FRONTIER%20SCIENCE%20AND%20GRAND%20CHALLENGES:%20INVESTING%20IN%20HIGH-POTENTIAL%20INDIVIDUALS%20AND%20HIGH-PAYOFF%20SCIENTIFIC%20FIELDS

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• FRONTIER SCIENCE AND GRAND CHALLENGES INVESTING
  IN HIGH-POTENTIAL INDIVIDUALS AND HIGH-PAYOFF
  SCIENTIFIC FIELDS
• Gilbert S. Omenn
• University of Michigan
• French Presidency of the EU
• Symposium Celebrating Frontier Science
• Paris, 7 October, 2008

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Europe Investing in Intelligence

• Research and innovation are the main keys
  to Europes development. They are also the most
  efficient way to respond to the challenges set by
  Asias large emerging economies and to lay the
  foundation for sustainable development for the
  entire planet.
• ---Nicolas Sarkozy
• 14 May, 2008

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Kudos to the EU on the Launch of the Frontiers of
Science Program

• Investments in young scientists and their
  individual investigator-initiated projects
• Sufficient funding to make a difference
• High standards
• The Ideas Program, complementary to the 7th
  Framework cooperative networks
• Congratulations to those honored today
• The rest of the world has noticed!

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This mornings headlineFrench, German
Scientists Win Nobel for HIV, Cervical Cancer

• France's Francoise Barre-Sinoussi and Luc
  Montagnier and German virologist Harald zur
  Hausen have won the Nobel Prize in Physiology and
  Medicine for 2008, for identifying viruses that
  cause AIDS and cervical cancer.

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Aims for the ERC in 2005 HLEG Report

• Create a globally competitive European Research
  Area (Lisbon 2000 Strategy), with international
  benchmarks
• Attract and support the very best talent
• Channel funds into new, highly promising research
  areas with agility and focuswith ICT, biotech,
  and nano mentioned
• Confer status and visibility on European frontier
  research and teams for institutional and national
  investment
• Generate economic and societal benefits

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Investing in Frontier Science

• Identify exceptional individuals with a
• passion for discovery and innovation
• Take risk for big payoffs, based on excellence
• Pose true grand challenge questions
• Stimulate over-the-horizon ideas
• Also
• Provide special resources and standards--instrumen
  ts (LHC), databases (GenBank), animal models,
  computational models
• Create/incentivize teams for needed scale
• Build institutional strengths, while facilitating
  mobility
• Set milestones, track results, test policies
• the science of science management

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International Approaches to Frontier Science

• 1. Identifying Compelling Questions, Grand
  Challenges, Emerging Fields
• Approaches (a) what outstanding
  investigators propose as individuals
• (b) using a group process to stimulate
  proposals in highlighted areas
• Investing in individual researchers
• NSF, NIH, HHMI, Keck, DARPA

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Categories of Grand Challenges

• By scientific or engineering field
• By multidisciplinary RD domain
• As part of a larger societal need
• 2006 AAAS Presidential Address
• Omenn GS. Grand challenges and great
  opportunities in science, technology, and public
  policy.
• Science Dec 15, 2006 3141696-1704

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A mathematical problem should be difficult in
order to entice us, yet not completely
inaccessible, lest it mock at our efforts. It
should be to us a guide post on the mazy paths to
hidden truths, and ultimately a reminder of our
pleasure in the successful solution. --David
Hilbert, Paris, 1900
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HILBERTS 23 PUZZLES

• Classes of problems
• 1-6 mathematical foundations/logic solutions to
  
• 4 and 5 were geometrical.
• 7-13 and 17 number theoretical.
• 14 algebra
• 15-16, 18 geometry and topology
• 19-20, 22-23 analysis and differential equations
  
• (tied to physics)
• 21 both analytical and algebraic geometry,
• solved relatively recently
• 8 Riemann hypothesis still incompletely
• solved/part of the Clay Challenge

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Grand Challenges in Physics Astronomy
Connecting Quarks with the Cosmos

