>> then new year's day, what is ahead for the new year, vladimir putin shares in innovation and art of catooning. >> since august, dr. frances collin has been the director of institution of health, he is our guest and we have rebecca

adams and dan mcconnell. what is your priorities doctor? >> it's a great year for research and the promises and the answers that have vexed us have never been better. we have technologies to answer questions about what are all the ways for a normal cell to be malignant. and all variations of our own dna to have risks in diabetes. and we have the focus to push into therapeutics where n.i.h. is playing a role and can be ramped up further. and we have the science of our own country and around the world, a global health agenda.

and finally we have health reform, the need of scientific basis of health reform filled in, and n.i.h. does that kind of research and has for years. and we are anxious to step up to the plate for our health care system. >> can you be more informative of how n.i.h. steps up to the plate? >> one is the effective comparative research, of what works and what doesn't. when you have a circumstance of more than one therapies of a particular disease, how do we know which is right one for that person? that takes research and designed research, and we often don't have enough of that, it's

a good guess and maybe not as good as it might be. wouldn't it be better to know the answer, that's what comparative research is about, we are doing that now from the money of the recovery act and more in the future. >> rebecca adams. >> i would like to follow up on that. you are getting $400 million of the recovery act of comparative effectiveness, tell me how you structure the comparative effectiveness as we enter the world of targeting species and how you work with that so that comparative effectiveness does not interfere with the investment of personalized medicine? >> sure, some people say there is design of both, and i think

it'slet best of both. take someone with diabetes and showing signs, and we know from studies that diet and exercise in that situation is more effective than medical therapy. which was a surprise to everyone, it's intense diet and exercise. and we are looking at whether that's true for all people with the risks of diabetes or are there other factors that make a difference of the diet and exercise approach or the medicine approach çand a lot o that is dna testing of family history and that's the next generation of comparative

effectiveness. these are not at war but be sure we factor in what works. >> i want to ask the stem cell question. you approved last week 27 new line and caveat that the funding was limited for pancreatic disease, and this was different what harvard allowed use for, their whole list, and these are considered to gold standard cells in the field, tms, the journal describes them that way. can you talk about your thinking? >> on december 7, prior to the line you are talking about, i approved 13 lines from boston children and some from rock

fellow. and those in july from the obama executive order looked at these lines and looked at the consent. and the consent said these cells are to be study in embryo term, and with an idea of understanding how the pancreas develops and how it works with diabetes. i didn't feel comfortable with that language and recommended that these lines be approved but restricted to fit that consent. and after considering the recommendations i had to agree, and hence the stipulations. reasonable people don't always come to the same conclusions, as these lines have been stripped of identifiers.

and some argue that the consent no longer applies. that's not how my committee feels. because of this area i felt as my advisors this is a circumstance to honor the terms of the original consent. >> there are a lot of lines of the pending list and hearing from stem cell researchers of the lines from march will get approved. can you say anything about your expectations for the lines? >> there is more than 100 in the pipeline. the guidelines for them could follow two pathways, if they follow the accordance established in july, they can be approved quickly. if other constraints, those

need careful review, but there are more coming regularly and many after that. we have these 40 lines as you said 20 with restrictions 3ñand 13 without. there are plenty of opportunities to get to work and many are starting to do that. >> are there more in the administrative pipeline? >> there are, but the administrative review involves looking carefully at the guidelines and looking at questions, so those don't happen overnight. and n.i.h. has to depend on those who derive the stem cell lines, and those who have derived those and that needs to happen. if those are out there taking their time, hurry up, the

field waiting. >> some say produce these lines of the cells that are populated and being the new thing, what is your response that stem cell is not important? >> i am excited about p.i. s.'s that can be derived and go back in time and being potent. but it's clear they are not the same as stem cell lines. last week with directors at n.i.h. we focused a half day on induced propietic stem cells, and it's not clear that psi

