Bioinformatics expert coordinates national initiatives
MCG receives largest-ever grant
by Toni Baker
An MCG bioinformatics expert is coordinating a national effort to develop animal models to study diabetes complications.
Dr. Richard A. McIndoe, associate director of the Center for Biotechnology and Genomic Medicine, has received a $15 million, five-year grant – MCG’s largest ever – to continue operating the Coordinating and Bioinformatics Unit for the innovative National Institutes of Health project, Animal Models of Diabetic Complications Consortium.
He also will provide the same services for the Mouse Metabolic Phenotyping Centers, another NIH-funded consortium of centers offering mouse-testing expertise to scientists nationwide for a variety of diseases.
The Animal Models of Diabetic Complications Consortium consists of 13 investigators from different institutions generating ideas for creating mouse models, a Mouse Generation and Husbandry Core to generate the mice and the Coordinating and Bioinformatics Unit to oversee consortium activities.
Founded scientists agree to make their development data and resulting animal models available to the scientific community.
In 2001, while on the University of Florida faculty, Dr. McIndoe received the first grant to provide administrative and coordinating activities for investigators working on model development. Work includes organizing semi-annual Executive Steering Committee meetings, monthly teleconferences, workshops, training sessions and organizing activities for External Advisory Boards.
A major task was developing a computer system that could store and analyze the huge amount of data generated by investigators, then share it with scientists worldwide through a Web portal, www.amdcc.org.
To date, about 70 animal models have been studied, information on about 25 has been deposited in the database Dr. McIndoe developed and about 20 of those models will soon be available from mouse repositories.
For the second round of NIH funding, each investigator will prepare two new models and turn them over to a husbandry core for development. “Once created, the models will be sent back to the investigators who will be in charge of understanding the pathology of the complications,” said Dr. McIndoe, noting the operational changes reflect the complexity and magnitude of the work.
The NIH integrated operation of the consortium with the Mouse Metabolic Phenotyping Centers, which also were up for grant renewal. The centers’ first round of funding didn’t include money for administration and bioinformatics, but it was quickly determined both were needed.
“The centers bring to the general scientific community a low-cost way of doing a variety of metabolic assays on mice that would be cost-prohibitive to set up in your local lab,” Dr. McIndoe said.
The University of Cincinnati, Vanderbilt University and the University of Washington have been designated as Mouse Metabolic Phenotyping Centers. MCG’s Coordinating and Bioinformatics Unit is soliciting additional centers, which will be funded through a subcontract with MCG.
The Animal Models of Diabetic Complications Consortium and the Mouse Metabolic Phenotyping Centers will continue to function autonomously. But Dr. McIndoe has gutted the infrastructure he created for the consortium to accommodate the workings of both. “The face of it will be individual, but the underlying software architecturally works together.”
“Dr. McIndoe’s work will speed the process of understanding the complex interplay between genetic and environmental factors in the development of human diseases such as diabetes and cardiovascular diseases,” said Vice President for Research Dr. Frank Treiber, “by enabling investigators across the nation to collaborate more efficiently.”
"This award will greatly strengthen our external competitiveness for other center grants,” said School of Medicine Dean D. Douglas Miller. “It also will help our internal planning efforts in the area of data coordination for clinical translational research.”
Dr. McIndoe also is the local director of informatics for two major newborn screening studies for type 1 diabetes and co-principal investigator on studies looking for biomarkers for type 1 diabetes.