The nature of biomedical research has been transformed during
the past decade. This transformation has been driven in
large part by development of new technologies for high throughput
data generation which now make it possible to acquire gene
sequences, measure the complement of genes and proteins
expressed in cells and/or tissues, map protein-protein interactions
and image functional properties of cells, tissue and organs
under a wide range of conditions. The impact of these technologies
on identification of the cause, diagnosis and treatment
of human illness will be profound. It will soon be common
for clinical research studies to collect genetic, transcriptional,
proteomic, imaging and clinical data from every patient
in large, carefully selected cohorts sharing a specific
disease diagnosis. The challenge of the coming decade will
be how best to use these multi-scale biomedical data to
gain a quantitative understanding of disease mechanisms
across hierarchical levels of biological organization, to
identify biological markers which correlate with different
disease states and inter-individual differences in disease
risk and to discover more effective therapeutics targeted
to meet the needs of the individual.
The Johns Hopkins University has created the Institute
for Computational Medicine (ICM) to address this challenge.
The mission of the ICM is to develop quantitative approaches
for understanding the mechanisms, diagnosis and treatment
of human disease through applications of mathematics,
engineering and computational science. Research will be
focused in three broad areas. Research in Biological
Systems Modeling is directed at understanding the
molecular basis of human disease through the development
and application of experimentally-based dynamical systems
models. Research in the area of Computational
Anatomy is directed at mathematical and computational
analysis of anatomic structure/function and its variation
in health and disease. Research in Bioinformatics
is directed at development of novel methods for representing,
managing and analyzing biomedical data, including biomedical
applications of statistical learning.
The Institute, chartered as of July 1, 2005, is
located in the new Computational
Sciences and Engineering Building at the Homewood campus which opened in August of 2007. The ICM consists of Faculty
and Affiliated Faculty
organized in Research Groups and Centers, including the
Center for Cardiovascular
Bioinformatics and Modeling and the Center
for Imaging Science. The Institute will hire six new
faculty to be appointed in appropriate Departments of
the Whiting School of Engineering (see ICM
News).
