Duke Gets $35 Million for Health Study
By DONALD W. PATTERSON
Billionaire real estate developer David H. Murdock will give the Duke University School of Medicine $35 million to fund a five-year study designed to help doctors match treatments to a patient’s genetic profile.
The research project could help develop more effective ways to treat maladies such as cancer, diabetes, liver disease, aging and arthritis, obesity, high blood pressure, mental illness and heart disease, researchers say.
The gift, the largest ever for the Duke medical school, will focus on Cabarrus County and Kannapolis, where the 350-acre North Carolina Research Campus is under construction at the site of a former Pillowtex plant. Much of the research will take place there.
The study, which researchers say holds great promise, will collect detailed information about thousands of participants and their families.
“By measuring genes, proteins and metabolites, we aspire to be able to give advice to individuals about how to stay healthy and optimally treat illness when it occurs,” Dr. Robert Califf, the lead investigator in the project and the director of the Duke Translational Medicine Institute , said in a news release. ” … With all the data we expect to generate, we will essentially be able to rewrite the textbook of medicine.”
Scientists say the study will significantly advance the field of translational medicine, or how scientists turn vast amounts of knowledge into real-world applications.
They say the research could yield results varied as specialized diets and new drugs, which could be tested and produced at the new campus.
Duke already has some of the most extensive databases and biospecimen repositories in the world. In addition, researchers will enroll study volunteers from Kannapolis and Cabarrus County.
Investigators will follow participants over time and see how they respond to specific treatments. Califf said the new data will reveal molecular signatures that characterize disease and provide doctors with cost-effective tools to help them treat patients.
“There won’t be any more one size fits all’ in patient care,” Califf said. “That is what translational medicine is all about.”
The Kannapolis/Cabarrus research has been likened to the historic Framingham study, founded in Framingham, Mass. , in 1948, which followed generations of residents and produced significant knowledge about heart disease.
“Our project is no less ambitious,” Califf said. ” … This is a Framingham study for the molecular age.”
Physicians and scientists from the UNC system and the state’s community colleges also will take part in the study.
“Our collective research will enable unprecedented understanding of human disease and how genetics, geography and environment contribute to health and wellness,” Dr. Victor J. Dzau , Duke’s chancellor for health affairs, said in the press release. “Mr. Murdock’s gift is truly a gift to us all.”
Murdock is owner and chairman of Dole Food and Castle & Cooke, one of the largest real estate development companies in the world. Castle & Cooke is building the research campus in Kannapolis.
“In this life we have only a few opportunities to make a lasting difference in the world,” said Murdock, whose wife died of cancer at a young age. ” … Human health has become my driving passion. … This passion becomes the point of departure for a scientific adventure that will save countless lives.”
The study will be called MURDOCK , or Measurement to Understand the Reclassification of Disease of Cabarrus and Kannapolis .
Contact Donald W. Patterson at 373-7027 or donpatterson@news- record.com.
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