Los Angeles billionaire Eli Broad announced Thursday that he will donate an additional 400 million dollars to the genomics research institute named after himself, in hopes that genomics-based medicine will provide future solutions to cure a host of human diseases.
Broad and his wife Edythe will increase their endowment at the Broad Institute to a total 600 million dollars. The Cambridge, Massachusetts-based institute is affiliated with Harvard University and Massachusetts Institute of Technology, and also relies on federal grants and other private donors.
Cambridge is considered the leading genomics research center in the United States due to its concentration of researchers and institutions that helped map the genetic makeup of humans.
The Broad Institute was launched in 2004 after the Eli and Edythe Broad Foundation pledged 100 million dollars to establish it. They added another 100 million dollars the following year.
Meanwhile, Broad and his wife also have made significant donations over the years to support medical research efforts in California.
A new stem cell research center is being built at the University of Southern California in Los Angeles. The facility received 30 million dollars from the Broad Foundation to supplement a grant of about 27 million dollars from the California Institute for Regenerative Medicine (CIRM).
Voters in California passed a bill in 2004 to borrow and spend 3 billion dollars over 10 years to support stem cell research, which is allocated by CIRM. CIRM has since become the biggest financial backer of human stem cell research in the United States.
Source: Xinhua
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