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The Interdisciplinary Center for Clinical Research (IZKF) was founded in 1996 under the major topic “Inflammatory Processes: Aetiopathogenesis, Diagnostics and Therapy”. During the first 8 years (1996-2004) it received funding from the Federal Ministry of Research and Technology within the programme “Health related research 2000”. Beginning with the funding period 2004-2007 the IZKF’s budget of 3,600,000 EUR was defrayed entirely by the state allowance for education and research of the University Hospital Erlangen. Since several years, the University contributes to the budget - currently 150,000 EUR yearly - to support the participation of the institutes outside the hospital.
Currently 150 scientists from 31 departments, institutes and divisions participate in the IZKF in altogether 42 projects from 4 major scientific topics. Through the support of mainly clinically oriented research projects of high quality and through fostering of collaborations between clinically and theoretically working groups the IZKF aims to increase the overall quality of clinical research at the Medical Faculty. New projects are established during triennial peer-review visits of the scientific advisory board as well as at yearly internal and external review sessions. After a single 3-year funding period projects should be transferred to extramural funding. Exceptionally, projects can receive additional funding for another 2 years.
Support and development of young scientists continues to be a main goal of the IZKF. Currently 2 very successful junior research groups are housed in the Nikolaus-Fiebiger-Center for Molecular Medicine. Junior group 2 (PD Dr. med. Reinhard Voll) on “the role of NF-kB in the pathogenesis of inflammatory diseases” finished its work in the IZKF on September 30th, 2009. The new junior group 2 (PD Dr. med. Jens Titze) works on "Immune system as regulator of volume and blood pressure" since November 1st, 2009. Group 3 (PD Dr. med. Michael Wiesener) on “The role of hypoxia-inducible transcription factors in the context of the development and progression of renal cell carcinoma” finished its work on December 31st, 2009. PD Dr. med. Beate Winner is going to succeed junior group 3 with her research team from June 1st, 2010. Participation in the IZKF was key to attract Prof. Falk Nimmerjahn for a third (associated) junior group to Erlangen funded by the Bavarian Genome Research Network.
Support of young scientists is also achieved through supporting young clinicians to rotate for a certain period of time into the laboratory to follow up their research projects. This programme is also directed to projects not directly funded by the IZKF. The IZKF also supports young medical students within IZKF projects with grants and a special training programme. An annual seminar for MD and PhD students participating in all the different research programmes at the Medical Faculty is organised by the IZKF.
Furthermore, core units represent a strong structuring element. Currently, 3 core units are funded:
Z2 – Non-invasive high-resolution imaging of small animals (since Oct. 2002)
Z3 – Affymetrix Platform (since Oct. 2007)
Z4 – DNA-Extraction Platform (Biobank) (since Jan. 2009)
Supporting activities also include the “Visiting Professor Programme” and a triennial international scientific meeting.
Research
The Interdisciplinary Center for Clinical research (IZKF) has established itself as a strong central institution in the research environment of the Medical Faculty. The initial focus on inflammation research could be developed further to also accommodate other research areas, without sacrificing this distinctive topic, thus allowing more institutions of the Medical Faculty to participate successfully in the IZKF. Almost half of the projects are so called “tandem-projects” between clinically and theoretically working institutions while 2 projects are collaborations between different clinical institutions. The stringent, two-stage peer-review process (first internal, then external) based solely on scientific criteria ensures a high scientific quality of the projects with current funding rates of about 50%. This helped to increase the acceptance of internal peer-review significantly and thus increasing the ability to apply successfully for extramural funding. In the last years, both junior groups and IZKF projects have been very successful in this respect. The high standard of research done at IZKF also becomes evident through the large number of scientists appointed to external chairs and professorships.
