Aiming to take Ireland higher up the curve

The new director general of Science Foundation Ireland wants to see creative partnerships, more impact for Irish research and changed mindsets as he begins his five year term of office. He hopes to witness the opening of Irish high-tech companies but also wants to boost Irish research higher up the international league tables.

Prof Mark Ferguson moved across from the University of Manchester, officially assumed his new position on January 16th. He has been a research academic since the late 1970s but has also started and floated a biotech company and founded an incubator unit in Manchester, a mix that must have impressed the international selection panel that chose him for the post.

It has taken about a year to find a replacement for the previous incumbent, Dr Frank Gannon, who left Dublin to take up a position in Brisbane, Australia. The Foundation put the long international search down to getting the right person for a job that has evolved and perhaps become somewhat more challenging given the fiscal situation. There is also a policy shift under way given a change in government since Gannon’s departure.

The economic landscape was bleak when the search began early last year but has worsened since. There is less money for SFI to spend and the Government and the relevant Minister, Richard Bruton, are anxious we begin to see a fiscal return on the past decade of increased State funding for scientific research.

Ferguson is not phased by the look of the budget however. He was full of enthusiasm and ready to make things happen when we met the day after he took office. He described how he had done research at Manchester, then headed a group, then a department and finally a faculty. Then he set up and ran a company. “For me it is kind of a natural step,” he suggested. “It is like running a country.” He feels the Foundation is a place where he can achieve something in his areas of expertise – research and enterprise. Even if his mix of science and enterprise was not an issue, it certainly chimes with current Government policy on the commercialisation of research. The Government is hoping for a flow of companies and jobs from the research investment.

Originally from Belfast he completed undergraduate and graduate degrees at Queen’s University, Belfast, where he graduated with a degree in dentistry of all things. He remains registered as a dentist but in fact he never pursued this as a career, he says.

Instead he became interested in life sciences research, taking courses at Queen’s on anatomy and embryology and later studying the genetics of cleft palate. This also led Ferguson to his first research breakthrough. Alligators and crocodiles have palates akin to a human’s and they became models for his embryological studies. “In the course of that I became an alligator anatomist,” he says wryly. This delivered a real breakthrough when he discovered these crocodilians have a temperature dependent sex determination. When temperatures rise above 33 degrees only males emerge, and if below 30 degrees then only females.

In 1984 he moved from Queen’s to the University of Manchester as a professor, at the time ranking as the youngest professor yet appointed in the UK. There he continued his research in life sciences for over a decade.

His work also delivered patents however and in 2000 he launched a company, Renovo, to develop a drug that could promote wound healing without causing scarring. It attracted immediate investor interest and was soon listed on the London stock market. Eventually the company was sold to biopharmaceutical company Shire for £830 million (€996m), Ferguson says. “It was the largest biotech deal of the year in 2007.”

He and his partner, Dr Sharon O’Kane – also a research scientist – were both involved in Renovo and despite their move to Dublin she continues to deal with the family’s business interests.

He was involved in the initial research, the translation of the discoveries into potential treatments, floating a company, dealing with investors and also with the regulatory authorities. This must give him a unique view of the entire discovery translation process that currently holds such an important position in Government enterprise policy.

He sees no conflict in engaging in these various roles. “Being an entrepreneur is not incompatible with being a scientist. I am clear in my mind you can still do high-quality science that can also be useful,” he says.

Translation of discoveries is obviously going to be an important consideration for him as head of the Foundation. The funder had done a superb job at taking the country from a low level of research activity to 20th place in the world league table. “That is great but there is much more to do in bringing things through and further developing basic science,” he says.

The appointment of any new DG will of course spark much backchat across the science community. This will be fuelled given the Foundation’s remit is about to be changed to allow it fund applied research. It comes as the Government prepares to launch the results of a prioritisation process that will define the targets for research funding over the coming decade. This will spark the inevitable debate about whether funding is better placed in basic research that is far from market as opposed to applied which is near to market with products that can earn revenue and create jobs. Pro Ferguson rejects this analysis. “That is an international universal,” he says. “I see very little difference between basic and applied research. The difference is minimal.”

People need science – not basic or applied – more than ever before to tackle international issues. It is about the science but not only the science. Discoveries deliver research papers but also impact on society in general, he says. “I think science is part of the solution, not part of the problem. That is what attracted me as a job,” he says.

His aim is to advance Ireland’s reputation as a place where world-class research takes place, but he also wants “pull through”, translation of discoveries into outcomes that deliver “societal benefit”.

Benefit can come in lots of ways and not just in producing spin-outs, he says. It could be the boost in reputation a significant paper attracts, research that encourages more foreign direct investment, improvements to medical diagnostics or treatments, energy conservation and other gains. But creating companies and employment and increasing the depth of our research capacity here is also a gain, he says. “Excellence is paramount. You have to fund the basic stuff but you also have to pull discoveries through. The mindset has to be about excellence but also demonstrating value.”

He is well aware the Foundation’s budgets are under severe pressure. “We are living within a very constrained public purse,” he says. “But if researchers can show that their work will have impact and deliver societal gains then money will be available, either from the State or from venture capitalists looking for investments that can turn a profit. “I don’t actually think there is a shortage of investment money. What there is a shortage of is well-honed investment subjects,” he suggests.

He looks forward to making a splash on science here. “I am excited. This is a job I wanted. It is about trying to have a major impact, it is about taking Ireland higher up the curve,” he says. “I am not unrealistic about the challenges, but we will be building on the strong foundation that is already there.”