Google Life Sciences, a research group recently branched out from its parent corporation, is partnering with the American Heart Association in a $50 million project to find new ways to fight heart disease.
The heart association's share of $25 million over five years is the largest single research investment in its history. For the Google group, its newest biomedical attempt will join projects that include mind-blowing devices such as driverless cars, contact lenses that monitor blood-sugar for diabetics and health-tracking wristbands.
The project was announced on Sunday at a heart association conference in Orlando by Andy Conrad, Google Life Sciences' chief executive. According to Conrad, heart disease has always been known as the world's top killer, a problem that "seems ripe for new innovation" and troublesome, odd thinking. He also said that progress has been slow and that the company should shake it up a little bit.
Aside from cash, Google has tech tools to offer the public such as sensors to closely monitor the health of people in the wild compared to just when they go to doctors and huge capabilities for data analysis. The company's goal is to find a cure, Conrad said. There's no guaranteed success, but the only thing that we can promise is that we'll try even harder.
By Valentine's Day next year, "a big heart day," Conrad said that people from Google and the heart association hope to select a project leader, who might be a cardiologist, a nurse or anyone as young as a teenager from Wisconsin, depending on the skills and ideas that person can bring to the table. The team is basically looking for "a maverick," he said.
Dr. Robert Harrington, chairman of the Stanford University School of Medicine and a member of the heart association's board said that the opportunity really allows the group to think about, doing research in a different approach.