cells are just as potent. stem cells are the goeldld standard. >> dr. collins how would you characterize your stem cell research approach as the approach of the bush administration? >> president bush needs to be credited for approving the funds to study those lines and that was established in 2001 and those were established. but the science has moved on and the president said to allow for stem cells that were derived since then to be used and for lines derived in the future to have that possibility. notice that in none of these

circumstances are the federal funds used to derive those stem cells, that's off the table because of an amendment. obama enlarged the menu of opportunities of which lines could use. perhaps not as drastic a step as presumed. but an important one, with more lines available. we want to understand how this can be applied to treat diseases like spinal cord and parkinson disease. we need as many smart people with that problem and this opens the opportunity. >> rebecca adams. >> i want to talk about funding for n.i.h., in the late-90's we saw the doubling for n.i.h. and then in 2003 it was flat. and then saw 4.4 million come

through the stimulus package, what do you expect to n.i.h. over the next year and what does this do when you have multi-year scientific projects going on? >> it's a great question, and i wish i had a crystal ball. certainly after years of flat funding, the industry was struggling, as inflation had been eating away at the buying power and n.i.h.'s ability for grants had dropped about 15%. and people were having a hard time keeping their labs going and really good ideas were going begging for lack of support. one grant out of five was getting funding. the recovering act dollars came

about at a great moment and the response from the community was breathtaking. of one grant that n.i.h. put out and thought maybe we would get four or five thousand applications and we got 21,000. it was a challenge for us but it was done. >> and you were only to provide 3%? >> about 4%, we scratched around and we wanted to find funds. i read some and they were breathtaking in terms of their innovation and ability to take risk. and it was distressing only to provide for 4%. lots of these applications will come back, but what will we be able to do to help them. as you know the recovery act

money was for only two years. that's fy-09 and fy-10, and the question is what about fy-11. as we face that outcome, no ones what it will be. but it's possible barring some major change in the economy that would allow a greater investment that success rates for grant applications will fall further. maybe that's not the way to make this case, what the public wants to know is what science could be done and what could you do with more than less. and this is where science speaks for itself, we could push the agenda faster on cancer and diabetes and push faster for diseases that have no interest in the private sector because their economics

don't allow. and we could reach out in the global health arena. and that's indexed by what possible in fy-11. my task is to explain that for those who listen, and thank you for asking. and this comes at a tough time in terms of our economy. >> isn't that pent-up demand for the grants, many say that the regular grant application process is conservative. they couldn't get away with these grant applications challenges going through the lines. if you got so many grants for the challenges, doesn't that say something to revamp the regular process, and you are boss, how do you do that? >> it's a good question, when the money gets tight, the

grants towards the conservativism. and the money was tight. and if you are a grant section and you are trying to decide, if you put your money on this established investigator that has a solid, exciting kind of proposal. but maybe not that ground breaking. versus this one that doesn't have a lot of data and their idea sounds wacky. we know that wackiness gets down played but sometimes that's where the excitement comes from. and we need to instigate those type and we have allowed for those proposals. like the transformtive 401, and the pioneer award, those

require innovation, and that helps. and we are revamping the whole peer review process on innovation and to be sure that people are paying attention to that. frankly all of this gets tougher when things are in a squeeze. if we had a stable objectory for this than the feast and famine, that's difficult to live with. then we would be in a better position to design a process that would encourage some high-risk efforts at some percentage of our portfolio than to constantly adjust and readjust. >> you said there is a push to get these innovations out. and it's 30 years, why is there still a push for translational

research, is it time to revamp that act and time to do more? >> that's one thing and the scientific support is another. take the development of new small molecule drugs for disease, particularly in markets where there is not a big incentive. bidoll won't make that happen, but what can happen to go from a scientific discover to the next steps that includes screening of chemistry libraries that an investigator never got in that got through that. we have done that where the centers in the country and the pharmaceutical companies have it available for the investigators that have to write a proposal to show why

this is a good use. and a new program, called t.r.e.n.d. and we have areas for them to go into animal and scientific and some other trials. that's what n.i.h. should produce in the therapeutic development, and maybe we didn't have an opportunity in the past years but can in the future. if n.i.h. can derisk some projects in the early stages and hand it off to a company that is ready to license that one, then we have the both of both words. >> talk about how you make the judgment of what the private sector can do and what taxpayer