• What is dark matter?
• What is the nature of dark energy?
• How did the universe begin?
• Did Einstein have the last word on gravity?
• What are neutrino masses/how have they shaped the
  universe?
• How do cosmic accelerators work/what are they
  accelerating?
• U.S. National Academy of Sciences (2001)

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About PDFs Sample PDF Speed

• --David Schramm

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title
Popular Sculpture at NAS, Near Lincoln Memorial
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Hubble Telescope
The importance of instruments---synergies between
technologies and science
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• François-Marie Arouet de Voltaire
• 1694-1778
• On ne peut désirer ce qu'on ne connaît pas.You
  can only desire what you do not
• yet know.

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Sustainability in the Chemical Industry Grand
Challenges and Research Needs A Workshop
Report NATIONAL RESEARCH COUNCIL OF
THE NATIONAL ACADEMIES
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Chemistry and Chemical Engineering for
Sustainability

• Green chemistry, replacing solvents, improving
  catalysts
• Life cycle analysis tools and models
• Toxicologic characterization of all chemical
  inputs and outputs
• Renewable chemical feedstocks from various
  biomass
• Renewable fuel sources
• More efficient chemical processing
• Separation, sequestration, and utilization of
  carbon dioxide
• Science literacy at all levels

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Grand Challenges in Environmental
Sciences National Research Council NATIONAL
ACADEMY PRESS
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Grand Challenges in Environmental Sciences

• Biogeochemical Cycles
• Biodiversity and Ecosystem Functioning
• Climate Variability
• Hydrologic Forecasting
• Infectious Disease and the Environment
• Institutions and Resource Use
• Land-Use Dynamics
• Reinventing the Use of Materials

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OUR NATIONS ENERGY FUTUREProject
Independence, December 1973

• Priorities, in order
• Create technologies for much more efficient
  combustion of fuels
• Enhance recovery from existing oil fields
• Create clean coal technologies
• Improve efficiency and safety of nuclear fission
  reactor operations and waste management
• Accelerate development of long-term
  sources---solar, wind, geothermal, nuclear fusion

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THE NATIONAL ACADEMIES CREATING A
DISASTER RESILIENT AMERICA _______________________
_________________________________________ GRAND
CHALLENGES IN SCIENCE AND TECHNOLOGY SUMMARY OF
A WORKSHOP OF THE DISASTERS ROUNDTABLE By
Patricia Jones Kershaw, National Research
Council OCTOBER 28, 2004 WASHINGTON,
DC Disaster Roundtable Division of Earth and
Life Studies THE NATIONAL ACADEMIES
PRESS Washington, D.C. www.nap.edu
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U.N. MILLENIUM DEVELOPMENT GOALS

• These goals for peace, security, development,
  human rights and fundamental freedoms (1990 to
  2015) are people-centered, time-bound, and
  measurable.
• 1. Eradicate extreme poverty (lt1/day 1 billion
  people)
• and hunger--by 50
• Achieve universal primary education for boys and
  girls
• Promote gender equality and empower women
• Reduce child mortality rate before age 5 by 67
• Improve maternal health--reduce mortality ratio
  by 75
• Combat HIV/AIDS, malaria and other
  diseases---begin to
• reverse incidence and spread
• Ensure environmental sustainabiity--50 reduction
  in those
• without safe drinking water
• 8. Develop a global partnership for development

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GRAND CHALLENGES IN GLOBAL INFECTIOUS DISEASES (7
Goals, 14 Challenges)Gates Foundation

• Improve childhood vaccines (3)
• Create new vaccines (3)
• Control insects that transmit agents of disease
  (2)
• Improve nutrition to promote health (1)
• Improve drug treatment of infectious diseases (1)
• Cure latent and chronic infection (2)
• Measure health status accurately and economically
  (2)

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Its a New World in Life Sciences

