PITTSBURGH, Jan. 20 /PRNewswire/ -- The Pittsburgh Life Sciences Greenhouse (PLSG), a partnership to put the region’s life sciences industry on a fast track for growth, today announced that it will be hosting a national gathering, Mobile Lab Programs: Best Practices and Networking Conference, January 22-23, 2006 in Pittsburgh. This two-day gathering will be the perfect forum for Mobile Lab Program experts, community leaders, and educators to exchange information about best practices in the delivery of science education through mobile laboratory facilities. It will be especially relevant for individuals who are planning to develop a mobile laboratory outreach program for science education.
Mobile Laboratories are self-contained, traveling laboratories that accommodate student participation in laboratory investigations on board the mobile laboratory unit. The Mobile Lab facilities feature state of the art science laboratory and computer technology. The flexibility and accessibility of mobile laboratories provide equal opportunities for all students to laboratory-based science education. A particular emphasis of the conference will be on programs focusing on the life sciences.
“The increasing significance of science and technology to the growth and prosperity of our society demands that we foster the excitement of scientific discovery among students and ignite interest in pursuing scientific careers(1),” said Dr. Doros Platika, PLSG President & CEO. “The life sciences industry is one of the fastest growing opportunities for high quality job creation in the Pittsburgh region. PLSG is dedicated to attracting and retaining skilled students and professionals that will stay in the region and help build the life sciences industry here.”
Dr. Platika continues, “We are pleased to step into a lead role to address this regional demand by creating a gathering that puts a national spotlight on Pittsburgh and will bring together the thought leaders of mobile lab training programs to discuss best practices in planning, implementing and evaluating the impact of Mobile Lab programs to ensure that they provide students valuable hands-on science experiences -- ideally guiding them into careers in the life sciences.”
The Mobile Lab Programs conference will provide a roadmap for communities considering launching a mobile laboratory program to help them design an effective and sustainable program. In addition to the conference offerings, a planning session will be held to discuss long term and short term goals of the Mobile Lab Coalition, a newly formed national network comprised of mobile science education programs committed to providing equal access to laboratory resources for all students, fostering the development of scientific literacy.
About the PLSG
The Pittsburgh Life Sciences Greenhouse is a public/private partnership, founded by the University of Pittsburgh, Carnegie Mellon University, UPMC Health System, the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania and its regional foundation community. Together with private industry and advanced research and healthcare capabilities of our institutional partners, PLSG invests in and supports the growth of regional life sciences companies in the areas of: bioinformatics; bionanotechnology; diagnostics; medical devices; medical robotics; therapeutics; and tools and services.
Keynote Speakers
L. Tony Beck, Ph.D., Program Officer, Science Education Partnership Awards Division for Clinical Research Resources, National Center for Research Resources, National Institutes of Health
Opening Keynote Presentation - January 23, 2006- 8:00 am
The Basic and Clinical Research Pipeline - Half Empty or Half Full?
Dr. Beck received his Ph.D. in Molecular Biology and Biochemistry from the University of California, Irvine and Brookhaven National Laboratory and his postdoctoral training in Denver at both the University of Colorado Health Sciences Center on the molecular biology of brain development and the Eleanor Roosevelt Institute for Cancer Research on the posttranslational processing and nuclear targeting of hepatic and viral proteins. In 1990, he was hired by Life Technologies, Inc. (LTI), in Gaithersburg, MD to establish their Molecular Biology and Cell Culture Training Center. In 1992, he moved to Cellco, Inc., a hollow-fiber bioreactor company based in Germantown, MD, where he held managerial positions in Research Applications, Drug Discovery and Asia Pacific Business Development. In 1997 and 1998, Dr. Beck was a consultant for Walter Reed Army Medical Center and the American Registry of Pathology on protocol development for hollow fiber-based zero gravity cell culture experiments for NASA’s Space Shuttle program. In 1998, he co-foundered Tissue Engineering Sciences (TES), Inc., where he served as VP for Research & Development. TES’ R&D portfolio included bioartificial blood vessels, ex vivo arterial perfusion models and in vitro blood-brain barrier and pharmacokinetic systems.
In 2000, Dr. Beck joined the National Institute on Alcohol Abuse and Alcoholism (NIAAA) as a Scientific Review Administrator and moved to NCRR in 2002 where his programmatic responsibilities include the trans-NIH R24 Human Embryonic Stem Cell Infrastructure awards, the S07 Human Subjects Research Enhancement Program, M01 General Clinical Research Centers (M01) and the R25 Science Education Partnership Award (SEPA).
Carl Franzblau, Ph.D., Chairman and Professor of Biochemistry, Dean, Division of Graduate Medical Science, Boston University School of Medicine, Boston, MA
Luncheon and Keynote Address - January 23, 2006 - 12:15 pm
The Coming of the Mobile Lab Era - Its Future Potential
The concept of the mobile bioscience laboratory was pioneered by Dr. Carl Franzblau, the Associate Dean of Graduate Biomedical Science at Boston University, who helped found Boston’s MobileLab, the first mobile bioscience lab. In 1998 Biochemist Carl Franzblau got the idea from bloodmobile units being demonstrated at a hematology meeting he was attending: Why not a mobile biology lab? The Boston University graduate dean of the school of medicine pitched the idea to the National Institutes of Health and the Howard Hughes Medical Institute, and in 1998 the nation’s first such lab began touring the back roads of Massachusetts.
The MobileLab is a forty-foot traveling science laboratory whose mission is to increase community access to modern day biotechnology. It is specially designed for grade 7-12 teachers and their students to participate in hands-on laboratory investigations. MobileLab staff work closely with participants during the laboratory sessions. The MobileLab is completely self-contained, providing state-of-the-art laboratory facilities. The MobileLab is wheelchair accessible. The idea has inspired similar labs in Connecticut, North Carolina, and Maryland, with several more on the way. Now Franzblau wants to cover the country with 100 such labs, staffed by freshly minted Ph.D.s and schoolteachers.
(1) The U.S. Department of Labor projects that new jobs requiring science, engineering and technical training will increase four times higher than the average national job growth rate. Despite these growing demands, only two out of every 100 high school graduates nationally will ever obtain an engineering or technical degree and only nine out of 1,000 women and eight out of 1,000 minorities will ever obtain an engineering degree. Further, most of the graduating class in America’s high schools is either not sufficiently prepared or not sufficiently motivated to pursue advanced study in science, math, engineering or technology fields. According to the National Assessment of Educational Progress (NAEP), fewer than one-third of all U.S. students in grades four, eight and twelve performed at or above proficient levels, while a third performed below basic levels. - U.S. HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES COMMITTEE ON SCIENCE
Pittsburgh Life Sciences Greenhouse
CONTACT: Tim O’Brien, O’Brien Communications, +1-412-854-8845, or LynnBanaszak Brusco, +1-412-770-1353, both of Pittsburgh Life SciencesGreenhouse
Web site: http://www.plsg.com/
