Barbara Alving, director of the National Center for Research Resources, speaks to an audience of about 200 yesterday in Providence.

The Providence Journal / Mary Murphy

PROVIDENCE — The head of a federal center that supplies financing for medical research told a Rhode Island symposium yesterday that her agency is placing a greater emphasis on “translating” advances in the laboratory into clinical applications.

Barbara Alving, director of the National Center for Research Resources at the National Institutes of Health, also told the audience of more than 200 that researchers need to be political advocates for the work they do.

“It’s going to be an ongoing battle to reinsert research into the national agenda,” Alving said. “You have a national mission in addition to a scientific mission.”

Researchers need to make sure that congressional budget makers realize the value of their research, she said. “It’s really up to you to show them the importance of the work you do.” Researchers also must push lawmakers for the money needed to conduct that research, she said.

In 2006, Rhode Island institutions received $131 million from the National Institutes of Health, plus $37 million from the National Science Foundation, according to a statement from the science and technology council. More than 20,000 people hold research and development jobs in Rhode Island, across all scientific disciplines, the statement said.

Alving yesterday also discussed a relatively new financing program at her center called Clinical and Translational Science Awards. The program provides money to help encourage science that takes research out of the laboratory and puts it to clinical use. The goal over the next few years is to have 60 awards totaling $500 million nationwide. In 2006-2007, 24 awards were made, with 14 more added this year. None of those, though, are in Rhode Island.

Alving encouraged the audience not to think strictly in terms of what states have programs, but to look to form broader alliances. “It was somebody long ago who invented state borders. Think about regions.”

On a side note, she urged young parents, especially mothers, to stick with their research and find a way to balance their scientific life with their family life, even if that means working part-time, or finding other ways to stay involved. “Find a way to do it,” she said. “Do not drop out. Do not give up. Once you leave science, it’s hard to come back.”

Above all, she told the researchers to keep at their work. “It’s up to you — and every one of you — to make a tremendous difference.”

Alving was one of the keynote speakers at the one-day Rhode Island Research Alliance Symposium, which the Rhode Island Science and Technology Advisory Council and other agencies hosted at the Rhode Island Convention Center.

pparker@projo.com