UCI Takes Scientific Approach to Future : Education: Chancellor hopes to attract research dollars with biomedicine and other rising disciplines.
UC Irvine believes in better living through science. At least that’s what some faculty members say, as UCI officials increasingly devote their efforts to attracting research grants to campus.
Want to identify the gene defect that causes dwarfism, or look for the roots of Alzheimer’s disease? UCI researchers are already seeking those answers, but UCI Chancellor Laurel L. Wilkening wants more.
Friday, Wilkening issued a report declaring her mission to propel UCI into the top 50 research institutions in the nation by 2000, and a longer-range vision--suggested by some students, faculty and staff members--to eventually crack the top 30.
It’s a tough proposition when top California universities such as UCLA, UC San Diego and Stanford are older, more established and competing for the same research dollars. But Wilkening will encourage UCI to grow by playing to Orange County’s strengths and interests in the post-Cold War age: biomedicine and medical devices, environmental issues, computers and information science and education.
“We do have advantages,” Wilkening said in a meeting with Times reporters and editors Friday. “Other universities have professional schools of agriculture, forestry, fisheries. . . . Those are from an era at the beginning of the century. We have to look at how we serve important industry, but not do things that were good to do 30 years ago.”
UCI researchers will be looking around Southern California and beyond for companies that can use the technology they are developing--and pay them for it. The university’s Technology Showcase, a first-ever conference held on campus Friday morning, was a first step.
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More than 100 executives and owners of biomedical companies visited UCI for the conference, organized by the Life Science Industry Council, a partnership between UCI and Southern California biomedical and medical device companies.
Eight UCI professors and researchers gave presentations on research at the university, which included new cancer therapies, the use of bacteria or fungi to change harmful chemicals into harmless materials and techniques for preserving human organs.
“We hope to nourish and expand UCI’s relationship with your industry,” Wilkening told conference attendees.
Michael W. Berns, surgery professor and director of the Beckman Laser Institute and Medical Clinic, showed business people how lasers can be used to cut chromosomes in half and manipulate them under a microscope.
“We’re looking for partners to commercialize our technology,” Berns told them. He clicked through slides showing medical center patients whose huge tattoos were removed by lasers, and how lasers can drill tiny holes in animal cells to extract genetic material.
Outside UCI’s Engineering Quad, business people exchanged cards with UCI scientists and checked out UC-ACCESS, a computer system in which companies can dial up a University of California database to find out which professors are doing research in areas they can apply to their own businesses.
“Our success to some degree is going to be linked to a changing of the culture at UCI,” said Dr. Michael E. Selsted, associate vice chancellor for research. “The expectation the campus has of its researchers needs to be raised.”
In the post-Cold War era, with government shying away from military projects, researchers are increasingly exploring health, the environment and family issues. As funding from state and federal governments evaporates, researchers are seeking additional support from the private sector.
“As we look toward the year 2000, it is clear that many of the old models of university research development will have to be discarded. There is simply not enough federal investment to support the potential for discovery and new technology in American universities,” Selsted said.
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Wilkening said she expects greater results from information and computer science, engineering and particularly the College of Medicine. Officials are going ahead with plans for a health center on campus. Construction of the first building--which will house neuroscience research--is scheduled for 1995.
UCI officials are banking on cancer research as well, anticipating UCI will be named a special cancer center by the National Cancer Institute.
But Wilkening has pointed to other areas of excellence she hopes to foster at UCI besides sciences. Concern about primary and secondary education has become so deep that funding from both government and private grants has skyrocketed, she has said. UCI has received about $6.5 million in federal funds for education since 1992, much of it from the National Science Foundation.
Some science specialists caution against losing the basic disciplines that make up a well-rounded university education, such as humanities, because of a stress on research.
“We have a writing program that is world famous at UCI,” Selsted said. “It is not evaluated on its ability to generate funds, it’s based on its intellectual product. That should be the case for every academic unit.”
