UCSF scientists will receive two grants totaling $15.1 million over the next five years to expand their research into how genes affect an individual's response to medication and to strengthen a global network of researchers involved in these efforts.
The UCSF team is the largest recipient in a $161.3 million effort by the National Institutes of Health to expand a national collaboration of scientists known as the Pharmacogenomics Research Network (PGRN), with the goal of paving the way for personalized medication.
"The grants dramatically extend our ability nationwide and globally to make the promise of individualized pharmaceutical care for patients a reality," said Mary Anne Koda-Kimble, PharmD, who is dean of the UCSF School of Pharmacy in which two UCSF projects are housed. "We see so much variability in how patients respond to drugs. What a great day it will be when we have the tools to easily predict response and adjust treatment on a personal level."
Both UCSF projects will be led by Kathleen Giacomini, PhD, a pioneer in the study of pharmacogenomics - how an individual's genetics determine his or her response to medicines - and co-chair of the UCSF Department of Bioengineering and Therapeutic Sciences.
The UCSF grants include $11.9 million for research into the genetics behind membrane transporters, which control the absorption, distribution and elimination of many of the most commonly used drugs. This multi-disciplinary, multi-center grant funds pharmaceutical scientists, geneticists, clinicians and computational biologists at UCSF and other institutions to carry out research in personalized medicine.
The expanded research ranges from studies in cells to studies in patients. The lead clinical study, which will be carried out in collaboration with scientists in the Division of Research at Kaiser Permanente Northern California and Kaiser Southeast, will focus on the genetic factors that determine response to the anti-diabetic drug metformin in African American patients with type 2 diabetes.
The field of membrane transporter pharmacogenomics has undergone enormous growth over the last decade, Giacomini said, and it is expected to have a significant impact on our understanding of pharmaceutical therapies over the next decade as well. In fact, the field of pharmacogenomics is expected to see enormous change, she said.
"Thanks to breakthroughs in genome sequencing technologies and our growing understanding of genetic variation among individuals, there has never been a better time to propel the field of pharmacogenomics," said NIH Director Francis S. Collins, MD, PhD. "Through these studies, we are moving closer to the goal of using genetic information to help prescribe the safest, most effective medicine for each patient."
Giacomini also will oversee a $3.2 million grant under the NIH program, to continue and expand a Global Alliance for Pharmacogenomics. This alliance involves NIH funded scientists in the Pharmacogenomics Research Network and scientists from the Center for Genomic Medicine, Riken, Yokohama, Japan.