News & Events

The National Disease Research Interchange (NDRI), in collaboration with the University of Maryland School of Medicine and Johns Hopkins All Children’s Hospital, has been awarded a research grant of $14.4M by the National Institutes of Health (NIH) with a goal to transform our knowledge of how much genetic variation there is in cells and tissues throughout our bodies.

The National Disease Research Interchange (NDRI), a world leader in the procurement and distribution of biospecimens to advance research, announces the promotion of Thomas J. Bell, PhD, to the role of Chief Scientific Officer (CSO), and Melissa VonDran, PhD, to Senior Vice President, Operations.

We are excited to share with you our Winter 2022 Research Nexus newsletter. Features in it include NDRI being featured in The National Institutes of Health ORIP fact sheet, completion of a multiyear project involving autism studies, profiles on employees Victoria Corbit and Dana Rosales, and awards to Washington Regional Transplant Community (WRTC), David Fajgenbaum, MD, MBA, MSc, Gift of Life Donor Program, Katalin Karikó, Dr. Drew Weissman, and more.

https://newsletter.ndriresource.org/

Bill Leinweber, NDRI President and CEO, has been elected to the Association of Organ Procurement Organizations (AOPO) Foundation Board of Directors. The newly formed AOPO Foundation is a 501(c)3 organization dedicated to administering research in the field of organ donation and transplantation. The organization is specifically focused on organ procurement organization (OPO) advancement. Read more here.

NDRI celebrated our researchers and partners at the Service to Science Awards Dinner on Wednesday, September 28, 2022, at the Union League in Philadelphia.

NDRI Presents Empowering Research and Discovery Award to Washington Regional Transplant Community, Recognizing Outstanding Commitment to Advancing Research.

The Board of Directors of the National Disease Research Interchange (NDRI) is pleased to announce that Dr. Katalin Karikó and Dr. Drew Weissman, the scientists who led the research and technology development for the therapeutic use of mRNA – the foundation for the COVID vaccines developed by Pfizer/BioNTech and Moderna/NIH, will receive NDRI’s 2022 Empowering Research and Discovery Award. Click here to read more 

NDRI CAP Accreditation

NDRI Board Member Dr. Hal Broxmeyer contributed to the world’s first successful cord blood transplant and will be missed.

-Philadelphia-based National Disease Research Interchange (NDRI) announces the election of Paul M. Lieberman, Ph.D., to its Board. Lieberman is the Hilary Koprowski, M.D., Endowed Professor, leader of the Gene Expression and Regulation Program, and director of the Center for Chemical Biology & Translational Medicine at The Wistar Institute, a biomedical research leader in cancer, immunology, infectious disease, and vaccine development. Elected on November 12 to a three-year term, Lieberman will bring his experience and insight to the nation’s leading source of human organs, cells and tissues for research.

 The National Disease Research Interchange (NDRI) is pleased to announce its recovery network partners for the developmental Genotype-Tissue Expression (dGTEx) project. The dGTEx project is the first comprehensive public resource correlating gene expression and genetic variation in pediatric tissues from all major organ systems in the human body.  NDRI will partner with multiple organ procurement organizations/tissue banks across the United States.

NDRI and collaborators were awarded a research grant of $12.5M over 5 years to collaborate on the developmental Genotype Expression (dGTEx) project

NDRI was recently awarded a research resource grant of $334,446 from the National Institute on Aging (NIA) to support the development of the Ocular Tissue Resource for Alzheimer’s Disease (OTRAD). While significant advances continue to be made with the identification of blood-based biomarkers for Alzheimer’s disease (AD), there is an emergent interest in the use of ocular imaging or other ocular biomarkers as a parallel approach in early detection of the disease.

NDRI issued a public comment on the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services proposed rule entitled "Medicare Program: Hospital Inpatient Prospective Payment Systems for Acute Care Hospitals and the Long Term Care Hospital Prospective Payment System and Proposed Policy Changes and Fiscal Year 2022 Rates; Quality Programs and Medicare Promoting Interoperability Program Requirements for Eligible Hospitals and Critical Access Hospitals; Proposed Changes to Medicaid Provider Enrollment". This rule dramatically discourages the use and acquisition of human tissues for biomedical research- our comment was posted on June 22. You can read the full submission on our website here: https://ndriresource.org/uploads/attachments/ckqgogkpsedvv96u16sf1qfss-ndripubliccomment.pdf

In early January 2021, NDRI’s Scientific Services and Marketing teams sent out a 10- question survey to approximately 3,000 researcher contacts. We have received a very strong and insightful 11% response.

NDRI is pleased to share our Spring 2021 edition of Research Nexus. Inside you will find findings from our COVID-19 Researcher Survey, stories and publications from our researchers, updates on our programmatic initiatives and staff, and highlights featuring some of our very own board members.

Read this edition and look for highlights of our stories in the days ahead!

Throughout NDRI’s 40-year history, we have partnered with more than 130 tissue source sites, including organ procurement organizations, tissue banks, eye banks and hospitals to provide some 500 scientists annually from across the globe with human specimens to advance research toward treatments and cures to improve the lives of patients and their families — without these partnerships NDRI’s mission simply would not be possible.

NDRI is proud to share a series of videos highlighting our partners, researchers and those who make the fulfillment of NDRI's mission possible!

View our researcher highlights:

https://ndriresource.org/researcherhighlights

The National Disease Research Interchange (NDRI), a world leader in the procurement and distribution of biospecimens to advance research, recognized Donor Network West, an Organ Procurement Organization (OPO) which serves northern California and northern Nevada, as the recipient of the second annual NDRI/AOPO Empowering Research and Discovery Award for outstanding commitment to the advancement of research.

Thank you for being a part of the NDRI Community. NDRI’s Board of Directors and leadership team has made the decision to postpone our 40th Anniversary Service to Science Dinner in Philadelphia, PA on November 12, 2020, due to growing uncertainty surrounding the current and evolving COVID19 outbreak.

NDRI is proud to announce the second annual NDRI & AOPO Empowering Research and Discovery Award will be presented virtually at the Association of Organ Procurement Organizations - AOPO the week of June 22.

This award recognizes an organ procurement organization committed to advancing research. Nominations will be accepted through June 1, 2020. The NDRI and AOPO Research and Discovery Award will be presented to an organ procurement organization for their work with NDRI and commitment to research broadly. Nominate your OPO here:

https://www.ndriresource.org/ndri-aopo