TMC PULSE

t m c » p u l s e | j u n e 2 0 1 4 31 Cheryl Lyn Walker, Ph.D. (Credit: Texas A&M Health Science Center) towards seeing the whole picture rather than each individual piece, is invalu- able." Joseph Petrosino, Ph.D., associate professor of Molecular Virology and Microbiology, directs the Alkek Center for Metagenomics and Microbiome Research (CMMR), where researchers strive to identify the organisms that impact human health and disease. Kjersti Agaard, M.D., Ph.D., associate professor of Obstetrics and Gynecology at Baylor, heads the PeriBank tissue repository, which collects perinatal samples from mothers and their chil- dren born at Texas Children's Pavilion for Women and Ben Taub Hospital. James Versalovic, M.D., Ph.D., head of the Department of Pathology at Texas Children's Hospital, is conducting research on how the microbiome affects intestinal diseases. "Here in the Texas Medical Center, we have all embraced the translational research paradigm which says that you have to get it from the bench to the bedside. It's essential to translate those results to the patient themselves," reflected Walker. "One of the things that our center does exceptionally well is to actually go to the next step, the community; we take it from bench to bedside to community." This novel approach will allow the center to accelerate the process of advancing basic scientific discoveries and translating them into treatment and prevention approaches for indi- viduals at the highest risk for environ- mental disease, including vulnerable populations such as children and low socio-economic individuals. Through fostered resources and expertise, the center will enable individuals, com- munities and policy makers to make informed decisions about environmen- tal exposures and to mitigate environ- mental disease risks. The Community Outreach and Engagement Core (COEC) of the CETHR is dedicated to improving environmental health science literacy. "One of our major goals is to provide objective, evidence based information for a variety of target audiences so that they can make informed decisions," said Robin Fuchs-Young, Ph.D., pro- fessor in the Texas A&M College of Medicine, with a joint appointment at the Texas A&M IBT, and COEC direc- tor. "Sometimes, scientific results are complex and not easy to understand. Our job is to take research results and put them in a form that's easily digest- ible and understandable for a variety of target audiences." That audience includes state legislators as well as regional policy makers. "The idea is to provide evi- dence based, research driven infor- mation in a useable form," clarifies Fuchs-Young. "It's not about trying to inject our opinions into policy or influence the decision making process. That's a critical distinction." As an extension of her work with health policy, Fuchs-Young wants to enhance the environmental health literacy of communities throughout Texas, furthering the center's ultimate goal of promoting health and prevent- ing disease. "We work with populations that are considered health disparity populations, where folks are dispropor- tionately exposed to environmental contaminants and/or have low access to resources," she said. "We interface with community leaders and key informants to assess the capacity of a community to deal with environmental health problems and to identify what their issues are and how to address them, often putting them in touch with policy makers. It's a long term process." As part of this process, the Community Outreach and Engagement Core is committed to working within school systems, using education as another conduit to communicate with the overall population. "Science performed in a vacuum is of lesser impact than science that is translated to the public," said Fuchs-Young. "One of the overall aims of our center, and the NIH as well, is to provide information about health promotion and disease prevention strategies for communities and their members to utilize in their decision making." The support of institutional leaders within the Texas Medical Center has been a driving force behind the scenes while center members focus on trans- lating research advances to improve detection, prevention and management of diseases intensified by environ- mental exposure. "The assistance we received, all across the board, was abso- lutely tremendous," said Walker. "It was another reason why we got one of the top scores in the study section. They appreciated that this was a multi-insti- tutional center; Baylor was contributing to the success at Texas A&M and Texas A&M was contributing to the success at Baylor." "The TMC is the most important health-related district in the world; up until now, no entity has existed to lead the world-class research performed here in the area of human environmen- tal health," said Brett P. Giroir, M.D., executive vice president and CEO of Texas A&M Health Science Center. "Through their combined efforts, CTEHR will harness the unparalleled scientific capabilities of this resource- rich location to promote new discover- ies that could have the potential to save millions of lives worldwide." through their combined efforts, the center for translational environmental health research will harness the unparalleled scientific capabilities of this resource-rich location to promote new discoveries that could have the potential to save millions of lives worldwide. — brett P. giroir, M.d. executive vice president and ceo of texas a&M health science center

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