Loyola University Chicago is building a center for translational research and education on its Health Sciences Campus in Maywood, Ill. The building will bring health scientists now scattered across the campus together under one roof to conduct primary research and translate discoveries into medications or devices to treat patients and contribute to the greater public health, school leadership said.
The $137 million Loyola University Chicago Center for Translational Research and Education is slated to open in April 2016. The five-story, 227,000-square-foot building is a collaboration involving Loyola University Chicago, Loyola University Health System and CHE Trinity Health. The university and CHE Trinity will split the costs, which include another $13 million in funding to attract and support leading researchers. (In 2011, Trinity Health, now CHE Trinity, acquired Loyola University Health System from the university.)
Richard H. Kennedy, vice provost for research and graduate programs in Loyola University Chicago's health sciences division, said initially the center will build on Loyola's established strengths with six primary research institutes: oncology, cardiovascular, infectious disease and immunology, burn and shock trauma, neuroscience, and public health.
Kennedy said the construction of the new center is energizing researchers by demonstrating the university's commitment to advancing health care through research.
The center will include room for 72 bench scientists, many of whom do wet lab work, or hands-on research and experimentation, and up to 40 "desktop scientists," who conduct research in public health, health services, nursing, bioinformatics and epidemiology, often using information extracted from large databases. The building will support about 500 scientists, staff and students working together. Kennedy said the plan is to add 10 to 15 new faculty, each with additional research teams of about three or four research trainees and staffers.
The center will collaborate with scientists from outside of the university. It also will include a 250-seat auditorium with plans to engage the public in programs about science and health care, Kennedy said.
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