For Patients
As the CF population ages, nontuberculous mycobacteria (NTM) are cultured with increasing frequency, and a coordinated effort is required to respond to this growing challenge.
The Colorado Research and Development Program (RDP) is unified by the scientific theme of NTM in CF, which will bring together an interdisciplinary group of scientists from across Colorado with the central goal of advancing research in the diagnosis and treatment of NTM in the CF airway. The RDP will support three research cores:
A NTM Culture, Biorepository, and Coordinating Core will provide state-of-the-art support for culture, basic molecular identification, drug susceptibility analysis, as well as banking of isolates, and sharing of results with CF Centers.
A Molecular Core will perform genomic fingerprinting of NTM isolates, to identify isolates suspected of being transmitted within CFF Care Centers, or originating from a common environmental source.
A Clinical Research Core will support the conduct of current and planned clinical trials focused on NTM diagnosis and treatment, and provide samples and data to researchers.
All cores will be designated as National Cores, accepting samples from all sites within the CFF Care Center Network, and allowing access to all qualified CF scientists.
A Research Training and Educational Enrichment Program will serve to increase collaboration, education and mentoring between investigators and Cores, and a Pilot Grant Program will fund a novel translational proposal which will test a method of environmental sampling in both the home and clinical environments using genomics techniques for high-level NTM monitoring and fine-scale genetic matching.