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The ARPA-H (Advance Research Project Agency for Health), a new organisation created to promote scientific development that improves all Americans’ healthcare, has named Doctor Renee Wegrzyn its founding head.
Doctor Wegrzyn, a researcher with deep expertise in the DARPA (Defence Advanced Research Project Agency) and the IARPA (Intelligence Advanced Research Project Activity), two of the organisations that prompted the formation of ARPA-H, will be in charge of the agency’s evolving data analysis securities and budget. The program is anticipated to provide funding for several initiatives to foster expertise in preventing, diagnosing, and treating various complex diseases, particularly cancer.
Key takeaways
- Biologist and former government scientist Doctor Renee Wegrzyn were chosen to serve as the first director of the recently established ARPA-H(Advancement of Research Project Agency for Health).
- The ARPA-H Director would serve for five years.
- The ARPA-H was designed to look for a cognitive process to physical challenges.
- It really would support highly perilous but fruitful life science research.
- It was established to follow the footsteps of the US DARPA (Defence Advanced Research Projects Agency), which had a massive effect on the rapid advancement of defence technologies by funding dangerous projects that might be quickly cancelled if the study did not reach the required benchmark.
- Dr Renee Wegrzyn worked on projects using biological methods to combat contagious illnesses and improve biosecurity throughout her five years as the project coordinator at DARPA.
- Although ARPA-H has a new head, little is known about the organisation’s history.
- The US Congress had given ARAP-H $1 billion until 2022. The Biden Presidency had proposed an expenditure of USD 6.5 billion.
- The organisation does not have the support of the law that established it explicitly.
First-ever Director of the Innovative Research organisation for Health, Doctor Renee Wegrzyn (ARPA-H)
Presently working as Head of Advancement at Concentric by Ginkgo and Vice President of Corporate Development at Ginkgo Bio works, Dr Renee Wegrzyn is devoted to using biological methods to outpace viral infections, such as COVID-19, and via biomanufacturing, vaccine development, and comprehensive biosurveillance of pathogens.
Wegrzyn worked as the programme manager for the DARPA’s BTO (Biological Technologies Office) before joining Ginkgo, where she used gene editing and synthetic biology to boost biosecurity, increase community health, and develop the American economy. She listed several DARPA initiatives, including the Biological Manufacturing facilities: 1k Compounds, Safe Genetic, PREPARE (Preventative Expression of Protective Allele and Response Element), and DIGET (Discover it using Genome – editing Technologies) programmes.
Wegrzyn was awarded the Outstanding Public Utility Medal for her work ethic and accomplishments at DARPA. Wegrzyn oversaw the international team in the commercial sector before returning to DARPA as a project manager. These teams are engaged in research on multiplex assay techniques, protein disease diagnosis, biosecurity, gene treatments, highly contagious illnesses, neurostimulation, and bioengineering.
Wegrzyn participated in the research advisory panel for the Air Force Research Labs, Revive & Restore, Innovative Genomic Foundation, and Institutes of Lab Group on Army R&d activities. She obtained a doctorate and a bachelor’s degree in technique from the University of Georgia and completed the Nationwide Nuclear Threat Program. She completed her postdoctoral coaching as an Arthur Friedrich Fellow and participated in the ELBI (Emerging Leaders in Biosecurity Initiative) programme of the Center for Security.
Dr Wegrzyn will accompany Prez Biden Tuesday at the John F. Kennedy Presidency Library in Boston to outline his plan for eliminating cancer on the anniversary celebration of President John F. Kennedy’s Moonshot talk.
History
Since 1958, a year after the Soviet Union released Sputnik, the DARPA (Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency), originally ARPA) has been the government’s in-house innovation. DARPA is very well known for developing ARPAnet, the industry’s forerunner, and for its advances in hardened circuits, brain-computer interfaces, connection technologies, aircraft, and stealth aircraft. Motivated by DARPA’s achievements, the IARPA (Intelligence Advanced Research Projects Activity) was created in 2006. In 2009, the ARPA-E (Advanced Research Projects Agency-Energy) was established. DARPA has influenced the Advanced Research and Invention Agency in the U.k., and the Biden presidency recently suggested ARPA-C for environmental research.
Moonshot Address by President Kennedy 60th Commemoration
President Kennedy, at Rice University in Houston, Texas, on Sept 12, 1962, addressed his renowned “Moonshot Speech.” The President reaffirmed during his speech the US’s goal to put astronauts on the moon’s surface by the end of the century and return safely to Earth, which was first proposed in May 1961.
Health Advanced Research Projects Agency
The Federal Institute of Health’s ARPA-H (Advanced Research Projects Agency for Health) is a separate entity inside the Institutes Of health. Its mission is to “invest strategically in technology innovation and generally applicable platforms, skills, assets, and remedies that possess the potential to change key places of health and medicine for the benefit of all patient populations and that can’t easily be managed to accomplish through research studies or business interest.”
APRA-H was approved by Congress with the passage of H.R.2471: Consolidated Appropriations Act, 2022, and was enacted into Public Law 117-103 on March 15, 2022, by US President Joe Biden. Fifteen days afterwards, Department of Health and Human Secretary Xavier Becerra indicated that the organisation would have access to NIH funds but would report to the HHS President. The agency’s initial budget is $1 billion, which will be spent by FY2025 (October 2024), and the Biden Presidency has requested significantly more money from Congress. Biden stated his intention to name Renee Wegrzyn as the company’s first director on Sept 13, 2022, but it is uncertain where its offices will be.