• New Biology---New Technology
• Genome Expression Microarrays
• Comparative Genomics, Epigenetics,
• miRNA Gene Regulation
• Proteomics
• Bioinformatics
• Systems Biology

Path to predictive, personalized,
preventive (P3) healthcare
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The DNA Pioneers
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The Historic Weekend of Feb 15-16, 2001
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U.S. Leaders of the Human Genome Project
Eric Lander
J. Craig Venter and Francis Collins
Ari Patrinos
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Protein
DNA
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• Matthias Ruedi Mathias
• Mann Aebersold Uhlen
• Max Planck Institute of
  Royal Institute
• Institute of Molecular of Technology,
• Biochemistry Systems Biology
  Stockholm
• Munich Zurich

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NIH ROADMAP National Centers for Biomedical
Computing
Informatics for IntegratingBiology and the
Bedside (i2b2) Isaac Kohane, PI
Physics-Based Simulation of Biological Structures
(SIMBIOS) Russ Altman, PI
National Center for Integrative Biomedical
Informatics (NCIBI) Brian D. Athey, PI
National Alliance for Medical Imaging Computing
(NA-MIC) Ron Kikinis, PI
The National Center For Biomedical Ontology
(NCBO) Mark Musen, PI
Multiscale Analysis of Genomic and Cellular
Networks (MAGNet) Andrea Califano, PI
Center for Computational Biology (CCB) Arthur
Toga, PI
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Multi- and Interdisciplinary Research will be
Required to Solve the Puzzle of Complex
Diseases and Conditions
Genes Behavior Diet/Nutrition Infectious
agents Environment Society ???
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Synthetic Biology, an Emerging Field

• Interdisciplinary science and engineering to
  design and build novel biological functions and
  systems to
• Gain insights into what makes life tick,
  constructing genetic circuits to achieve what
  nature evolved over eons
• Develop powerful biotechnologies by integrating
  biological components, circuits and replicating
  organisms
• Applications
• Engineered microorganisms that produce drugs
• Biosensors for detecting abnormalities and
  diseases
• Microorganisms that convert renewable resources
  into energy carriers
• Microorganisms to remediate hazardous material
  contaminated sites
• Safety regimens will be critical.

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Presidential Young Investigators AwardsNational
Science Foundation

• The NSF is the broadest and most basic research
  agency in the United States
• Individual investigator grants are the bedrock
• The Presidential Young Investigators (PYI) Award
  was a five-year, no-strings-attached research
  grant to outstanding young scientists and
  engineers who showed exceptional potential for
  leadership at the frontiers of knowledge. The
  cornerstone of the program was that NSF funds be
  matched by private or industrial sources.
• One of its influences was the establishment of
  academic departments of computer sciences and
  engineering.
• PECASE, Presidential Early Career Awards for
  Scientists and Engineers at the frontiers of
  knowledge (20/yr)

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Howard Hughes Medical Institute Investigators

• Emphasis on individuals, not projects
• Encouraged to pursue the science, be bold
  daring
• In emerging fields of genetics, immunology,
  structural biology, neuro and visual sciences
  systems/ computational biology recently added
• Multi-year awards with renewal, HHMI mentoring,
  and spectacular peer group
• 340 HHMI researchers currently employed at 64
  universities, including 12 Nobel laureates and
  124 members of the National Academy of Sciences
• 56 new in 2008, from gt1000 applications
• Build a group of 10-25 students, post-docs,
  technicians
• 2008 niches Early Career Scientists (own labs
  2-6 yrs)
• International Research
  Scholars

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NIH Directors Pioneer and Innovator Awards, part
of the NIH Roadmap for Medical Research

• In response to increasingly conservative peer
  review for the 47,000 current research grants,
  the NIH has experimented with special grant
  competitions that seek unusually innovative
  and/or cross-disciplinary proposals
• In 5 years, 63 Pioneer Awards (2.5M over 5 yrs)
  
