To improve human health, scientific discoveries must be translated into practical applications. Such discoveries typically begin at "the bench" with basic research - in which scientists study disease at a molecular or cellular level - then progress to the clinical level, or the patient's "bedside." Scientists are increasingly aware that this bench-to-bedside approach to translational research is really a two-way street. Basic scientists provide clinicians with new tools for use in patients and for assessment of their impact, and clinical researchers make novel observations about the nature and progression of disease that often stimulate basic investigations.

The CVRF's Translational Research is a unit of the CVRF, and the program was established to encourage and provide support for novel translational cardiovascular research. Physicians-scientists play a crucial role in the continuum of cardiovascular research that brings together the progress we're making in the laboratory with the progress we're making in the clinic. The Translational Research demands an intense interaction between investigators with diverse backgrounds. Our Translational Research will accelerate the pace of cardiovascular research in the early stages of translation to the clinical setting and transfer of findings from the laboratory to clinical application. The program's purpose is to support research that shows high promise for translating basic biomedical knowledge to diagnosis or new treatments and, ultimately, to prolong and enhance life in the field of cardiovascular disease. The CVRF's Translational Research also supports activities that impact the environment in which translational research is conducted.

The translational research of CVRF depends heavily on innovative new technologies to overcome the limitation of current devices in interventional cardiology. In particular, because of an apparent paradox of the current drugeluting stent, which slightly increases the incidence of late thrombosis, the development of the new drug-eluting stent has been highlighted in our translational research. We developed a successful system of a new drug-eluting stent to reduce the rate of restenosis even further and to abolish the risk of thrombosis. The new drug-eluting stent is unique in that a combination of drugs is incorporated into a proprietary polymer. We also support the human clinical trials assessing the outcomes of new coronary devices.