What's our agronomist doing with that computer engineer? What would a veterinary scientist be doing with a professor of fuel science? Over the past several years, University scientists have discovered some pretty good reasons to pop over to the next ivory tower and stay a while. And while no one's talking about tearing down towers, many scientists are realizing that some of the best research and teaching is taking place in the no-man's-land between academic boundaries.

One mechanism to promote such collaboration at Penn State is the Life Sciences Consortium (LSC), which was founded in 1996 to bolster the University's expertise in the life sciences. "Many of the greatest advances in graduate education, research, scholarship, and creative work will most likely occur at the boundaries between disciplines, in interdisciplinary efforts that promise to have a significant impact on society," Penn State President Graham Spanier said in his 1997 State of the University Address. "The establishment of the Life Sciences Consortium is one such initiative." Turning from more traditional organizational models, the consortium's planners embraced the concept of a "virtual organization" that is neither college nor department nor institute. Both intercollegiate and interdisciplinary, the consortium brings together faculty from several colleges in flexible, fluid configurations that match the needs of specific research projects.

The LSC comprises more than 190 faculty and graduate students in science, medicine, agricultural sciences, health and human development, engineering, earth and mineral sciences, and the liberal arts. It is charged with preparing Penn State students for careers in a rapidly changing world, building the University's research strengths in the life sciences, and encouraging new and unexpected faculty alliances. The consortium also facilitates technology-transfer opportunities that stem from LSC-sponsored research.

According to director Nina Fedoroff, the consortium's peculiar structure is central to its success. She had seen the challenge inherent in trying to force the frenetic, shifting energies of today's bioscience research into the conventions of a university. "It was clear that we could put a lot of time into creating new administrative units and not accomplish much," she explains. "The challenge was to create a structure that will accommodate whatever comes down the pike, yet not lock things in so much that in 25 years we'd have a bunch of programs that weren't relevant any more. I decided that my primary objective was the substance and not the form, so I tried to figure out how to bring people together across boundaries in a way that was more fluid than creating another college."

Instead, the consortium has a minimalist structure composed of an internal academic and technical support unit, a funding organization, and two decision-making components: an executive committee and a faculty steering committee. The faculty steering committee, which comprises outstanding faculty from the six colleges and is chaired by Fedoroff, works to formulate LSC policy. It serves as the primary evaluative group in assessing and ranking proposals submitted to the consortium. The steering committee also is the primary liaison between the LSC and the participating departments or units. The executive committee, which encompasses the deans of the six participating colleges, the graduate school, and the directors of the LSC and Intercollege Research Programs, makes final evaluations and decisions for LSC-sponsored faculty hires.

Representatives of the College of Agricultural Sciences have been active in the committees from the beginning. Animal nutritionist Terry Etherton, who holds a seat on the steering committee, describes it as a forum to evaluate the future of life sciences research at Penn State and to have an impact on its direction. "The steering committee brings together people from different colleges to interact in a very dynamic way," he says. "It gives me a perspective on what other colleges are doing. Similarly, faculty in other participating colleges get exposed to what's going on in agricultural sciences."

When President Spanier committed $5 million to the LSC in 1996, his goal was to hire 50 new faculty over five years. A primary objective was to bring in people who would enhance the visibility and quality of life sciences research at Penn State. In the first three years, the colleges and the consortium split the cost of faculty salaries. The LSC also provides start-up funds to match college resources that allow the investigator to buy lab equipment and supplies. The process is very competitive, Etherton notes, because each participating college puts out a request for proposals, evaluates the submissions, and sends a select few to the LSC for evaluation. When they reach the consortium, each proposal is again evaluated on a competitive basis.

Complementing the consortium's structure and approach to hiring new faculty is the Integrative Biosciences (IBIOS) graduate program, which aims to provide doctoral and master's degree students with greater awareness of research career options in academic and nonacademic settings. Trained to function equally well in traditional academic tracks or in nontraditional career paths, these students conduct collaborative research with faculty across departments. The program offers options in biomolecular transport dynamics, cell and developmental biology, chemical biology, ecological and molecular plant physiology, immunobiology, molecular medicine, neuroscience, nutritional sciences, and cellular and molecular mechanisms of toxicity.

The cellular and molecular mechanisms of toxicity option is headed by Melvin Billingsley, professor and vice chair of the Department of Pharmacology at The Milton S. Hershey Medical Center, and veterinary scientist C. Channa Reddy. "Students in this option explore the science of poisons at the molecular, cellular, and organic levels, as well as in the whole animal," Reddy says.

