CU-Boulder Professor Marvin Caruthers Gives $20 Million To Boost Biotech Building, Bolstering Collaborative Research

(Taken from University of Colorado news website. To see the page click here.)

A $20 million gift from University of Colorado at Boulder Distinguished Professor Marvin Caruthers will be the linchpin for construction of a new interdisciplinary biotechnology building on the CU-Boulder campus, a facility expected to revolutionize biotechnology and biomedical research and teaching, CU-Boulder Chancellor G.P. "Bud" Peterson announced Tuesday.

The gift is one of the largest in the history of the University of Colorado at Boulder and the largest ever by a faculty member.

The gift, which Peterson announced Tuesday morning at his annual Campus Address to the CU-Boulder community, will allow the campus to move more quickly to develop the planned $115 million research and teaching facility, to be built in the CU-Boulder Research Park near 30th Street and Colorado Avenue, east of the main campus.

As part of CU's Colorado Initiative in Molecular Biotechnology, or CIMB, the 260,000-square-foot building will host 60 faculty and more than 600 researchers from a wide variety of science, engineering and medical disciplines to collaborate on high-tech solutions to biomedical problems, Peterson said.

"This gift, in the name of the late Jennie Smoly Caruthers, is more than just an act of supreme generosity," said Peterson. "It is an investment in CU-Boulder's future, and it heralds a new era of collaborative research and discovery that will transform our campus, the field of biotechnology and, we hope, the collective health of humanity itself."

The facility also will contain classrooms, teaching labs and seminar rooms for more than 1,000 students annually from science and engineering disciplines across campus, said CU Professor Leslie Leinwand, director of CIMB. The students will participate in classes and labs, as well as work with faculty and research staff on cutting-edge biomedicine efforts.

"The importance of this gift from Marvin Caruthers, who has revolutionized biotechnology in the U.S. with his research and inventions, cannot be overstated," said Leinwand, former chair of CU-Boulder's molecular, cellular and developmental biology department. "It is a powerful catalyst for additional fundraising for the new facility which, when completed, will position the University of Colorado and the Front Range as a national powerhouse in genomics and biotechnology research."

Colorado Gov. Bill Ritter said such a facility would have enormous economic implications for the state of Colorado. "It will help to solidify biotech research as a mainstay of Colorado's economy, fueled by the important work being done at CU-Boulder and University of Colorado at Denver and Health Sciences Center," Ritter said. "I want to congratulate Dr. Caruthers both for his recent National Medal of Science of Award from the White House, and for the vision and public mindedness embodied by this gift to CU. It is truly a gift to the people of Colorado and the world."

In honor of the Caruthers gift to CU, the building will be named the Jennie Smoly Caruthers Biotechnology Building, pending approval of the Board of Regents, in honor of Caruthers' late wife. Remaining funds for the building will be provided by additional private support, CU, the state of Colorado and through indirect cost recovery funds. The building is expected to open in 2010, said Leinwand.

The interdisciplinary facility will house CU system faculty from several departments including but not limited to chemistry and biochemistry, MCD biology, physics, applied math, computer science and chemical and biological engineering, said Leinwand.

"People from diverse disciplines need to work side-by-side on a daily basis in order to make new biomedical discoveries, and this next-generation facility will allow this to happen on a large scale," she said.

"We expect this facility to be a magnet for outstanding new students and faculty," said Leinwand, also a professor in the cardiology division at the Anschutz Medical Campus of the University of Colorado at Denver and Health Sciences Center. "We will use it to develop tools for teaching science in new ways and to educate future generations of inventors, researchers and doctors."

Caruthers said, "We can mend broken bones but we can't cure cancer. It's gratifying to see the university invest in an initiative that encourages collaboration and the kind of exciting research that can result in breakthrough discoveries."

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