Klausner's unconventional 'field station' in Seattle
Marshall, E.
Science 271(5253): 1224-1225
1996
ISSN/ISBN: 0036-8075 PMID: 8638096 Document Number: 455968
The efforts of the head of the National Cancer Institute (NCI), Richard Klausner, helped to make the "Seattle Project" a reality in a relatively short space of time. Klausner immediately grasped the project's proposed strategy, which involved transplanting human genes into yeast cells to develop a screen for anticancer drugs. He helped guide a proposal from the group of cell biologists involved in the project through a set of reviews, hovered nearby as it passed through NCI, and voted in its favor as chair of NCI's executive committee. He also presented it to NCI's top advisers and set up an unusual funding structure in which intramural funds support the research at a "field station" in Seattle. As well as a 3-year, $3 million grant from NCI, the team involved has also obtained support from the Merck Pharmaceutical Co. for a connected but independent genetics research effort.