U of T research centre faces tough questions

Student group links MaRS to private sector and U.S. military

David Smookler
The Varsity (University of Toronto)

TORONTO (CUP) — MaRS (Medical and Related Sciences), which opened last fall, is a “convergence innovation centre,” according to its website and flashy, rainbow-coloured billboards that surround the site.

It is a not-for-profit corporation including the Toronto Medical Discovery Tower — a 15-floor building full of labs housing University of Toronto professors, start-up companies that MaRS provides with business resources, and investment groups that fund the development of basic research discoveries into products.

Because MaRS strives to encompass such an unusual mix of corporations, capital and research, it immediately draws suspicion from those who are leery of the private sector’s involvement in research, universities and health care.

Dr. Paul Hammel, a professor in the faculty of medicine and a former president of Science For Peace, objects to the model.

“I’m not personally going to go to a seminar or give a seminar at MaRS. They’re mixing publicly-funded research with private enterprise,” to increase the profits of private corporations, he said.

Hammel thinks universities should be able to carry research through the development stage by themselves. He points out that people who work in private pharmaceutical companies were all initially trained at universities.

“Why is it that we can’t get those people together ourselves, instead of handing over everything to somebody else to make money and charge us again for those same things?”

MaRS has also drawn criticism from at least one student peace group: People Against the Militarization of Life, who recently delivered two oversized, heart-shaped Valentine’s Day cards to Naylor, which read: “Kiss off Pentagon-Big Pharma. This is our public university. Happy Valentine’s,” criticizing the university’s involvement with MaRS and MaRS’ association with Battelle Memorial Institute, a corporation the group maintains has ties to the U.S. military.

Ilse Treurnicht, CEO of MaRS and U of T president Naylor’s wife, discounted concerns about Battelle’s presence.

“Battelle has one small office here in a 700,000 square foot complex. So having that as a focus is unfortunate and out of proportion,” she said.

“Battelle has had a number of important breakthroughs in the area of medical research. Military research is not what we do, or would want to do. Haven’t done it, do not do it, have no interest in it.”

Jim Woodgett, head of the Samuel Lunenfeld Research Institute at Mount Sinai Hospital, said that he understands both sides of the debate, but he believes MaRS is a valuable link between business and research.

“It’s easy to say ‘evil corporate empire,’ but get real,” he said. “I don’t think MaRS is at all powerful. I think MaRS is a conduit. It’s a lens.

It’s trying to focus and bring together two communities which don’t communicate very well.”

Woodgett is sensitive to Hammel’s concerns with the mixing of public and private interests.

“Clearly there are issues with corporate funding of research. For example, the information isn’t free. You can’t publish everything — they want to review everything before you publish it.”

Woodgett noted that medical scientists have an obligation to help their discoveries become therapies.

He described how MaRS can help carry research beyond the lab.

“Scientists should not be distracted [by] product design and product marketing. This is not what we do,” Woodgett said.

“I think you should also be concerned about missed opportunities as well. You should be just as concerned that somebody doesn’t pursue a discovery and translate it into either a product or diagnostic or a new drug.

“I think MaRS will be a net gain,” he said. “I hope it succeeds. It will only take money out of [health care] if it doesn’t succeed. It’s an experiment. It’s not a sure thing.”