Medical lab does first-rate research in second-rate facilities

The longtime researchers like to tell the stories. The raccoon that fell through the lab roof. The buckets put out to collect rain from leaky roofs. The fire ? and lack of sprinklers.

Scientists at Los Angeles' venerable Biomedical Research Institute, a cutting-edge hub of medical invention housed for 60 years in World War II military barracks near Torrance, have grown accustomed to trailblazing through peeling paint, slanted floors, rickety stairs and exposed telephone wires.

The decidedly backward facilities stand in sharp contrast to the center's medical breakthroughs and research, rivaling forward-leaning institutions across the nation.

The center's work ? much of it funded by the National Institutes of Health ? has led to the development of the modern cholesterol test, the newborn thyroid deficiency exam and eyedrops to prevent blindness in children. Investigators also created the paramedic model for emergency care and helped pave the way for in-vitro fertilization.

"The only difference between us and everybody else is that we are doing it in buildings that were promised to be torn down in 1946," said David Meyer, the center's president.

Last year, LA BioMed, as the center is known, finally began replacing some of the old Army structures with an up-to-date building. And now, Meyer said the nonprofit institution is raising funds and negotiating $30 million in county bonds to again create something new: a fully modern research facility.

Researchers say modernizing the campus, which is next to and works closely with county-operated Harbor-UCLA Medical Center, will make it easier to attract top talent and help remedy possible hazards.

A small lake ? complete with frogs ? formed outside his aging lab during storms, recalled John Michael Criley, a professor emeritus at UCLA who has been at LA BioMed for 45 years. He had to build a makeshift bridge to cross it. "It was like being in 'Raiders of the Lost Ark,'" he said.

The outmoded facilities did have some advantages, he said. They were cheap and there was plenty of room. "If we needed more space, we could knock out a wall with a hammer and a saw," said Criley, a cardiologist who helped create paramedic medicine.

The campus spans more than 30 acres, a sprawling maze of old wooden bungalows and newer concrete-and-steel buildings. Cars are parked at all angles around the odd enclave of labs and research spaces scattered between patches of grass and trees.

French researcher Fawzia Bardag-Gorce said her jaw dropped when she arrived at the center in 1999. "I was shocked," she said. She adapted and now, inside one of the old barracks, Bardag-Gorce and her team are using high-tech equipment to create replacement corneas using cells from inside people's cheeks.

Outside of the bungalows, feral cats sip from bowls in the parking lot. And in nearby buildings, scientists are researching drugs to vaccinate against hospital-acquired infections and to alleviate the pain associated with sickle cell disease, among hundreds of other projects.

Across campus, construction crews are working on a $10-million federally funded building that will house a chronic disease research center.

The Army opened the Los Angeles Port of Embarkation Hospital in 1943 to treat soldiers shipping out to World War II. After the war ended, Los Angeles County bought the hospital and opened it in 1946. It became UCLA's first teaching hospital.

In 1952, several doctors started a research organization that would later become LA BioMed. The current Harbor-UCLA Medical Center opened in 1963, and the vacant barracks were turned into more research space.

William French, a Harbor-UCLA cardiologist, started at LA BioMed in 1975. The wooden floors in his old work space couldn't support newer, heavier equipment, so he had to stick with antiquated machines. "It was pretty bad ? but we made do," he said.

French, who has since moved to a newer building, said he stayed with the center because of his colleagues ? about 150 altogether ? and the research opportunities.

John Edwards, a UCLA medical school professor and head of infectious diseases at the hospital, said the conditions and the long hours he and other young scientists worked helped breed a strong camaraderie. "That created a trench-like work atmosphere," he said. He worked in a bungalow, E-5, for many years before moving to another building on campus, where he conducts research on hospital-acquired infections.

More than most, Edwards appreciates the campus' history. His father, a Navy admiral, was treated at the old hospital at the end of WWII. Recently, the deteriorating condition of the research buildings has made it more difficult to hire and retain scientists, he said. "Most of the younger investigators we'd like to recruit have never seen facilities like these," he said.

The barracks "served us well, but no longer," he said. "Their day is over."

anna.gorman@latimes.com

Source: http://feeds.latimes.com/~r/latimes/news/science/~3/67uZW2UI3Ss/la-me-biomed-20120130,0,7798614.story

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