The Biotechnology Initiative at WFU:

In August, 2002, an ambitious plan was announced for a 180-acre expansion of the Piedmont Triad Research Park (PTRP) in downtown Winston-Salem. PTRP is currently anchored by the WFUSM Department of Physiology and Pharmacology and by Targacept, Inc., the Winston-Salem based pharmaceutical company whose first-round venture capital financing in 2000 was one of the largest ever in the biotechnology industry. The expanded PTRP will be anchored, in addition, by a new WFUHS Biomedical Research Campus; groundbreaking for the first new research building took place on April 15, 2004, and Biotechnology Facility 1 opened in May, 2006. PTRP and the expansion project are owned and managed, respectively, by !dealliance, a Winston-Salem based non-profit organization. The research park expansion is being master-planned by Sasaki Associates of Boston.

In 2003, the North Carolina Biotechnology Center opened its first satellite office within PTRP. WFUHS and !dealliance are major partners in supporting this milestone in the emerging collaboration between the Biotechnology Center and the Triad's business and academic community. In January, 2004, Dr. Anthony Atala, former Director of Tissue Engineering and Cellular Therapeutics at Children's Hospital and Harvard Medical School, joined the WFUSM faculty as Director of the new Wake Forest Institute for Regenerative Medicine. Two companies that hold licenses for the tissue engineering technologies developed by Dr. Atala have also opened in Winston-Salem as well.

CSBWFU and the Biotechnology Initiative:

!dealliance has already provided support for efforts to enhance the investigative capabilities of the Center for Structural Biology and has committed to working with CSBWFU in developing, promoting, and executing additional educational programs within the expanding PTRP.