of Translational Medicine, headed by prof. R.I. Litvinov (University of Pennsylvania, USA). The center includes the following OpenLabs: Protein and Cellular Interrelations, headed by prof. R.I. Litvinov (University of Pennsylvania, USA); Electronic Synapse, headed by V.V. Erokhin (Institute of Materials for Electronics and Magnetism, National Research Council, Italy); Molecular and Biochemical Bases of Pathogenesis and Therapy of Tumor Diseases, headed by I.G. Serebriysky (Fox Chase Cancer Center, USA).
The University Clinic launched four translational projects in the field of ethno-specific pharmacogenomics, neurorehabilitation, reconstructive gene-cell therapy and neurolinguistics.
In 2016, within the framework of the Russian federal target program “Pharma 2020” the StrAU’s team successfully completed the first in the Republic of Tatarstan official pre-clinical trial of the innovative anticancer drug – composition of doxorubicin and oligo-ether-polyol inhibitor of the reverse transporters for multidrug resistant cells. Based on the StrAU’s Pharmaceutics Research and Educational Center five government contracts in development and pre-clinical trials of drugs were executed (total value of 56.9 mln rubles). 65clinical studies were conducted in 2016 to the total amount of 6.25 mln. rubles in the Preclinical Study Centre of the University Clinic.
In 2016, the StrAU held 10 international conferences which attended more than 800 scientists from Russia and abroad. Twenty-seven post-graduate students of the Institute of Fundamental Medicine and Biology of Kazan Federal University received various grant support and scholarships from the Program of Competitive Growth of Kazan Federal University (Project 5-100). Twenty-seven scholars of the StrAU are the members of the editorial boards of international scientific journals.
Cooperation with research and educational centres. KFU signed a three-way cooperation agreement with RIKEN and Juntendo University (Japan). The document envisages the joint activity of the research centers on establishing the first in Russia IT-clinic and laboratory which will conduct genetic studies headed by the Director of the RIKEN innovative program of translational medicine and diagnostics Dr. Yoshihide Hayashizaki (h-index – 85). Currently, the involved institutes co-fund the KFU laboratory of translational medicine established at the RIKEN premises in Japan. At the same time, at Clinical Research Center of Kazan University Clinic, a mirror genetic laboratory was established for whole genome sequencing and RNA analysis.
In March 2016, the Charity organization “Russian Aid Fund”, the Ministry of Health Care of the Republic of Tatarstan, and the KFU Institute of Fundamental Medicine and Biology together launched a socially relevant project on creating bone marrow donor registry integrated into the Russian-wide registry. More than 850 samples of blood of potential bone marrow donors were included in the database.
At KFU there was established the Regional cluster of translational medicine with participation of some regional leading medical institutions (nine centers), universities and research institutes.