(From left) Jay Short and Andrew Dumke of YPO join Scripps-YPO Innovation Challenge winners Bill Gerwick and George Nicola.
Pioneering Idea
to Catalog Sources behind Marine-based Medicines Wins Novel Young President’s
Competition at Scripps
George Nicola and Bill Gerwick’s plan to build a library of
new ocean drug sources
wins $10,000 and distinction across business networking
organization
Scripps Institution of Oceanography / University of California, San Diego
The vast diversity of natural sources, or compounds,
housed at Scripps Institution of Oceanography at UC San Diego hold immeasurable
potential for biomedical applications. Extracted by Scripps researchers on
diving expeditions to Fiji, Panama, Madagascar, Papua New Guinea, and other
exotic destinations, the compounds carry the hope that one day their molecular
makeup could lead to drugs to treat diseases such as malaria, dengue fever, and
various forms of cancer.
George Nicola also sees great potential in the natural
compound collection, but from a different viewpoint. A postdoctoral scholar at
the UCSD Skaggs School of Pharmacy and Pharmaceutical Sciences and recent MBA
graduate from UCSD’s Rady School of Management, Nicola, along with Scripps
Oceanography and Skaggs Professor Bill Gerwick, believe the potential of the
marine sources could be maximized by being organized and catalogued in a “natural
compound library” at Scripps, in conjunction with the Skaggs School of
Pharmacy.
“Currently, this collection is completely inaccessible to
drug companies; the traditional route of patenting and licensing one compound
at a time is the preferred method…,” said Nicola. “We are seeking to build an
avenue that will bring this vast collection of natural compounds into a
suitable format the drug companies can screen.”
Such a liaison between the university and outside
pharmaceutical companies holds a potentially massive revenue stream for the
university, Nicola says. Part of the revenue could go to the governments where
the sources were collected, supporting efforts to protect and preserve natural
marine resources for the future.
“The goal of this effort is to influence the
sustainability of their ecological conditions,” said Nicola,
who was introduced to the natural compound library idea during his MBA education
at the Rady School by Steve Flaim, Nicola’s executive mentor, of the von Liebig
Center at the UCSD Jacobs School of Engineering.
Not only do Nicola and Gerwick believe the idea has merit,
but so do more than 75 of San Diego’s leading CEOs and other business leaders.
The Scripps Natural Compounds Library idea recently took first place in a
science-meets-business competition jointly organized by Scripps Oceanography
and the Young Presidents’ Organization (YPO), a global business education and
networking association.
In a unique competition intended to blend the business
acumen of YPO with Scripps’ scientific leadership, students, faculty, and staff
at Scripps were challenged with coming up with ideas (presented in short,
YouTube-style videos) that address global ecological and environmental issues.
The goal was to foster ties between scientists and business leaders in support
of scientific research.
On
Nov. 17, “Scripps-YPO Innovation Challenge” workshops were held at the Scripps
Seaside Forum that determined which of three finalists would prevail. Groups of
50 YPO invitees worked with each of the finalist teams to construct a basic
business plan around each research theme. The final presentations were judged
via a web-based platformallowing
YPO attendees to text message their votes.
“Scripps scientists don’t
typically get the opportunity to cross paths with the business leaders in YPO
and on the flipside YPO members are rarely forced to think about an
environmental issue front to back, so this event was perfect for getting each
of them to think inside the other’s box,” said Steve Bennett, director of
business development at Scripps. “Each group has a different set of
problem-solving skills, but each has an explorative mindset. The strengths of
the two work well together.”
In winning the $10,000 cash prize, the Scripps Natural
Compounds Library project beat out stiff competition posed by a group looking
to develop biodegradable plastics from algae and another working on aerial
ocean imaging.
“I am tremendously grateful to YPO
for recognizing this business opportunity and awarding us this prize,” said
Nicola. “This will help take the project to the next step in realizing its full
commercial potential.”
“There’s a very exciting vision at
UCSD to combine the completely unique marine compound resources discovered at
Scripps with the incredible biomedical strengths at the UCSD Schools of
Pharmacy and Medicine, including the Moores Cancer Center, and take discoveries
from ‘the sea to the bedside,’ all on the UCSD campus,” said Gerwick, who’s
initial ideas prompted the winning entry. “This compound library will certainly
play a key and pivotal role in realizing this vision.”
