Federal dollars are crucial to such organizations as Roanoke-based Fralin Biomedical Research Institute at VTC. Much of its funding comes from the National Institutes of Health.
With recently reported restrictions that the Trump administration has placed on the NIH, that source’s future is unclear. The restrictions have forced NIH officials to cancel multiple grant application review sessions, according to The Washington Post and NPR.
The agency grants at least $30 billion per year for biomedical research. At Fralin Biomedical, where most grants are multiyear awards, the NIH’s portfolio is $163 million, according to Virginia Tech figures. It accounts for about 68% of all outside funding to FBRI, the figures show.
The administration in a memo last week ordered that the agency stop actions that include publishing regulations, guidance documents, grant announcements, social media posts and press releases, and that it cancel speaking engagements, the Post and the Associated Press have reported. Hiring across federal agencies has been halted as well, with exemptions including the Department of Veterans Affairs and Department of Defense, according to multiple published reports.
It is unclear what impact the orders will have on Fralin Biomedical. Officials there are waiting and watching, a spokesman said.
“The short answer … is we need to take the time to understand the impact, if any, to the work we are doing at FBRI or elsewhere at the university,” Virginia Tech spokesman Mark Owczarski said in an email exchange. “Our work to conduct groundbreaking biomedical research will continue, whether it be curing children’s cancer, understanding addiction, or any number of other biomedical research projects that [seek] to improve the human condition.”
Process pauses are not unusual when new administrations take power, and the communications ban is scheduled to end Feb. 1. The travel ban, however, is “indefinite” and an unusual order, Science.org reported.
Neuroscience, cardiovascular science and cancer research are atop the list of specialties at Fralin Biomedical Research Center, its executive director, Michael Friedlander, said in a presentation to the Roanoke-Blacksburg Technology Council earlier this month in Roanoke. Addiction recovery, children’s health and infectious disease science are also part of the institute’s research portfolio.
FBRI focuses on innovation and commercialization, with spinoff companies that include nano-sized drug-delivery purveyor Tiny Cargo and cancer cell-targeting Acomhal Research. Virginia Tech professors who specialize in cancer research founded both companies. Multiple researchers there have published articles in respected scientific journals, Friedlander said at the Roanoke gathering.
“For an academic enterprise, we have a phenomenal group of people that have all the tools and the experiences to go way beyond the academic mission and involve getting us connected to industry, startups, commercialization, and all the other parts of the ecosystem that are really necessary to do what we want to accomplish,” he said.
President Donald Trump has nominated Robert F. Kennedy Jr. to lead the Department of Health and Human Services, which includes the NIH. Kennedy has called for a major overhaul of the NIH, according to multiple news accounts.
Gov. Glenn Youngkin, who spoke during one of Trump’s inaugural events, has supported efforts to expand the institute’s work during his term. In a statement released Friday through his spokesman, he said that no one should be surprised that Trump is keeping a promise to review federal spending.
“There are amazing things going on at the Fralin Biomedical Research Institute,” he said. “I’m confident that the quality of this work will be readily evident to the Administration.”
