MDI Bio Lab leads expansion of biomed research and education network

Photo / Courtesy MDI Bio Lab MDI Bio Lab President Hermann Haller demonstrates pipetting techniques with Colby College students at a 2024 INBRE course on the lab’s Bar Harbor campus.

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By Laurie Schreiber

Bar Harbor’s MDI Biological Laboratory is a nonprofit hub for the science of aging and regeneration. It is leading the expansion of the Maine IDeA Network of Biomedical Research Excellence, or INBRE — a network of research and higher education institutions providing hands-on research experience, equipment and financial support for college students and early-career science faculty.

In 2024, the lab received a $19.4 million National Institutes of Health grant to renew and expand INBRE with three new members — University of Southern Maine, Maine Health Institute for Research and University of Maine at Augusta.

Now totaling 17 members, other members are the University of Maine; UMaine Honors College; UMaine campuses in Fort Kent, Presque Isle, Farmington and Machias; Southern Maine Community College; College of the Atlantic; University of New England; Colby, Bates and Bowdoin; Jackson Laboratory and MDI Bio Lab.

So far, INBRE’s direct investment has been $87 million, with an additional $100 million more supported as research grants.

“In a state like Maine with a small population and a vast geography, it’s our willingness to work together that makes us competitive in the global biomedical world, that helps us to punch above our weight,” Hermann Haller, MDI Bio Lab’s president, has said.

Additional awards

A $6 million grant renewal from NIH’s National Institute of General Medical Sciences increases researchers’ access to the lab’s light microscopy facility’s magnification and image-processing infrastructure. Last summer, scientists outfitted a laser-based 3D microscope with virtual reality features, allowing users to magnify, view, measure and move around molecular structures of whole organisms as if from the inside. The grant also widens access to the lab’s data science facilities, improves outreach to Maine communities and establishes a paid internship program for animal care.
$1.6 million in congressionally directed spending for the lab’s entrepreneurial initiative, MDI Bioscience, which develops emerging drug discovery technologies. The funding supports renovation and construction of additional campus space and related equipment purchases. The work is underway.

The lab said NIH’s 15% cap on reimbursements for support services for direct biomedical research, while stayed for the moment, “remains a major threat to MDI Biological Laboratory’s mission to make life-changing discoveries for human health while training a new generation of science leaders.”

The cap would decrease a typical year’s grant support by 27%, including sub-awards to Maine INBRE partners and others.

The measure would slow, and in some cases could end, front-line biomedical research projects; limit training opportunities for college students and early-career scientists; and imperil job stability, the lab said.