Message from the Dean
A Fine Spring for Growing Research
This has been a very rewarding spring for the School of Medicine
as it strives to become a leader in academic medicine, complementing
its accomplishments in educational and clinical services. The Indiana
General Assembly approved $62 million in state bonds for three IUSM
research and education buildings. In addition, Lilly Endowment demonstrated
its confidence in the School by granting an additional $50 million
to the Indiana Genomics Initiative.
With $15 million in state appropriations and another $5 million
from private donors, including the Lilly Foundation, we will begin
construction on the Medical Information Sciences building this fall.
The occupants will include the Regenstrief Institute Inc., the Center
for Computational Biology and Bioinformatics, the IU Center for
Bioethics, the Otis Bowen Research Center, the Department of Public
Health, biostatistics and pediatric health services research.
Another $33 million from the state is earmarked for a to-be-designed
research facility that will sit between the just-completed Research
II and the Cancer Research Institute buildings, creating a research
phalanx that reaches from Riley Hospital for Children to University
Boulevard. This facility will provide laboratories for researchers
in proteomics and genomics, many with interests in genetic and cancer-related
disorders.
In April, we dedicated the new Biotechnology Research and Training
Center (BRTC) that is located in what we hope will be a larger biotechnology
research community north of the medical center campus. The BRTC
can be the northernmost anchor of this research community being
planned with the city, Clarian Health and other private industries.
(Read more in this article)
The Fort Wayne Center for Medical Education received $14 million
of the new state funds for a new 30,000-square-foot medical education
and research facility. Along with a recent grant of $2 million from
the Lutheran Foundation to establish the Northern Indiana Cardiovascular
Research and Education Center, the center will be able to expand
its research in cardiovascular, neurological and natural products
and pursue new research in other areas.
Fort Wayne is one of the School’s eight medical education
centers that act as research spokes around the hub of life sciences
research in Indianapolis and also work independently with their
local economic bases and host institutions.
Clearly, every successful economic life sciences model includes
a strong medical research institution. Our goal is to make certain
that the School of Medicine brings that to the life sciences initiative
throughout Indiana. Buildings give us the collateral we need to
retain and attract the scientists who will make this goal possible.
D. Craig Brater, MD
Dean and Walter J. Daly Professor
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