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Course introduction
Brief introduction of this six-week course.
Hello everyone! My name is Wei-Chung Vivian Yang. I’m coming from the Ph.D. program for translational medicine Taipei Medical University. Today, I’m going to give a lecture for introduction of
translational medicine: From bench to bedside. What is translational medicine? Is it a translational science for medical terms?
No. Translational medicine research is an effort to carry scientific knowledge from bench to bedside. It is a kind of studies for biological processes. Usually using cell culture or animal models to confirm and verify the molecular mechanisms of the disease and then use the findings to develop new drugs or therapeutic strategies. Therefore, translational medicine is an interdisciplinary science. It often requires the knowledges from genomics, proteomics, cell biology, physics, the basic sciences, and the collected clinical information from pathology, oncology, and in combined with applied science such as material science and informatics including systems biology and computational science to develop methodology and analyze the big data.
It combines all knowledges to dissect the underlying molecular mechanism of disease and to identify scientific bio signatures and develop new tools for disease diagnosis and find new drugs for the treatment. Who is involved in translational medicine? Of course, scientists from basic research and physician scientist play key roles. In fact, scientist learn a lot from patients. They need to identify the real unmet med need from patients and bring back to lab to work on bench. And try solve the problems in cell or animal models. Then bring the new findings back to bedside for initiating a series of clinical trials and then actually benefit to the patients. In addition, people from biotechnology or pharmaceutical industry help to make the knowledge applicable.
Regulators need to monitor and make sure the new drugs or diagnostic tools to be effective and safe to patients based on the data
from research labs: animal studies and clinical trial. Policy makers and the government participate in making appropriate policy for improving public health. Investors and business developers will provide financial support and make the new technology possible and marketable.
We used to struggle a lot to prevent and cure cancer. It has made dramatic improvements since human genome has been decode in year 2000. Nowadays medical doctors have known better on how to treating cancers. For some cancers, physicians base upon certain genetic markers such as EGFR mutation for lung cancer, BRCA1, 2 gene mutations for breast cancer can even identify who is fit for what treatment and use the appropriate dosage for the patient to avoid side effect. These are all because we know better on human genome and understand how does genes work and be regulated.
We used to struggle a lot to prevent and cure cancer. For advanced translational research should rely on high quality human biospecimen. High quality and comprehensive human specimen biobanking may enable the discovery or susceptibility and disease progression factors. The discovery of treatment validation drug targets and identified drug, drug interactions. By using the pathologically confirmed biospecimens from biobank, it can perform target validation of genes or proteins to confirm a particular molecular as a useful target for future therapeutics or use as a diagnosis marker. To identify the basis of drug reactions and disease mechanisms, in addition, biobank can provide the specimen for developing screening tests for biomarker association with a disease or a therapy.
Furthermore, through the analysis of the genomic and protein expression profile, from the specimen, one can group patients based on their genetic characteristics and likelihood of positive response for testing of new drugs and group patients based on the biomarkers of their disease to determine which treatment is appropriate. Omic studies are often conducted in modern translational medicine research. It is usually used genomic or proteomic approaches to analyze biosignatures from collection of cells.
From an organism in one or more possible states. For instance, different genotype with or without disease or before and after the treatment. After comparing the alterations, potential altered genes or proteins associated with a disease condition may be identified. However, the variability due to different populations, sampling method, or tissue types need to be concerned. To reach the goals of translational research, for more effective, safe, and cost-effective diagnosis and therapy, and apply precision medicine, comprehensive data, integration from clinic and bio informatics from research lab is the key.
General demographic data such as age, race, ethnic, sex, and so on, family history data, social history data, history or present illness treatments and responses, especially prescribed drugs, and adverse reactions and response data from microscopic and molecular analysis of tumor. Longitudinal data such as a timed series of blood tests after tissue collection to test test if the disease is progression, clinical
outcomes, such as: was the treatment successful? Is the donor still living? May all need to be collected. In addition, recent advances in genomic, proteomic, and increasing demands for biomarker validation study, have catalysed changes in the landscape of cancer research. Fueling the development of biospecimen banks for translational research.
Translational science is a signature project for the 21st century. It is an interdisciplinary science from genomics to therapy. There are various bio-signatures from the human genome. We are about to get know more the links between the biosignature and the functional body. In the class of introduction to translational medicine we are going to offer a six-week class including several topics for you to get the ideas how a translational research scientist to identify a disease, to identify a target, and how to identify and optimize a drug. How to initiate a clinical trial to make the knowledge from basic research to be applicable to clinics. The faculties from the P.H.D.
programs of translational medicine and expertise in translational medicine from Taipei Medical University will introduce you the most interesting innovative technology and hot topics of research in translational medicine. Welcome to join us and let’s enjoy the up to date medical science and technology journey.
Welcome to this six-week course!
In this video, Professor Wei-Chung Yang, the director of the PhD. Program of Translational medicine at Taipei Medical University (TMU), will introduce the course.
Besides the first week of introduction, we introduce five key topics, starting from the most basic gene research and ending in clinical trials in a hospital setting. We will go through the topics week by week.
There are 16 academics involved in this course, including faculties of the PhD Program for Translational Medicine and the PhD Program for Cancer Biology and Drug Discovery. Moreover, we have invited the current president, Prof. Yen, to give a special talk in one of his researches.
We would like you to get an idea that this interdisciplinary course might involve genomics, proteomics, cell biology, physics, pathology, oncology, material science, and informatics. You may find a point in this ecological circle that you are interested in.
Please enjoy the content we prepared for you in the following weeks.
This article is from the online course:
Introduction to Translational Research: Connecting Scientists and Medical Doctors
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Introduction to Translational Research: Connecting Scientists and Medical Doctors
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