The modern biomedical landscape is one of rapid change, marked by the seemingly daily emergence of new tools and techniques that promise to transform how scientists interrogate biology and disease.
As a consequence, research core facilities, which provide access to enabling technologies and to the expertise needed to utilize them, play an increasingly integral role in the growth of productive research ecosystems by serving as partners for investigators exploring new areas of inquiry and as links that foster collaboration.
For these reasons, Harvard Medical School has launched the Foundry, an organizing program and principal component of the Therapeutics Initiative, to coordinate and manage Quad-based core facilities under a single umbrella. Its goals are to maintain world-class research facilities at HMS, increase ease of access for community members, reduce inefficiencies and support the basic and translational research mission of the School.
To this end, the Foundry recently awarded 21 grants totaling $11.2 million, which will enhance existing infrastructure and bring new, cutting-edge technologies to the Quad. The award recommendations were made jointly by the Foundry Committee and HMS preclinical department chairs.
“Our focus is on ensuring that our research community has ready access to tools and expertise to help them continue to produce high quality, rigorous, reproducible science,” said Caroline Shamu, associate dean for research cores and technology and director of the HMS Foundry.
