Scott Steele selected to serve on FDA’s Science Board

Scott Steele, Ph.D., director of the Regulatory Science Core at the CTSI has been selected to serve on the Food and Drug Administration’s Science Board. The Board provides advice to the Commissioner and other FDA officials, exploring issues from gene editing or regulation of opioids to food safety, and aims to help the FDA keep pace with technical and scientific developments.

Steele, who is also the director of the Rochester Center of Excellence in Data Science at the Goergen Institute for Data Science and an associate professor of Public Health Sciences at the University of Rochester School of Medicine and Dentistry, will serve as one of the 21 voting members of the Science Board.

Steele has chaired two Science Board subcommittees prior to joining the Board, one tasked with assessing FDA’s engagement with the external scientific community in addressing needs facing the FDA and supporting training of the next generation of regulatory scientists and reviewers. The other evaluated the Centers of Excellence in Regulatory Science and Innovation (CERSI) program, a partnership between the FDA and academic institutions that aims to advance regulatory science.

 “Subcommittees play a key role for the Science Board,” said Steele, “they support the Science Board by helping to conduct reviews, draft reports, and provide recommendations on how the FDA could address current and emerging issues.”

Steele has focused on issues of science policy, public-private partnerships, translational research and education in his career and has a special interest in precision medicine. The Science Board utilizes members with diverse expertise to review and advise on a broad spectrum of topics.

For example, the board is currently reviewing the research program of the Center for Biologics Evaluation and Research (CBER), which ensures biological products such as vaccines, blood, and gene therapies are safe, effective, and available to those in need. In these types of reviews the Science Board assists with advising on the Agency's research agenda and approaches to enhance its scientific and research facilities and training opportunities.

With a constant flow of new medical technologies, the Science Board is also asked to provide forward-looking reviews of new technologies on the horizon.  These new technologies, such as nano-medicine, 3D printing, and gene editing often require new and individualized methods of evaluation and sometimes present scientific, regulatory and policy challenges. The Board reviews these issues and presents recommendations to the FDA Commissioner, the Chief Scientist and others at the FDA.

With the new year underway, Steele is looking forward to the broad range of issues the Board will be considering and is eager to provide advice to support the mission of the FDA.

Michael Hazard | 2/13/2017

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