• bold ideas and inventive technologies
• In 2 years, 61 New Innovator Awards (1.5M over 5
  yrs)
• Pan-NIH review group thousands of applicants, as
  with ERC competition
• 38 Exceptional, Unconventional Research Enabling
  Knowledge Acceleration (EUREKA) grants, Sept 2008

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Keck Futures Initiative Program

• 15 yr program administered by National Academies
  of Science, Engg, Medicine
• Annual multidisciplinary topic chosen for high
  potential to spark discovery
• About 100 outstanding researchers invited for 3
  day conference after extensive preparation and
  tutorials
• Grants available to pursue ideas and
  collaborations generated at the conference

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Keck Futures Conference Themes

• 2003 Signals, Decision, and Meaning in Biology,
  Chemistry, Physics, Engineering
• 2004 Designing Nanostructures at the Interface
  of Biomedical and Physical Systems
• 2005 The Genomic RevolutionImplications for
  Treatment and Control of Infectious Disease
• 2006 Smart Prosthetics Exploring Assistive
  Devices for Body and Mind
• 2007 The Future of the Human Healthspan
  Demography, Evolution, Medicine, BioEngg
• 2008 Complexity

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Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA)

• Top-down program manager model for innovative
  goal-oriented RD free-wheeling zealots,
  technically outstanding, 3-5 yr rotations
• Admirable record since 1958 leading to Internet,
  graphical user interfaces, global positioning
  systems, and many other outputs of long-term
  university-based work
• Complete acceptance of failure if payoff high
• Model for E-ARPA and H-ARPA
• Complaints recently of more short-term and more
  classified research at DARPA

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The Quiet Crisis---Shirley Ann Jackson, 2005
AAAS Presidential Address

• Projected extreme shortages of well-prepared
  women and men to pursue careers in science and
  engineering, just as the knowledge-based world
  economy demands high skills
• Broad investments are needed, not just for the
  most exceptional individuals

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The Global Scientific Community

• People are mobile, seek opportunities
• The World is FlatTom Friedman
• Academies of Science around the world
• EU-US Agreement for ST Cooperation
• Innocentive Inc---problems for scientists or
  engineers to solve, with payoffs from 5K to
  100K, through the Internet for companies,
  Rockefeller Foundation, others
• Grainger Challenge Prize for Sustainability

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Prizes can stimulate discovery--- and cause
controversy
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• Louis Pasteur
• 1822-1995
• Let me tell you the secret that has
• led me to my goal.
• My strength lies solely in my tenacity.

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Human Frontier Science Program

• Launched by Japanese scientists and government in
  mid-1980s
• Proposed at Venice Economic Summit, 1987 by PM
  Nakasone
• Implemented in 1989 in Strasbourg by G7, EU,
  Switzerland, Austria, Korea, NZ
• Global collaboration and post-doc training in new
  fields and new labs/countries
• In 15 yrs, 59 nationalities supported

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The Instructive Case of Richard Muller, of
Lawrence-Berkeley National Lab

• NSF Waterman Award for outstanding scientific
  achievements before age 35 (1978)
• Groundbreaking work in three areasastrophysics,
  optics, radio-dating
• The projects were so far beyond conventional
  wisdom and methods that his peer-reviewed
  proposals had been rejected that year by four
  agencies!
• Supported by his National Laboratory chief.
• Recommended to Congress that divergent peer
  reviews be given special emphasis.

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Summary of Challenges for the ERC

• To sustain the career progress of Starter Grant
  recipients
• To take risks in peer review
• To be a learning organization
• To generate benefit for those not awarded grants
• To make the whole gt the sum of parts by
  stimulating coalescence in emerging fields and
  productive interdisciplinary interactions
• To attract scientists from around the world to
  European laboratories
• To translate the passion for discovery in all
  fields into societal benefits

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• There are those who look at things the way
  they are, and ask, why?...
• I dream of things that never were, and ask,
  why not?
• --Robert F. Kennedy
• (1968)

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• Pierre Teilhard de Chardin
• 1881-1955
• The future belongs to those who give the
• next generation hope.