The Atlanta Veterans Affairs (VA) Medical Center conducts a highly active research program which is among the ten largest in the nation and is largely conducted by VA physician-scientists who are also faculty members at Emory University School of Medicine. The program is fortunate to include one of the twelve national VA Rehabilitation Research Centers, one of twenty national Research Enhancement Program Awards, and research programs focused on medical and clinical problems, rehabilitation medicine and engineering, as well as health services and outcomes research.

The research program involves over 450 projects conducted by 112 principal research investigators with more than 150 research associates and staff. These research projects cover a broad range of subjects, including bacterial infection; diabetes; development of new anti-HIV and -HBV (hepatitis) agents; low vision devices and aids, low vision and disequilibrium in the elderly; engineering and environmental design of facilities; genetics and regulation of bone growth and remodeling; hormone action; kidney mechanisms of hypertension; growth factor interactions in lung development and disease; the genetics of cancer; control of blood vessel contraction; drug addiction, clinical anxiety and mood disorders, post-traumatic stress disorder, disorders of memory and cognition, and clinical management problems in hypertension, oncology, gastroenterology, and pulmonary medicine.

The total research budget exceeds $30 million in direct costs per year, with approximately half funded by the Department of Veterans Affairs and the remainder funded by the National Institutes of Health and the CDC and other sources. Laboratory research is performed in a new 40,000 square foot state-of-the-art facility that offers laboratories and core areas to support a wide variety of multidisciplinary programs.

Specific developments during the recent several years of rapid growth of the Atlanta VA research program include:

• Establishing an outpatient Clinical Studies Center headed by a physician and certified clinical coordinator nurse.
• Utilization of 60,000 square feet of research space, including of new laboratory facilities with state of the art instrumentation.
• Establishing shared VA/Emory Core research facilities serving the entire Emory research community.
     - DNA sequencing core with microarray gene expression analysis.
     - Micro-chemical protein sequencing and synthesis core.
• Funding of the VA Rehabilitation R&D Center collaboration with the Emory University Rehabilitation Medicine, Ophthalmology, and Geriatrics programs.
• Creation of the Atlanta Center for Clinical Effectiveness Studies (ACCES), the Atlanta VA Medical Center's local HSR&D group.
• Establishing a successful non-profit research foundation, which offers $25,000 initial research funding on a competitive basis to support future faculty development at the Atlanta VA Medical Center.
• Funding of a multi-disciplinary VA Research Enhancement Award Program (REAP) on Genetic Therapy for Bone and Mineral Disorders.