Record Donation Made to MIT for Brain Research Institute

The Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT; Cambridge, MA) announced the creation of the McGovern Institute for Brain Research, made possible by a gift from International Data Group (IDG; Boston) founder and chairman Patrick J. McGovern Jr. and his wife, entrepreneur Lore Harp McGovern. The gift, which will total $350 million over 20 years, is the largest gift to a university, according to The Chronicle of Higher Education, which reported that the previous largest gift to a university was $300 million.

The new institute will explore human learning and communication through interdisciplinary research encompassing neuroscience, molecular neurobiology, bioengineering, cognitive sciences, computation, and genetics. Interdisciplinary research is widely viewed as the wave of the future of science, and these areas of study in particular are expected to have profound implications for human health and quality of life.

At the helm of the McGovern Institute's will be Phillip A. Sharp, a molecular biologist and Nobel Laureate who won the prize in 1993 for his seminal work on gene-splicing. A member of the MIT faculty since 1970, Sharp was director of the Center for Cancer Research from 1985 to 1991 and head of the department of biology from 1991 to 1999.

As founding director, Sharp will assemble 16 McGovern Investigators, 10 of whom will come from outside the MIT community. Investigators will hold faculty appointments in academic departments at MIT, such as brain and cognitive science, biology, electrical engineering and computer science, linguistics, and bioengineering. The new institute will also offer interdisciplinary learning opportunities for both undergraduate and graduate students, in keeping with MIT's commitment to integrating research and teaching at all levels.

"The McGovern Institute will do ground-breaking research on how the brain works," Sharp said. "It will allow us to move to a new level of pre-eminence in neuroscience. This is an exciting addition to the MIT community that will enrich the body of existing work at MIT in neurosciences, imaging technology, and molecular, cellular and genetic science."

McGovern founded IDG in 1964 and since then has launched almost 300 computer magazines and newspapers, Computerworld and PC World among them. He said that he has had a lifetime interest in understanding the brain and its impact on human behavior, stemming back to his undergraduate days at MIT, when he majored in life sciences with a special interest in neurophysiology and the function of the human nervous system.

Lore Harp McGovern has been involved in the technology field since the early 1970s. A co-founder in 1976 of Vector Graphics, one of the earliest PC companies, she is currently involved with numerous start-up ventures in Silicon Valley. McGovern is the chairman of the board of associates at the Whitehead Institute for Biomedical Research at MIT.

Robert Birgeneau, dean of science at MIT from 1991 until this year, said, "Expansion of research, teaching, and educational opportunities in the neurosciences has been a strategic priority of the School of Science at MIT for several years, and MIT is poised to become a leading player in defining and advancing this critical new field. The McGovern Institute adds momentum to our plans as well as force to our pioneering research in the neurosciences."

For more information: Kenneth D. Campbell, MIT News Office, Room 5-111, 77 Massachusetts Ave., Cambridge, MA 02139-4307. Tel: 617-253-2703. Email: kdc@mit.edu.