After spending over a decade leading one of Philly’s top biomedical research centers, Dario Altieri is ready to hand someone else the reins.
Altieri announced plans last month to step down from his role as president and CEO of the Wistar Institute at the end of this year.
“What I would like to see is more support, more commitment on the part of state and local officials.”
Dario Altieri, Wistar Institute
He spent 11 years as the institution’s top executive and 16 years as director of its Ellen and Ronald Caplan Cancer Center. He learned that collaboration, both within the institute and with external partners, is key to a successful ecosystem. While he’s not exactly sure what’s next for him, he knows the institute will continue on a path of innovation, partnership and workforce development.
“I would like to describe it as a natural evolution of things,” Altieri told Technical.ly. “I’ve been doing a lot of soul searching, and it seemed like the right time for new leadership to come in.”
During his tenure, Altieri oversaw the opening of two new research centers, the Center for Advanced Therapeutics and the HIV Cure and Viral Diseases Center.
“The opening of these two centers doubles the footprint of the research enterprise here in the institute,” he said. “I wanted to see that milestone through.”
He also worked to ensure the institute kept its National Cancer Institute designation, which recognizes that a research center meets certain standards set by the National Institutes of Health. Plus, he maintained and expanded the research center’s Biomedical Technician Training Program, a workforce development program that helps non-traditional workers enter the life sciences field.
Throughout all of that, though, Altieri said he kept hands-on research roles to improve his leadership. After all, he said, it’s the best way to understand the challenges people are facing, like competing for funding and publishing papers.
Being accessible to Wistar’s staff and staying involved in research “were very important to me and helped create the institute culture of … we all want the same thing,” he said. “We want to be excellent [and] want to make a difference.”
Technical.ly spoke with Altieri about his time at Wistar, the state of the local life sciences ecosystem and the importance of federal funding for biomedical innovation.
This Q&A has been edited for length and clarity.
What is the local life sciences ecosystem doing well right now? What can we do better?
The concentration of academic institutions and of talent is remarkable. There is a great zest for innovation here. Great new discoveries were made in this community, including ones that reached the market and changed the lives of millions.
What I would like to see is more support, more commitment on the part of state and local officials. Incentives and tax credits are what other states are doing to create an economic engine for life sciences jobs.
There are remarkable state-sponsored programs in other states. Why can’t we do that? Why not create a self-perpetuating engine to continue economic development?
As a publicly funded research institution, how do you make sense of recent federal funding cuts?
Wistar was not affected by cuts in federal funding. We have not experienced the type of challenges that other academic institutions have seen. We have not been targeted by lawsuits, cuts and pauses.
Remember, we’re a single mission organization. That means that we don’t have issues that were seen as lightning rods by the current administration. So we were very lucky, if you will, that we will continue our work.
Sustained public investment in research is indispensable. There is no substitute for that.
Perhaps we, as a community of doctors and scientists, have to do a better job in explaining what we do and why we do it. There has been a significant erosion of public trust in science and scientists. We as a community need to do a better job in trying to reverse their perception.
How have you seen Wistar researchers bring innovations to market?
It varies depending on the person, the asset and the potential prospective agent to be tested. We have seen two main paths.
One has been public funding. They are far and few, but there have been funding mechanisms through the National Institutes of Health that would provide support to check all the boxes for the preclinical development of interest.
Some of our researchers follow that path and then establish a collaboration with a clinician at a neighboring hospital. We have clinical trials going on at Jefferson, Fox Chase and Penn using that model.
The second model has been the more entrepreneurial strategy of launching a spinout and raising enough money in order to bring that potential asset to the clinic.
Raising money for early startup companies is very hard. Even though traditionally, that has been the fastest vehicle to bring an agent to the clinic, right now, we have seen that perhaps this is not as easy as it was.
Unfortunately, with everything that has happened in terms of federal funding, the other path has been significantly impacted. So I hope that this is just a temporary drop.
We recognize that the science that we do is high-risk. We are in the risk-taking business. We recognize that that’s really the only way in which we can make substantial progress.
What’s Wistar’s role in Philly’s life sciences community?
We have one mission: biomedical research.
A translational research institute like ours can collaborate with clinicians, community hospitals, universities and colleges to really elevate the conversation about science and technology and how that can bring about transformative changes in medicine.
We are incredibly proud to have a formal collaborative agreement with the University of Pennsylvania, Drexel University, Fox Chase Cancer Center and Thomas Jefferson University, because we bring to the table a level of focus, a level of dedication to the mission that is undiluted.
We have expanded the workforce development programs to encompass many different aspects of the life science industry.
The most recent developments we’re incredibly excited about are the opportunities to train people with no college degree to become laboratory technicians.
Workforce development, these programs that are life-changing for the region, are intimately linked to the scientific mission of the organization.
The other one that I am particularly proud of has been the opportunity to move some of the Wistar science all the way to the clinic in human trials, both in cancer and infectious diseases.
What’s next for you?
I want to go back to the values that have stayed with me since I was a medical student, and that is research, teaching and mentoring.
I look forward to transitioning away from these leadership roles and really dedicating myself full-time to laboratory research and teaching, which I’ve always enjoyed.