The option equips graduate students with the disciplinary concepts and methodological tools needed to attack complex diseases. Recent breakthroughs in the study of human hormonal and enzymatic symptoms are opening the doors for assaults on the basic processes behind problems such as arteriosclerosis, cancer, arthritis, and migraine headaches, Reddy explains. Instead of finding cures for these diseases, toxicity researchers look for the biochemical factors that can make humans and animals vulnerable to them. "We're exposed to pollutants every day, and our bodies interact with them," Reddy says. "We need to figure out how our bodies can cope with this environment, especially with all the industrial waste that is dumped. How is dioxin, for instance, taken up by cells and metabolized, and how do we excrete it?"

Students in the IBIOS program's ecological and molecular plant physiology option learn to integrate molecular, biochemical, physiological, and ecological approaches to plant research. Plant nutritionist Jonathan Lynch provides a model for students with his studies of how plants adapt to poor and infertile soils. He breeds bean plants that make increasingly more efficient use of phosphorus, an essential and expensive nutrient that is deficient in most of the world's soils.

Much of Lynch's success has resulted from collaborative efforts with researchers in other fields. With bean breeder Steve Beebe from the International Center for Tropical Agriculture in Cali, Colombia, he identified bean varieties that out-produce commercial strains in low-phosphorus soils. Other research on root system efficiency led him into a partnership with Penn State computer scientist Andrei Jablokow, now at Silicon Graphics, Inc., to develop SimRoot, a computer program that simulates and models root growth. "Solving real-world problems is a multidisciplinary activity," Lynch explains. "I have a goal to reduce world hunger. You can't take on that large a challenge from within a narrow discipline."

Lynch says his graduate-education philosophy matches that of the LSC: to expand students' research horizons. "You don't want a narrowly trained person who can't work in a team, solve problems, shift to an industrial environment, or take advantage of opportunities as they arise," he says. "We're trying to get graduate students, even though they have expertise in one area, to be aware of issues in related areas. Molecular biologists, for instance, should be aware of how whole plants work so that they'll know how the genes they study are likely to work when they're put into a plant."

To ensure that students are exposed to a wide range of experiences, the consortium needs faculty with a wide range of backgrounds. When the Department of Plant Pathology identified a need for an expert in the molecular biology of plant/bacteria interactions, department head Elwin Stewart saw an excellent opportunity for the College to partner with the LSC. When Fedoroff distributed the proposals from all colleges to the faculty steering committee, Stewart saw that his was just one of many exciting proposals. "That's what this process is about taking the opportunity to make Penn State a leader in a number of different areas," Stewart says.

The plant pathology proposal resulted in the joint LSC/Agricultural Sciences appointment of Timothy McNellis, a plant molecular geneticist who will work on bacteria as part of his model system. He joins two other recent appointees. John Carlson joined the School of Forest Resources as an associate professor of molecular genetics studying tree molecular biology, and Robert Paulson joined the veterinary science department to conduct research and teach in molecular immunology. A faculty search is underway to fill an additional position in environmental toxicology.

When a position is approved for funding by the LSC, it is a victory for the participating college and for the University, says Robert Steele, dean of the College. Most important, he explains, it exemplifies the LSC model. "The model has really validated itself over the last few years," Steele says. "From a research standpoint, the consortium has inspired new initiatives. From a teaching standpoint, it has educated new students. From the perspective of our outreach mission, the consortium has successfully taken the fruits of research to the state. We couldn't be more pleased."

Steele points to the faculty and graduate positions made available to the College through the LSC as proof of the beneficial effect that the consortium has had on the College. "Our participation in the LSC has opened up new opportunities for faculty to train graduate students and has brought new faculty in," he explains. "More subtly, it's brought the campus community of bioscientists together in our College and across other colleges. We have a tendency to stay within our own disciplines, departments, and colleges, but the LSC creates bridges."

Steele says that the interdisciplinary, intercollege model successfully piloted by the LSC will have influence on the development and structure of four new program initiatives identified by President Spanier in 1997: information science and technologies, materials science, environmental studies, and children, youth, and families.

"It's very exciting, not just for the LSC, but also for the virtual-college model they have pioneered. When you establish a new system, you wonder if it's going to work. I think we can say with confidence that the LSC is working the way it's intended. The idea of gathering together the best of the University community and bringing their skills to bear on what we do as a College is a dynamic example of synergy: the resulting whole is far more than our contributed parts."

— Gary Abdullah

Faculty referenced in this article are Terry D. Etherton, distinguished professor of animal nutrition and head of the Department of Dairy and Animal Science; Nina V. Federoff, Willaman Professor of Life Sciences and director of the Life Sciences Consortium; Jonathan P. Lynch, associate professor of plant nutrition and agronomy; C. Channa Reddy, distinguished professor of veterinary science; Robert D. Steele, professor of food science and dean of the College; and Elwin L. Stewart, professor and head of the Department of Plant Pathology. To contact the Life Sciences Consortium, access their Web site at http://www.lsc.psu.edu.