Julie Kurth
Biodesign Institute Manager, Community and Employee Relations at ArizonaStateUniversity http://www.biodesign.asu.edu/
ASU's Biodesign Institute is driven by a passion to solve some of the world's most urgent problems affecting human health and the health of our planet. The result includes such ambitious projects as detecting disease before symptoms appear, finding more sustainable sources of fuel and energy, developing vaccines against the world's most devastating diseases, and much more.
ASU's efforts dovetail with a statewide initiative to build a robust bioscience economy in Arizona. The focused statewide efforts began in 2002 with the establishment of a 10-year roadmap that outlined the following returns to the community:
Greater availability of new medical treatments for Arizona residents
Opportunity to build a higher wage, skilled, and technology-driven employment base overall, with added benefit of an industry that provides jobs at various skill levels. (Expectation: 32,000 direct and indirect jobs and 120 bioscience firms by 2012.)
Greater stability for Arizona's economy with a sector that balances more cyclical industries (Expectation: $140 million investment to generate $6 in return for every $1 invested over a 10-year period.)