dollars. >> n.i.h.'s focus is to be basic research and exploring that basic research to explore applications to benefit dual health. that the our dual mission, and we are apologetic about both parts. to the extent we have the opportunity to push our agenda in part with the private sector and making it more appropriate for beneficial. that's what they expect. >> this is "newsmakers" and we have dr. frances collins of n.i.h. and we have rebecca

adams and dan vergana. he's from the university of yale and university of virginia where he got his undergraduate degree. he was former director of human genome research, for how long? >> 15 years. >> and you were home schooled until the fifth grade. and you founded an institute for religion and science. >> a foundation. >> is there concern of being the head of n.i.h.? >> there was some concern, i read with it in "new york times," the concern about a scientist that openly talked about his religious base and maybe not be as hard nosed in scientific projects as he should be.

anyone who worked with me in those 15 years in the human genome project would say it was not an issue. and no one would say my particular interest of religion got in the way, and i promise it won't get in the way of n.i.h.. and as a compromise i resigned that foundation, and i don't want to be distracted of what the president has asked me to do. >> time for one more round of question. >> can you say about that flack of being evangelical. why do they care? what does that say about the head of science and religion? >> it was interesting that this became an issue, 40% of

scientists are believers. i am not this bizarre outlier, but what is different that i talked about it and wrote a book about it. and that made some people uneasy. it's a point where we derived in our culture of the polarized sense of scientific review and religious review. and those from scientific could argue that anyone with basis in science need to renounce their religion, i don't think there is a rational basis on that and having been an atheist and it's the universal negative that is

bold to adopt. and about my appointment this reflects to me the degree of the tension that exists between the extreme voices, on the one hand atheism pronouncing itself and on fundamentalism to look at the age of the earth and not feeling the need to rebel against them. neither of those are places that we want to land, and to have the opportunity in middle ground that professes the harmony and faith and i pointed that out in my book as an alternative. >> i am thinking as the matters, what be the conflict of interest, this was in the

last election. >> and i am concerned about it, the integrity of the bio med research is something we can't compromise. the public requires trustworthy data and to have these disclosed and that makes the whole field look less than it should be. and we have to tighten up on that. there is a process in n.i.h. to put out new ideas of how investigators need to be more forthcoming about disclosure, that's a notice of proposed rule making, a government term that will appear in the in fact month or two. it will be a change in the way that n.i.h. in the past has largely left that to institutions. and now n.i.h. will want to have more information about what their investigators are up to as far as potential conflicts.

>> what kind of information will you ask for that is different from the past? >> in the past universities would ask their investigators to disclose any conflicts that may be relative to their grants. they didn't necessarily enforce that. n.i.h. will be asked for that to be done in a more rigorous way and to pass that information on. and there will be also be a requirement to have much more of an open disclosure of this information on websites. so that anyone interested in trying to find out if doctor so-and-so is getting money from company y will be able to do so. >> and dr. collins, what is your relationship with congress? do they like to know what n.i.h. is up to? >> congress is a wonderful organization that really cares about health. and they should. as we have seen with the health

reform debate. i have rarely been to a meeting with congress and didn't feel it was like an important matter. this has never been about which party you are in, it's about what can we do to try to alleviate suffering and to try to give people the chance to live healthy lives and not impaired by illness. we can all sign on to that. >> dan has one more question about your bobbing. -- book. >> before i hassle you about your book, and the issue of ghost writing and is that possible to have ghost writing? >> i was shocked by that revelation that people would

allow their articles to be shown. we need to be careful if we want to have the integrity of science preserved. that's not the way to do it. and that message needs to be put forward by n.i.h. and the grantees. >> if i could, could you talk about the new book, it's coming out in january. 10 years ago and how many billions for human genomes and now talking about it's just dollars. and what are we looking towards? >> the era of personalized medicine where we have a chance to use the information derived from our study of genomes is coming quick low. -- quickly.