I came to work here from Harvard five years ago, because stepping onto an entirely new medical campus is a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity. As far as I can see, there really isn’t another campus like this in the world.
I also came here because my research involves Inflammatory Bowel Disease (IBD) and there is a real need for work in this field throughout the Rocky Mountain region.
We are mindful every day that the disease we are studying affects real people and their ability to live a quality life, so we try not to distance ourselves from the patients. One of the real advantages of being on this campus is that it takes us two minutes to walk to the Gastroenterology Clinic. There, we can collect samples from patients with IBD on a daily basis and use these samples in the lab to ask questions about the disease. In this way, we are fortunate to collaborate with both the clinicians and the patients in an effort to help solve the puzzles of this disease.
IBD is essentially an autoimmune disease of the intestine. There is a genetic component to this disease and while we have identified the genes, we don’t yet know how these genes contribute to the disease process. That is part of what my lab does. We study these gene mutations at a very basic level with the hopes of identifying a mechanism and a link to the disease. The ultimate goal is to target these mutations with a novel drug to alleviate the symptoms associated with this genetic defect.
The Anschutz Medical Campus allows us to take a multi-disciplinary and multi-departmental approach to our research. We’re not working in just in one specific area in the campus. We are currently spread across five different departments on this campus. We have recruited experts in who have strengths that we do not have and who are in need of our strengths. The goal here is to be collectively better than any one lab might be in isolation.
If you walk through the lab, you will find MDs and PhDs, physicians and scientists, working elbow to elbow at the same bench. These collaborations require that the MDs learn the language of science and likewise, that the PhDs learn the language of the clinic. This is the kind of unique collaboration that makes for new discoveries. This is what I live for every day.
Would I love to say in 20 years that we have found a cure for Crohn’s Disease or a new therapy for ulcerative colitis? Absolutely.
For the time being, what I do have control over is training the next generation of biomedical scientists. My job as a professor is to train the young physicians and scientists who then develop their own independent careers and ultimately impact the lives of others.
I hope my legacy is this: a new generation of scientists who look back and say “I’m glad I went to the Anschutz Medical Campus” or “I’m glad I went to that lab.” If that happens, I can say that I influenced one person, and that person influenced someone else. In that regard, many great minds will have worked together to help people living with IBD.
Professor Sean P. Colgan