Department of Science & Technology and Department of Biotechnology are jointly planning a mission mode programme in biomaterial and medical devices to promote R&D and industrial activity, besides setting up a number of institutions for research to help the biotechnological sector emerge better in the country.

A draft of national biotechnology policy, prepared by the concerned departments, is aiming to accord high priority to basic and applied research, strengthen capacity in pre-clinical and clinical product evaluation technologies relevant to all aspects of health and medical care-predictive, preventive, therapeutic and restorative.

Innovation will be supported through new granting mechanisms to support interdisciplinary networks and public private partnerships, sources said. On the industrial biotechnology side, the Government would take steps to reduce chemical and toxic load in effluent streams, developing eco-friendly non-fossil fuels to help bio-pharmaceutical firms, among other players, develop green technologies.
Basic and applied research would be supported in molecular and cellular biology, genomics, proteomics, system biology, stem cell biology, RNA interference, host response and new platform technologies. Pathogenesis of major diseases and molecular mechanics of disease transmission would be investigated. Product development will be focused on vaccines, diagnostics, new therapies based on cell and tissue replacement, therapeutic antibodies, herbal medicine, plant based medicine, nucleic acids, therapeutics, drug and vaccine delivery systems, new anti microbial agents, sources said.

Research to improve production and manufacturing process and local production of biological reagents for development of diagnostics are other areas which will be given importance in the proposed policy.

A centre for translational research, to deal with technology policy for public health, molecular pathogenesis of disease, technology development, scale up product evaluation and technology diffusion into programmes, is one of the proposed institutions under the policy. The proposed centre will be unique in having a pool of scientists, physicians, engineers and public health persons working on public health. This institute will work through public-private partnerships and will be a training centre for product development, IPR and regulation.

Two centres of molecular medicine within medical school system closely interacting with basic science institutes, a virtual network of stem cell centres using a city cluster approach to network scientists and clinicians, two core stem cell research centres and an umbilical cord stem cell bank are also being proposed.

An inter agency task force of ICMR, Department of Biotechnology, and DST will be established to suggest strategies for strengthening medical school based research. Capacity related to translational biology, clinical trials, molecular epidemiology and product development would be strengthened. Integrated MD-PhD programs will also be supported.