A Funder-Backed Model to Translate Academic Science into Real-World Treatments

The road from basic biomedical research to approved medicines is long and costly. What is perhaps most frustrating is that many promising compounds or concepts simply never make it out of the university lab and into the pipeline for development into real-world treatments. That gap between academic science and approved new therapeutics has long been a bottleneck in health and medical research. 

But philanthropic dollars have been supporting a model to make biomedical innovation more efficient – and that just might give universities a financial leg up amid federal funding cuts. The Chicago Biomedical Consortium (CBC) — supported by the Searle Funds at the Chicago Community Trust, as well as other donors — has in recent years worked to develop an ecosystem to carry scientific discoveries beyond the campus. The organization works with nine Illinois universities — including Northwestern University, the University of Illinois at Chicago, and the University of Chicago — and combs through biomedical research being conducted by faculty scientists. 

“We’re an expert-driven team that identifies the university research in Illinois universities that has the highest potential to become actual biomedical applications,” explained Michelle Hoffman, the consortium’s executive director. Once the CBC team identifies research that might have an application as a drug or therapy, they develop a potential investment thesis and put those ideas before a board of volunteer biotech venture investors. If the investors agree that the research has potential, the CBC works with the original researchers to advance the research further.  

The consortium will also provide funding to the scientists to help them generate the data that investors or drug companies need to take a chance on novel research. “We identify it, help shape it, help fund it, and make sure that it leaves the university with a robust data package,” Hoffman said.

The CBC was created back in 2001 by Chicago-area philanthropist Dan Searle, who died in 2007. Searle’s generational connection to the pharmaceutical industry ran deep: his great-grandfather was Gideon Daniel Searle, founder of the G.D. Searle & Co. pharmaceutical company, now a subsidiary of Pfizer. Dan Searle was the CEO and chairman of the Searle company during the 1970s and 1980s. He also founded the right-leaning Searle Freedom Trust in 1998, which made grants to conservative and libertarian organizations in support of free market economics; the trust is slated to sunset at the end of this year. 

During its first two decades, the CBC worked with area universities and made grants to advance research, collaboration and education. But over the years, and particularly since 2021, when Hoffmann assumed the role of executive director, the organization has sharpened its focus on so-called translational efforts — that is, turning basic science into needed medicines and therapies.  

Hoffmann was trained as a scientist and subsequently spent 15 years in strategic advisory roles helping life science companies grow. This gave her the background to understand the complex dance between science, the biotech industry and investors. “Our process (at the CBC) brings the same type of diligence and expertise that I would do in my old life when working on a live transaction,” Hoffman said. “And by applying that rigorous process in academia, we found that the vast majority of projects are not ready to take the next step forward.” 

In fact, of approximately 43 projects reviewed in the last few years, the CBC team has only presented seven to its venture investor board. A handful of projects reviewed by the CBC team have attracted further seed grant funding and, with luck, will advance through the biotech pipeline and turn into approved therapeutics.

Hoffmann says the CBC also is driving toward a broader economic development goal for biotech in the Chicago area. In the U.S., the bulk of biotech innovation has typically been centered in the California Bay Area and in Massachusetts, both homes to numerous powerhouse research institutions. The CBC’s goal is to have Illinois’ own top-flight academic research community anchor a similar geographical hub of innovation. “With California and Massachusetts attracting so much of the business, we lose a lot of young talent to those states,” she said. “But there are a lot of people who want to stay here in the Midwest, so if we can build a similar ecosystem here, we can bring some of that talent here.”

The bottleneck between basic science and commercial development of therapeutics is common to nearly all universities throughout the country, Hoffmann said, and there’s also no reason other regions can’t follow the CBC’s playbook. Another philanthropy-backed organization with a similar model, Blackbird Laboratories, is working to accelerate life science development in the Baltimore, Maryland, area. Launched in 2023 with a $100 million founding grant from the Stephen and Renee Bisciotti Foundation, Blackbird Laboratories works with universities and researchers in the region — including Johns Hopkins University, the University of Maryland and the Lieber Institute for Brain Development — to commercialize academic science and expand the region’s life science ecosystem.

Hoffmann also pointed out that for universities struggling to maintain programs and replace lost federal funding, the successful translation of academic discoveries into approved therapeutics can provide a much-needed additional source of income. “Universities do need to diversify their funding streams,” she said. “Going forward, thinking about these types of science translation strategies for their intellectual property will be really important for universities.”

The income from a successful drug has been a boon for some schools: Warfarin, a widely used blood anticoagulant, has brought in substantial income for the University of Wisconsin, where the initial research was done. Similarly, royalties from sale of the drug Lyrica, used to control seizures and for pain, has generated substantial income for Northwestern University. Paving the way for business deals of that magnitude, involving venture capital and giant pharmaceutical companies, is where Hoffman emphasized the value of CBC.

“A university might make money on transferring technology, but without that middle group that knows how to take fundamental research and turn it into a potential application that’s derisked enough for a VC, (the university) is not going to be realizing the full potential.”