LeeHood, MD, PhD

Lee Hood, MD, PhD
Co-founder and President
Institute for Systems Biology

Systems Biology and the "New Biology"

     The Institute for Systems Biology, born almost 10 years ago, was created from the vision that a systems approach is essential for dealing with biological complexity. At the time, systems biology was viewed by the majority of the biological scientific community with skepticism. Our belief held that biology must be approached in a holistic (study all components at once) rather than an atomistic (study one gene or one protein at a time) manner.

     This vision included the belief that systems biology must be built within a cross–disciplinary environment–one that brings biologists, chemists, computer scientists, engineers, mathematicians and physicists together–all speaking each other's languages and working in teams to attack biological problems. In the end, systems biology is driven by the view that the frontiers of biological research dictate new technologies that must be created to explore the unknown–and that the resulting new information must in turn drive the development of computational and mathematical tools. These latter tools are needed for data capture, storage, analysis and integration to develop modeling that is predictive of how biology works. At ISB we use the most advanced technologies in the world to solve biological challenges, and if technologies don.t exist... we build them. At ISB we clearly articulated this vision of systems biology almost 10 years ago.

     As for the results generated through this approach, in 2007 Thomson Scientific identified ISB as having the sixth highest impact in the global scientific community, based on the number of times other scientists cited ISB–generated research papers in their work from 2002 to 2006. Imagine our delight when the National Academy of Sciences recently released a report that articulated the nature of an emerging "new biology" that described perfectly the systems biology of ISB. It is remarkable how rapidly the fundamental vision of systems biology has not only achieved scientific respectability, but has begun to dominate plans for future research– and indeed the report stated strongly that the "new biology" would transform those research areas so important to society–healthcare, agriculture, energy, etc.–just as we had argued 10 years ago.

     For ISB, systems biology (or the "new biology") applied to disease and wellness promises to catalyze a dramatic shift from reactive to proactive medicine over the next 10 to 20 years–a medicine that is predictive, preventive, personalized and participatory–what we call P4 medicine. P4 medicine and the changes it will catalyze in healthcare constitute a major direction for ISB as we move into the second decade of the 21st century.

Lee Hood, MD, PhD
Co-founder and President
Institute for Systems Biology

In this issue
RESEARCH.....................................................2
ISB Plays Key Role in National Effort to Map Cancer Genome
Systems Approaches to Complex Diseases: Asthma
Advancing Efforts to Reengineer Damaged Cells
Life Sciences Discovery Fund Supports ISB Biomarker Research
ISB Researchers on Giant Expedition to Catch Little Fish
COMMUNITY INVOLVEMENT......................6
Glioblastoma Campaign Fundraising Surpasses the $5 Million Mark
RECOGNITION...............................................7
ISB Scientist Recognized for AIDS Vaccine Research Contributions
ISB Announces Nearly $30 Million in Grant Awards
SYMPOSIUM..................................................8
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BIOS Editor: Todd Langton
email: tlangton@systemsbiology.org
BIOS Production and
Design: Christine Emswiler
email: cemswiler@systemsbiology.org
BIOS Contributor: Daniel Rodriguez
email: dlrodrig@systemsbiology.org
VP for Development: Larry Herron
email: lherron@systemsbiology.org
Institute for Systems Biology
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