National Center for Advancing Translational Sciences

The National Center for Advancing Translational Sciences (NCATS) was established on December 23, 2011^[1] and is located in Bethesda, Maryland. NCATS is one of 27 institutes and centers of the U.S. National Institutes of Health (NIH), an agency of the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services. The mission of NCATS is to transform scientific discoveries into new treatments and cures for disease that can be delivered faster to patients. The budget provided to NCATS for fiscal year 2018 is $557,373,000.^[2]

National Center for Advancing Translational Sciences (NCATS)

Abbreviation	NCATS
Formation	December 23, 2011
Type	U.S. government agency
Legal status	Active
Headquarters	Bethesda, Maryland, US
Director	Joni L. Rutter
Parent organization	National Institutes of Health
Affiliations	United States Public Health Service
Website	ncats.nih.gov

History

NCATS was created on December 23, 2011 by the Consolidated Appropriations Act, 2012.^[3]

The center was created from a number of existing NIH programs:^[4]

• Clinical and Translational Science Award program
• Components of the Molecular Libraries Program
• Therapeutics for Rare and Neglected Diseases
• RAID renamed Bridging Interventional Development Gaps
• Office of Rare Diseases Research
• NIH–FDA Regulatory Science Initiative
• Cures Acceleration Network (CAN)^[5][6]

Directors

Past directors 2011 - present^[7]

Portrait	Director	Took office	Left office
	Thomas R. Insel (acting)	December 23, 2011	September 22, 2012
	Christopher_P._Austin	September 23, 2012	April 15, 2021
	Joni L. Rutter	April 16, 2021	Present

Divisions

NCATS is organized into a number of divisions:

• Division of Clinical Innovation
• Division of Pre-Clinical Innovation
• Office of Administrative Management
• Office of Grants Management and Scientific Review
• Office of Rare Diseases Research: Oversees the Rare Diseases Clinical Research Network and Genetic and Rare Diseases Information Center (GARD)^[8]
• Office of Strategic Alliances: Works with businesses in the biotech and pharmaceutical industry to speed the development of new drugs^[8]

Programs and initiatives

Overview

The stated goal of NCATS is to promote research in both existing and new areas of medicine and science, in order to promote public health and to overcome high failure rates in clinical trials.^[9][10] To accomplish this, NCATS supports 31 programs and initiatives that relate to translational research and improving the speed of therapeutic development.^[11] The 31 programs and initiatives involve a range of STEM-related fields including biology, biochemistry, chemistry, bioengineering, virology, genetics, and data science.^[12] Within the realm of translational science, issues that NCATS is particularly focused on addressing using its programs, initiatives, and partnerships include increasing the success and de-risking the costs associated with therapeutic development, incentivizing more collaborative work, and addressing data transparency issues.^[13]

COVID response

During the COVID-19 pandemic, NCATS launched an open data initiative to promote collaborative sharing of COVID-related drug data.^[14] An additional data sharing partnership with several other government institutes resulted in a study detailing the COVID-related risks for patients with chronic obstructive pulmonary disease.^[15][16]

See also

• Translational research

References

1. Wadman, Meredith (12 January 2012). "US translational-science centre gets under way". Nature. 481 (7380): 128. Bibcode:2012Natur.481..128W. doi:10.1038/481128a. PMID 22237088.
2. "Budget". National Center for Advancing Translational Sciences. 12 March 2015.
3. . Archived from the original on 2014-03-16. Retrieved 2014-03-16.
4. Wadman, Meredith (12 January 2012). "US translational-science centre gets under way". Nature. 481 (7380): 128. Bibcode:2012Natur.481..128W. doi:10.1038/481128a. PMID 22237088.
5. "NIH's Cures Acceleration Network (CAN) - Rare Disease Legislative Advocates". 12 May 2010.
6. "Cures Acceleration Network (CAN) Review Board - National Center for Advancing Translational Sciences". National Center for Advancing Translational Sciences. 13 March 2015.
7. "NCATS Directors". www.nih.gov.
8. "Divisions & Offices". National Center for Advancing Translational Sciences. 12 March 2015.
9. "About NCATS". National Center for Advancing Translational Sciences. 2017-10-30. Retrieved 2021-10-20.
10. Sacks, Leonard V.; Shamsuddin, Hala H.; Yasinskaya, Yuliya I.; Bouri, Khaled; Lanthier, Michael L.; Sherman, Rachel E. (2014-01-22). "Scientific and Regulatory Reasons for Delay and Denial of FDA Approval of Initial Applications for New Drugs, 2000-2012". JAMA. 311 (4): 378–384. doi:10.1001/jama.2013.282542. ISSN 0098-7484. PMID 24449316.
11. "NCATS Programs & Initiatives". National Center for Advancing Translational Sciences. 2015-03-16. Retrieved 2021-09-28.
12. "NCATS Programs & Initiatives". National Center for Advancing Translational Sciences. 2015-03-16. Retrieved 2021-10-20.
13. "Issues in Translation". National Center for Advancing Translational Sciences. 2015-03-12. Retrieved 2021-10-20.
14. "COVID-19 OpenData Portal". National Center for Advancing Translational Sciences. 2020-06-08. Retrieved 2021-10-01.
15. "N3C Data Reveals COVID-19's Stark Mortality Risk in People with COPD". National Center for Advancing Translational Sciences. 2021-09-23. Retrieved 2021-10-01.
16. Meza, Daniel; Khuder, Basil; Bailey, Joseph I; Rosenberg, Sharon R; Kalhan, Ravi; Reyfman, Paul A (August 2021). "Mortality from COVID-19 in Patients with COPD: A US Study in the N3C Data Enclave". International Journal of Chronic Obstructive Pulmonary Disease. 16: 2323–2326. doi:10.2147/copd.s318000. ISSN 1178-2005. PMC 8370846. PMID 34413640.