From Bench to Bedside and Back Again
Since 1959, when it moved from San Francisco to the main university campus in Palo Alto, the Stanford School of Medicine has been known for the strength of its research programs. We have a celebrated record of making discoveries in the life sciences and biomedicine that reveal the fundamental rules that govern life and then determining how those rules apply to disease detection, treatment and prevention. Today, we are building on that strong tradition and launching new programs for the future.
We have more than 500 principal investigators
who oversee 1,600 sponsored research projects
annually. These investigators are located in 16 clinical and 11 basic
science departments. In 2002, we received grants and contracts worth more
than $272 million in support of research, teaching and patient care.
Our distinguished faculty includes:
- Nobel Prize winners Arthur Kornberg and Paul Berg
- 27 members of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences
- 34 members of the Institute of Medicine
- 28 members of the National Academy of Sciences
- 14 investigators for the Howard Hughes Medical Institute
One of the most important parts of our research enterprise is translating our fundamental discoveries into technologies, treatments and policies that improve the world in which we live. This is accomplished through collaborations between basic scientists and clinicians from a broad range of disciplines, with crucial input from our colleagues across the full breadth of Stanford University. The small size of our faculty, our location on the undergraduate university campus and the fact that many faculty members and administrators live on or near campus creates a collegial atmosphere in which these types of interdisciplinary efforts flourish.
Historic milestones
-
Arthur Kornberg won the Nobel Prize in 1959 for being the first to synthesize DNA-like material in a test tube. His work is seminal to understanding the relationship of DNA to diseases.
Arthur Kornberg in the lab
- Stanley Cohen and his colleague helped create the biotechnology industry
by showing that DNA segments from two species, once joined, could be
put back into a living cell to replicate.
- Radiologist Henry Kaplan helped build the first 6-million-volt accelerator
for cancer therapy, making Hodgkin's disease and forms of cancer treatable.
- In 1968, Stanford surgeon Norman Shumway performed the first human
heart transplant in the United States, followed in 1981 by the world’s
first heart/lung transplant.
- Sleep expert William Dement coined the term REM sleep, for Rapid Eye
Movement, to describe the portion of sleep when people dream.
-
Paul Berg constructed the first molecule containing parts of DNA from different species, earning him the 1980 Nobel Prize. His recombinant DNA work laid the foundation for genetic engineering.
Paul Berg
- Researcher Peter Wood first established in 1975 the link between exercise
and increased levels of “good” (HDL) cholesterol.
- Researchers led by William Haskell demonstrated in 1993 that lifestyle
changes and drug therapy could decrease heart attack rates and slow
the buildup of plaque in coronary arteries.
- In 1995, a team led by biochemist Pat Brown published a method for
fabricating DNA microarrays, also known as gene chips. This technology
is now widely used to find and analyze genes.
- Sleep researcher Emmanuel Mignot discovered in 1999 the genetic mutation
that causes narcolepsy, a disabling sleep disorder that affects humans
and animals
More
breakthroughs