 Thank you for your patience. We wanted to make sure we had both presentations up before we started So I'm going to make some opening remarks to try to provide a little bit of background about What we're going to talk about for the next hour or so which relates specifically to a Blue Ribbon panel review of our intramural program, but especially because the council has not heard And a formal update from an intramural program for some time and because you're going to now hear it Coupled to a review that takes place only once a decade. I thought it was worth giving some background information So you could fully sort of appreciate sort of the context by which this presentation is going to take place and I think the real way to to to educate you about our intramural program at NHR Which again the council doesn't have real formal oversight over we have a whole separate advisory structure our board of scientific counselors That has that responsibility, but nonetheless we do keep council updated on what's going on at the Institute So they can sort of fit that into the rest of the Institute's research activities and and and be aware of it And actually in principle give me a very high level advice about it But I think the thing to really appreciate about our intramural program is that in many ways It has its own set of eras that it has gone through very much like the kinds of eras that have the Institute has gone through More more globally. I will take you back through down memory lane if you will and Point out the intramural program started actually At the end of the human genome project, which of course was guided by strategic plans that gave us a blueprint for how to accomplish the goals of the genome project The intro program specifically began when Francis Collins was recruited here and it began in 1993 a Bob Nussbaum our incoming council member was one of the first investigators to arrive here in the intramural program He actually arrived a year before I got there of course that intramural program took on a Different type of as you will hear about sort of set of research objectives and then in the next era of genomics I think in many ways took off Dealing with the kinds of things that we're going to have unique Circumstances from program-provided opportunities to pursue genomics and genetics research to capitalize on the human genome project And then of course the same time now we're operating within the new strategic vision for genomics and as Dan Kaster Will tell you shortly I think very much it fits in to some very important aspects of that Strategic vision, but I purposely set up these three eras for the Institute More broadly and for genomics just to sort of give you a little bit of background about the different eras that the intramural research Program has now seen again coming up to 20 years of existence and not surprisingly Different growth phases and in each of these phases I think it has faced different opportunities different challenges and they really have they really have been different times for that intramural program and Again, I think you you will hear this echoed by Dan, but I also think there's others here including Bob Nussbaum and myself And others in the room who've been part of it at different times Will reflect back and I think very much agree with some of these general ideas So again when the program began in 1993 the scientific director That's the term we use for the director of the division of intramural research was Jeff Trent He was our founding a scientific director. This literally was an infancy I when Bob arrived or roughly when Bob and a small number of people arrived there were empty labs And there was no equipment and he was involved as well a small number were involved in literally ordering the very first piece of Equipment and getting this set up essentially from ground zero So I would say it's maturation stage during that time went from about infancy to toddler The blood budget to be quite candid it was right during the doubling of the NIH budget was right during the scallop of the Genome project and admittedly the intramural program benefited from those types of increases along with the rest of the Institute And the rest of NIH I can tell you from those days budget was it was a very comfortable budgetary circumstance But I think the focus of the program was very much on creating initial vision for having an intramural program Lots and lots of recruiting and significant growth that took place. Like I said, I arrived in 1994 But recruitment I think went on throughout the time that Jeff Trent was a scientific director When Jeff departed I was appointed the scientific director and I led the Intramural program for eight plus years I would say I Oversaw an organization that very much was at an adolescent stage and I mean that in the good ways and the bad ways But truly it was beyond being toddler And it sort of had a view that I could do absolutely anything and it was mostly just about keeping it from getting in too much trouble I noticed and almost immediately because it when I became the scientific director almost on that day It seemed we went to a flat NIH budget and the entire time I was there We were essentially functionally had a flat budget and so we had to focus things a little bit different It was much more about strategic refinement and it was much more about organizational management We went from a stage where we knew we were going to have to be far more Organized and managed in a fashion that would deal with tightening budget budgets And we knew eventually would grow into our clothing and eventually of course, it's exactly what happened From 2010 on and I'm reminded that it's always easy for to remember So I became director of NHGRI in December of 2009 I remained the acting scientific director during the recruitment for a new scientific director and then Dan Caster who's going to follow me was appointed the scientific director and took the reins of the program It's easy to remember on 10 10 10 so October 10th of 2010 is