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Two physician-scientists affiliated with the Ó³»­´«Ã½ have received grants from the Doris Duke Charitable Foundation to support translational research in human disease and to foster the professional development of the next generation of physician-scientists.

David Altshuler, director of the Ó³»­´«Ã½'s Program in Medical and Population Genetics and associate professor at Massachusetts General Hospital and Harvard Medical School, is one of seven individuals to receive the foundation's 2006 Distinguished Clinical Scientist Award (DCSA), which honors outstanding mid-career clinical researchers. Over the next several years, the $1.5M grant will support his efforts to uncover the genetic underpinnings of type 2 diabetes and to apply this knowledge in the clinic to improve diabetes prevention, diagnosis and treatment. Moreover, at least one-third of the grant must be directed toward Altshuler's training and mentoring of junior physician-scientists.

Begun in 1999, the Doris Duke DCSA program has awarded a total of 34 grants to clinical scientists who work at the interface of basic biology and medicine, translating scientific discoveries into clinical applications to improve human health. One of the first DCSA awardees was Bruce Walker, a Ó³»­´«Ã½ associate member and professor of medicine at Harvard Medical School and Massachusetts General Hospital. This year he receives one of the foundation’s first "continuation grants" to support his ongoing work in the AIDS and tuberculosis epidemics of South Africa, where he trains graduate students and postdoctoral fellows at the Doris Duke Medical Research Institute in Durban. The award will also sponsor fellowships for African trainees to visit the United States and complete summer courses at the Harvard School of Public Health.

The DCSA program is tailored to support the work of clinical scientists, who juggle the demands of the clinic and the laboratory, while also making time to advise junior clinical researchers. Importantly, it provides investigators with the financial means to limit their advisees' clinical duties, thereby protecting the time their advisees can devote to laboratory research.

"Opportunities are greater than ever to translate basic discoveries into the prevention, diagnosis, treatment and cure of disease," said Joan E. Spero, president of the Doris Duke Charitable Foundation. "We are extremely pleased to be able to support another group of outstanding physician-scientists devoted to this goal not only through their research, but also through their mentoring activities."