Successes
The Nebraska Center for the Prevention of Obesity-related Diseases through Dietary Molecules (NPOD) was founded in August of 2014 with support from the National Institute of General Medicine at the National Institutes of Health.
Between June of 2014 and November of 2023, we have achieved the following key metrics of success:
- NPOD Phase 1 began in September 2014 with 12 investigators from 12 units at UNL and UNMC. NPOD’s member base has grown 4.9-fold to its current level of 59 investigators from 26 units in UNL, UNMC, and the University of Nebraska Omaha.
- NPOD members have secured nearly $195 million in external research funding, a nearly 36:1 return on institutional investment.
- NPOD members published over 1,000 peer reviewed research papers
- The Biomedical and Obesity Research Core (BORC) is a university-approved fee-for-service center and pays 84% of its costs through user fees etc.
Credit
The credit for NPOD’s success goes to the following persons and units:
- 59 faculty from UNL, UNMC, and UNO
- 571 students, postdocs, and staff
- Institutional support from the University of Nebraska-Lincoln (UNL; lead institution) and the University of Nebraska Medical Center (UNMC; strategic partner)
- Accomplished and visionary leadership by center director and associate director
- A dynamic administrative core, supporting an NPOD coordinator, two Ph.D. level biostatistics and bioinformatics coordinators, and a large-capacity, high-speed computational facility and two Ph.D. level staff
- Advisory Committee (internal, and external)
- A group of top talent assistant professors & project leaders, pilot grant recipients, seed grant recipients, and veteran mentors for the project leaders
- Cutting edge core molecular biology, bioinformatics and biostatistics core facilities, staffed by a Ph.D. level director and two research technologists