when he became and and Dan as the scientific director Really has had to deal with an intramural program at a different life stage It is very much a young adult stage I don't think it's an old adult yet, but I'll probably see it into it's it's later years But as all of you can appreciate because you're facing the same thing in your in academic settings It is a time of incredible restrictive budgets as a result as you will hear I think Dan very much is focusing on programmatic prioritization and budgetary challenges Just as all of you are doing at your institutions as well Well, one of the things is Dan took over the reins of the intramural program many many questions had to be asked about Priorities about process about many the analogous things we deal with around the council table as well And it was very clear that as he got more and more Familiar with our program. It was also very clear. There was going to have to be some very tough decisions along the way and in one of the Retreats that we had there was discussion about how are we going to get our hands around sort of getting some Getting these these priorities just right and really empowering him to make what's likely going to have to be some tough decisions And it was we quickly gravitate to the idea It would be very helpful if we got an outside group to come in and really look at us But who haven't been necessarily too involved with the intramural program to get a fresh perspective And then it also occurred to me that indeed there was a process for that and NIH I'm something called a blue ribbon panel review and in fact this is signed that Harold Varmas started when he was the NIH director Where he said and found in fact when he became an ice director that some that that while the boards of scientific counselors of Individual intramural programs were were reasonably effective or intended to be effective at Evaluating individual scientific programs every four years in a very rigorous way that what was lacking was sort of a big picture view of a complete intramural program And in fact he felt that some intramural programs of some institutes and centers needed that and having an external group come out and Do it not too frequently, but do it at some frequency enough to sort of help Make sure that that program is strong and is heading in the right direction And so Harold instituted something called a blue ribbon panel review where he called for and he actually said at once a decade An external group should be constituted that would come in and do a serious look at holistically an entire intramural program And indeed do so and provide feedback to the NIH director actually but along the way of course provide input to the Institute director And to the deputy director for intramural research at NIH who's Michael Goddisman Well, it just turned out that when we had this epiphany would it be helpful if we had an external group come in and look at us I happened to look up the date of our last blue ribbon panel, and I sort of remembered it because I was here I was That was it was only you know not turned out to be about nine and a half years ago So we were due we were due to have and I'm sure Bob remembers that because I know he participated as did I And so we were due anyway, it seemed like the perfect thing to be done I wanted to follow the rules as it is and so I Went forward in implementing a blue ribbon panel review of our intramural program the one little nuance I could immediately tell you is that it's supposed to report to the NIH director in this particular case because the NIH director is Francis Collins Of course who has his intramural lab within our intramural program He was recused from this was not involved, and we've put it under the the oversight of Michael Goddisman In particular Larry Tabeck was also involved in this as the deputy director So with with working with Michael and working with Larry. I constituted this group By by laws or by rules by policies it requires a minimum number of individuals We met that it also requires a representative from council and Rick Myers Appropriately agreed to do that and one of the reasons I'm happy that Rick was willing to do this Is Rick was one of the original members of our Board of Scientific Counselors years ago And and so Rick was willing to do that Bruce Korf joined on as a member of our current Board of Scientific Counselors And I was able to arm twist this incredibly wonderful person by the way who just joined the phone This incredibly wonderful person David page. I was just complimenting you David. I had no idea you And David page agreed to share this And it was also appropriate being a former member of council and very familiar with NHGRI and our research program and as you can see I was successful in getting an all-star group of additional people to join this blue ribbon panel And so this has taken place now it started it took place over about a nine month period and and the Provided to all of you in the electronic book is the draft report of the blue ribbon panel That also includes information about agendas and things like that But it all and it also includes a vision statement that the blue ribbon panel asked Dan to put together And I'm sure he's going to talk about it And so David joins us by phone now and what we're going to do is I've now also combined this with So what's supposed to be a roughly annual update to the council by the scientific director And so we're going to start by having Dan Caster give that update about the instrument program It's the first time counsel is going to hear a presentation from Dan But I purposely delayed it to today because I thought it was appropriate to do it back to back with the blue ribbon panel report And then following that Rick Myers is going to going to give a Update or an overview of this the report of the blue ribbon panel And he has David on the phone to add to that discussion as well So with that in mind let me introduce Dan Caster to you and we'll do a quick slide change so that Dan can Just jump right in