Dozens of test tubes in a holder

Nuss to Head New Institute for Bioscience and Biotechnology Research

Thu, Aug 4, 2011

New Institute to lead Maryland to national leadership in scientific and technological advances and economic development

  COLLEGE PARK, Md - The University of Maryland today announced the appointment of Donald L. Nuss as the founding director of the new Institute for Bioscience and Biotechnology Research (IBBR).

The institute is one of five new research centers created from the former University of Maryland Biotechnology Institute (UMBI)that today officially begin their realignment with other institutions within the University System of Maryland.

"The new Institute for Bioscience and Biotechnology Research will create a joint research center that leverages the research assets of the two University of Maryland campuses at College Park and Baltimore plus the National Institute of Standards and Technology in Gaithersburg," said University of Maryland President C.D."Dan" Mote, Jr."The institute will undertake major bio-problems that serve the expanding economic base of biosciences and biotechnology in the 270-corridor and across the state."

IBBR is an outgrowth of the USM Board of Regents' 2009 decision to restructure the University of Maryland Biotechnology Institute. The new Institute will bring together the collective research strengths among the University of Maryland College Park (UM), the University of Maryland Baltimore (UMB), the National Institute for Standards and Technology (NIST), and the former University of Maryland Biotechnology Institute (UMBI Shady Grove). The University of Maryland will administer the new Institute.

"I am confident that under Dr. Nuss's capable leadership, IBBR will become a hub for advanced research and education programs that encourage stronger collaborations among our university, the University of Maryland, Baltimore, and the National Institute of Standards and Technology, propelling Maryland to a position of national leadership in scientific and technological advances and economic development," said University of Maryland Vice President for Academic Affairs and Provost Nariman Farvardin. 

Farvardin says the IBBR will become a major research enterprise for the university system and the state of Maryland by:

  • bringing together three big players -- UM, UMB, and NIST -- to significantly boost the state's research capacities in bioscience and biotechnology;
  • bringing to Maryland some of the most brilliant researchers in the bioscience and biotechnology fields;
  • significantly boosting the state's ability to tackle some of the most vexing bioscience and biotechnology problems; and
  • conducting "translational research" - research that quickly turns groundbreaking science into business ventures that solve problems, strengthen the state's economy, and provide jobs for its residents.

Nuss says answering the compelling bioscience research challenges in the future demands a more fully integrated approach among the life sciences, technology and engineering. To respond to those challenges, Maryland has made a major commitment in restructuring UMBI to strengthen and leverage its team research capacity among the medical school in Baltimore, the biosciences and engineering in College Park and the National Institute for Standards and Technology, as well as to increase research capacity at Shady Grove and along Montgomery County's I-270 Technology Corridor.

"Our goal at IBBR will be to develop a more integrated, cross-disciplinary approach to research that leads to scientific discovery, technology transfer and economic development across the state and in the county," said Nuss.

"We are very excited about the IBBR's ability to bring many disciplines together to tackle some of these extremely challenging problems in bioscience and biotechnology. Just as important will be the institute's mission to conduct 'translational research' - research that quickly turns science conducted in the laboratory into business ventures that solve problems, strengthen the state's economy, and provide jobs for its residents," said Farvardin. 

Nuss is a professor in the Center for Biosystems Research (CBR, formerly the Center for Agricultural Biotechnology) of the University of Maryland Biotechnology Institute, where he served as director from 1995 to 2006. He is also a professor in the Department of Cell Biology and Molecular Genetics (College of Chemical and Life Sciences).

Prior to coming to Maryland, Nuss held various positions at the Roche Institute of Molecular Biology (RIMB) in New Jersey: Associate member of the Dept. of Cell and Developmental Biology; Full member (equivalent of professor) of the Dept. of Molecular Oncology and Virology; Head of the Laboratory of Molecular Virology; and chairperson of the RIMB/Columbia University Joint Graduate Studies Program Advisory Committee (1989-1995).  Nuss has also served as an adjunct professor at Columbia University, SUNY Downstate Medical Center, Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute, and SUNY Albany.

Nuss received his B.A. (1969) in biology from Edinboro University, Pennsylvania, and his Ph.D. (1973) in biochemistry from the University of New Hampshire. Through his transformative research on the chestnut blight fungus, Cryphonectria parasitica, and associated virulence-attenuating hypoviruses, he has developed a powerful experimental system capable of providing answers to some of the most fundamental questions in virology, host-pathogen interactions, and fungal biology.  His work, currently supported by grants from NIH, has resulted in more than 140 publications, including two seminal papers in Science, seven in EMBO Journal (European Molecular Biology Association), and ten in PNAS (Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences).

Professor Nuss has received numerous awards, the most recent of which was the 2009 Ruth Allen Award, presented by the American Phytopathological Society to honor individuals who have made an outstanding, innovative research contribution that has changed the direction of research in plant pathology.  In 2003, he was awarded the status of Fellow of the American Association for the Advancement of Science.

 

For Immediate Release
July 1, 2010 
Contacts: Lee Tune, 301 405 4679 or ltune@umd.edu