For the second straight year, the Oklahoma Medical Foundation topped $27 million in research grants and contracts from the National Institutes of Health. In 2005, scientists at OMRF secured 48 individual research awards totaling $27.4 million.
“For a biomedical scientist, there is no greater seal of approval than a grant from the National Institutes of Health,” said OMRF President J. Donald Capra, M.D. “The NIH is the world’s leading supporter of medical research, and each grant is like a blue ribbon for our state.”
OMRF’s 47 principal researchers secured an average of $580,000 in NIH funding per scientist in 2005. The individual awards ranged from $26,000 to $2.8 million. The research topics were equally diverse, from investigating methods to treat Alzheimer’s disease to developing more effective ways to fight the bacterium that causes anthrax.
“National Institutes of Health grants and contracts give our scientists the tools to achieve OMRF’s mission—helping Oklahomans and people everywhere to live longer, healthier lives,” said Capra.
Since 1998, when it secured $7.76 million in NIH grants and contracts, OMRF’s NIH funding has grown at an average annual rate of more than 19 percent, outpacing all but a handful of institutions in the country. OMRF’s NIH funding ranks it among the top 20 independent medical research institutes in the U.S.
“The NIH funding process has always been fiercely competitive, and it’s grown more so in recent years,” said Capra. “Yet even in the face of reduced granting budgets, our scientists have continued to excel. That speaks volumes about the quality of medical research at OMRF.”
In addition to the $27.4 million in NIH funds, OMRF obtained $6.9 million in competitive research funding from other sources, pushing its 2005 total past $34 million. The additional funding came primarily from three sources: nonprofits such as the American Heart Association; pharmaceutical companies; and federal and state agencies like the National Science Foundation and the Oklahoma Center for the Advancement of Science and Technology.
“Each of our scientists is bringing an average in $725,000 in out-of-state funding to this state’s economy,” said Capra. “OMRF is making a tremendous impact on Oklahoma’s economy. And these dollars are not only creating jobs and stimulating business in the state—they’re finding new ways to diagnose, treat and prevent deadly diseases.”
OMRF will celebrate its 60th birthday in 2006. The time is ripe, says Capra, for the state to salute OMRF’s past by helping pave the way for its future.
“We’ve enjoyed tremendous successes in recent years, but if we are to continue this trajectory of growth, we need to recruit more scientists,” he said. “We need to build a new research tower to house those additional researchers. And that’s something we simply cannot do without the state’s help.”
About OMRF:
Chartered in 1946, OMRF (www.omrf.org) is a nonprofit biomedical research institute dedicated to understanding and curing human disease. Its scientists focus on such critical research areas as Alzheimer’s disease, cancer, lupus and cardiovascular disease. It is home to Oklahoma’s only member of the National Academy of Sciences.
