Frequently Asked Questions

  • 1. Whom should I contact to request specific information about STSI and its programs?
    • Please see our online form for requesting infrastructure support or resource sharing. E-mail and telephone contact information as well as directions also are posted.
  • 2. Who is eligible to apply for research support from STSI?
    • The Pilot Funding section contains eligibility information. Clinical investigators and laboratory scientists in STSI’s network of participating institutions may apply for the pilot/methodological grants.
  • 3. How is the Scripps Translational Science Institute (STSI) funded?
    • STSI was selected by the National Institutes of Health (NIH) for one of 61 national Clinical and Translational Science Awards (CTSA) in 2008. Additional institutional/infrastructure support comes from Scripps Health and The Scripps Research Institute.
  • 4. Can a researcher or clinician who is not part of Scripps Health or The Scripps Research Institute partner with STSI and/or take advantage of its expertise and resources?
    • Please check our infrastructure information page. In addition to an overview of STSI’s resources and capabilities, the page contains a form that you can use to ask questions and request specific information.
  • 5. What is STSI’s relationship with San Diego’s biotechnology and pharmaceutical community?
    • STSI participates in the San Diego iHUB initiative, a program created by former California Gov. Arnold Schwarznegger to recognize and strengthen regions of the state that are “hotbeds” of innovation. San Diego was one of the six inaugural iHUB designations.STSI views San Diego’s science and technology community as an asset to expedite the translation of research findings from the “bench” into effective and ultimately safer patient care. Please see Partnering Institutions and Research Collaborations pages.
  • 6. What is Scripps Health’s role in STSI?
    • Scripps Health provides community access and dissemination for clinical research seldom encountered in large university health systems and private hospital systems. STSI leverages this unique relationship in its efforts to train the next generation of clinician scientists called for under NIH’s Roadmap for the 21st Century. STSI’s headquarters are situated among The Scripps Research Institute and Scripps Green Hospital/Scripps Clinic. (The San Diego/La Jolla area also is home to over 50 different research institutions and over 600 life science corporations.) Scripps Health clinicians participate as researchers in STSI’s translational research mission, and serve as hands-on mentors in STSI’s clinician scholars training program. As the bridge between TSRI and Scripps Health, STSI enjoys a tremendous amount of intellectual rapport from both basic research and comprehensive clinical perspectives.
  • 7. What is translational science?
    • Translational research transforms discoveries from laboratory, clinical, or population studies into clinical applications that benefit individual patients and change medicine.The three dimensions of translation science are:• discoveries made at the lab bench to are deployed at the bedside,
      • bedside observations relayed to bench scientists influence research and loop back to the bedside, and
      • bedside results penetrate into the community and change the practice of medicine.
  • 8. Is the field of translational science new?
    • Yes. Because of the dramatic expansion of knowledge about genomics and molecular biology, no one field of science, medicine and public health can keep abreast and see the “big picture” of what patients need and what science can deliver. Thus, today’s science rarely is conducted by a lone researcher.To foster a biomedical environment in which translational research is an integral component of both science and medical practice, the National Institutes of Health (NIH) launched the Clinical and Translational Science Awards (CTSA) program. The Scripps Translational Science Institute and the other CTSA member institutions nationally work together as well as individually to transform the scientific environment, to improve the efficiency and speed of translational science through education as well as research programs.
  • 9. Why do the CTSA programs include such a strong educational and training component?
    • Collaborations involving laboratory scientists, clinicians and public health researchers have not always been seamless or efficient. Academic specialization has failed to train basic scientists on the potential clinical application of their research as a priority outcome for their hypotheses. Physicians struggle to integrate research based on clinical observation into the daily practice of medicine as a way to improve patient care. And, both basic and physician research traditionally has not included public health experts in moving their discoveries into the mainstream.The educational and training programs conducted by STSI and the other CTSA institutions are designed to train and integrate biomedical investigators and clinicians into “teams” that translate day-to-day research, patient care, and community activities into a cohesive vehicle for changing medicine across all fronts of health care delivery.
  • 10. How do the research programs of the Scripps Translational Science Institute and Scripps Genomic Medicine differ?
    • While STSI sponsors highly innovative pilot/methodology grant proposals on a wide range of translational science topics, Scripps Genomic Medicine (SGM)’s research program focuses on five specific areas: pharmacogenomics; diabetes; cancer; biomarkers; and healthy aging.In addition to the pilot research grants, STSI sponsors educational programs to train and integrate biomedical investigators and clinicians into “teams” that translate day-to-day research, patient care, and community activities into a cohesive vehicle for changing medicine across all fronts of health care delivery.The National Institutes of Health’s Clinical and Translational Science Award (CTSA) to STSI funds the pilot/methodology grants. SGM’s research studies are primarily funded by other NIH grants, not-for-profit foundations, research collaborations with industry, and philanthropy.