Genetically tailored medicines and drugs tested on computers rather than people are part of the vision of Professor Fred Wright. Health Editor Barry Nelson meets the man who is driving forward the North-East's new industrial revolution.

THE needleless syringe was an invention which changed the lives of millions of people. For the first time, instead of using a conventional needle to inject pharmaceutical drugs, nurses could offer patients a pain-free alternative. Anyone nervous about needles could relax in the knowledge that none were involved.

The needleless syringe, which uses a powerful jet of anaesthetic to punch the medication through the patient's skin and into the bloodstream, was the kind of technological breakthrough that Professor Fred Wright had in mind when he took over as chief executive of CELS, the Newcastle-based Centre of Excellence for Life Sciences, two years ago.

Prof Wright should know - as a researcher, he played a key role in developing the very first needleless syringes, a concept which has spread throughout the world.

Now after a stellar career in the UK and America as a scientist-turned- businessman, Prof Wright is hoping to repeat the success he had in Cambridge, where he helped to set up 19 biotechnology companies in just ten years.

Prof Wright was head hunted as part of an ambitious drive to put the North-East on the map as the leading UK life science centre. In simple terms, his job is to encourage organisations in the North-East, including the five universities, to turn promising academic research into concrete medical and healthcare applications, generating new business and creating research and employment opportunities for an area which still lags behind the more economically successful South.

But CELS is just one of five 'centres of excellence' in the North-East, which is already a leading player internationally. Along with life sciences, the region is prominent in nanotechnology, photonics and microsystems; digital media and technology; energy and renewables and process industries.

With a pledge from the regional development agency, One NorthEast, to commit funding of more than £200m over five years in these five key areas, much progress has already been achieved.

Prof Wright is optimistic about the future but aware of the scale of the task. "The North-East has had 20 years of industrial decline. A great deal has been done but there is still a hell of a lot to do," says Prof Wright, speaking in the futuristic surroundings of NetPark, a CELS development near Sedgefield, County Durham, which will be the home of an advanced polymer electronics company making flexible roll-down screens next year.

"As far as research and development money invested in the public sector is concerned, we are second worst in the UK - only Northern Ireland has a poorer record. In terms of private sector investment, we rank even lower than Northern Ireland. We can only go up," he says.

The seed corn money from One NorthEast is already making a difference.

Prof Wright estimates that across the five investment areas, about £95m of One NorthEast cash has already been invested.

In the life sciences area, about £15m has already gone into programmes and projects that are going to have long term benefits for the region and its economy.

One key area is the Genetics Knowledge Park within the International Centre for Life in Newcastle. "The quest is to give genetic diagnosis a much greater role in our health service. With our greater understanding of the human genome and our ability to go down to a molecular level we can become much better at getting the diagnosis right the first time around," says Prof Wright.

"We need to develop a different, more personalised kind of medicine based on our genetic make-up so instead of getting it right in three out of ten cases, we might be able to get it right six or seven times, which would be fantastic for the patient and the Health Service."

About £6.5m has been invested in the Northern Genetic Service and the Institute of Human Genetics in Newcastle, the largest organisation of its kind in Europe.

Another £4m has gone on the rapidly evolving science of bioinformatics.

Prof Wright explains: "Since I took my doctorate 30 years ago there has been an explosion of research. It is no longer possible to keep abreast of all the scientific papers and clinical trials going on. Bioinformatics is a computer software programme which will keep track of what is happening around the world."

This could be vital for a company developing new drugs. Recently, a major pharmaceutical company had to withdraw a new cholesterol-reducing drug after several unforseen fatalities. It turned out that the drug interfered with the functioning of the heart in a small number of patients.

"Some of the clinical information which would have warned the company of the danger was already out there but they just hadn't seen it. This is where bioinformatics can help," says Prof Wright.

Another cutting edge area in which scientists in the North-East are working is computer modelling of biological systems.

Non Linear Dynamics, one of a growing number of so-called 'spin-out' companies which started out as university research projects, is now developing computer software which will allow scientists to carry out virtual experiments, simulating the way the body reacts to new drugs.

"We have also built the Biosystem Information Institute within the Centre for Life which represents an investment of £4m," says Prof Wright.

Some of the cash is being used to encourage bright young researchers to stay in the North-East rather than head to the so-called Golden Triangle of London, Cambridge and Oxford.

While a lot of media attention has been focused on the work of scientists investigating embryonic stem cells at the Centre for Life in Newcastle - the most glamorous part of the CELS project - a group of researchers at Durham University has also been looking at potential applications of adult-derived stem cells.

"Adult stem cells have real potential. It is possible that they could be useful in rapid wound healing and there is also the potential to generate new hair follicle cells," says Prof Wright.

By any standards, the North-East's big project is gathering momentum but Prof Wright is far from satisfied. "We are not as far forward as I would have wanted but we have really stimulated the network and got people to believe that something is really happening here," he says.

"We have now got people from all over the world - America, Canada, Singapore, saying this is the place to be."

Sites where CELS projects are under way include Newcastle, Durham, Wilton, Sedgefield and Blyth.

If the right proposals are put forward, another £95m should be invested in a range of centre of excellence projects in the next couple of years.

The recent arrival in the North-East of an American company which produces automated lab technology and a Chinese company which makes medical devices illustrates that businesses around the world sense that something important is happening in the region and want a slice of the action.

"We want to make the Newcastle and Durham axis a new science city and a hub of innovation," says Prof Wright, who hopes that the region will become an internationally known research centre in the same way that the development of the now world famous Massachusetts Institute of Technology turned the American city of Boston into a byword for scientific excellence.