The Department of Biotechnology and Department of Science Technology have jointly announced a Core Vaccine Research Units (CVRU) programme to boost up the vaccine research activities in the country.

The DBT is aiming at CVRU to build a critical mass of human resources, institutional capacity and supporting environments which would be able to respond to vaccine and public health research needs. The DBT has called for proposals from public and other Department of Scientific & Industrial Research (DSIR) recognised institutions to establish vaccine research units using the fund.

According to an announcement by DSIR, about 1212 in-house R&D units in the industry and 568 Scientific and Industrial Research Organisations (SIROs) were recognised by the Department in 2007. Out of these 568 SIROs, 205 are in the area of natural and applied sciences and 197 are in the area of medical sciences.

"The number of institutions to be supported and the funds to be allotted has not been decided. These matters will be considered once after the institutions propose for the project," said a senior official from DBT. The activities of the CVRUs should contribute to the definition of research priorities, conduct of vaccine research, and translation of results of surveillance and field trials into evidence-based policy, the CVRU will provide short term training to build a talent pool in the country, informed the officials.

The grant will support the development of leadership in research, scientific expertise in biomedical managerial skills, and institutional infrastructure. Research proposals addressing areas on the interface between laboratory-oriented research and applied field research would be supported through the programme. The research activity should be the axis for strengthening the research capacity of the team or institution.

The eligible institutions and R&D units should submit the applications to the DBT before January 9, 2009. The DBT has also announced opening of several joint research programmes with countries like Finland and Sweden and a Biotechnology Industry Partnership Programme (BIPP) - An Advanced Technology Scheme (ATS) - envisaged as a government partnership programme with industries for support on cost sharing basis for high risk discovery and innovation, accelerated technology development specially for futuristic areas.