Johanna DiStefano, Ph.D., Director of TGen's Diabetes, Cardiovascular & Metabolic Diseases Division, will lead TGen's efforts to understand the genetic basis of obesity and liver disease. She said research strategies would capitalize on the synergistic strengths of a large multidisciplinary research program in obesity at Geisinger. "I am confident that the long-term results of this collaboration will yield improved diagnostic and therapeutic outcomes for countless individuals suffering from chronic metabolic diseases."

TGen also plans to bring to bear its collaboration with the Partnership for Personalized Medicine (PPM), which includes TGen, Arizona State University's Biodesign Institute and the Fred Hutchinson Cancer Research Center. The PPM's mission is to improve medical outcomes and reduced costs through more effective diagnosis of disease risk, early stage, and matching patients to therapies.

"Working with Geisinger will provide yet another significant opportunity for the Partnership for Personalized Medicine to provide better evidence to meet the specific medical needs of individual patients," said Lee Hartwell, Ph.D., a 2001 Nobel laureate and Executive Committee Chairman of PPM.

The research partnership between TGen and Geisinger will also address some of the nation's other critical health challenges. Preliminary discussions covered such research areas as genetic variations that predispose individuals to disease, congestive heart failure, abdominal aortic aneurysms, and the potential side effects of prescription drugs.

Source: The Translational Genomics Research Institute