A collaboration between The University of Texas M. D. Anderson Cancer Center and The University of Texas Health Science Center at Houston and in cooperation with GE Healthcare and the Texas Enterprise Fund, the Center for Advanced Biomedical Imaging Research brings together the resources and expertise of academia, government and industry to take imaging beyond its current capacity of visualizing the body’s anatomy.

Scheduled for completion in late 2009, the six-story Center for Advanced Biomedical Imaging Research is the fourth building to be constructed and one of six centers that will comprise M. D. Anderson’s Red and Charline McCombs Institute for the Early Detection and Treatment of Cancer. The McCombs Institute is sited on the UT Research Park.

The 315,000-square-foot building will accommodate state-of-the-art research laboratories for synthetic and analytical chemistry, biochemistry, molecular and cellular biology and facilities for production of clinical-grade imaging agents such as radiopharmaceuticals, nanoparticle-based agents, gene-reporter and cellular tracers.

The building also will house the health science center’s new Department of Biomedical Engineering. The facility will accommodate a translational imaging core that will include technologies supplied by GE Healthcare. The core will include a cyclotron, radiochemistry modules for production and labeling with radionuclides, a combination positron emission tomography (PET) / computed tomography (CT) unit, a volume CT unit and a magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) unit. Other technologies and applications developed by GE Healthcare and M. D. Anderson will be tested on-site as well.

“The dreams and visions from which this facility arose have no end state. As we make progress in the detection, treatment and prevention of human disease, the dreams and visions will continue to move forward, forward to new challenges and opportunities. We also must remember that this facility is a building. It will be a magnificent building with state-of-the-art equipment. But the secret of this building, its energy and heart and soul, will be the physician scientists, scientists, and technicians who will chart the course for the future,” said James T. Willerson, M.D., president of the UT Health Science Center at Houston and president-elect of the Texas Heart Institute.

According to Peter Davies, M.D., Ph.D., UT-Houston’s executive vice president for Research, the dedicated facility will enable scientists and engineers to work together and accelerate the development of new technologies.

“Our goal is to bring together some of our most talented scientists and biomedical engineers in an environment that will foster their collaboration with colleagues at M. D. Anderson and GE Healthcare,” he said.

With the new UT Dental Branch and two additional health science center facilities to be located in the Research Park, collaboration between M. D. Anderson and the health science center is expected to broaden applications beyond cancer and cardiovascular disease.

These facilities will include a new Neuroscience Center, a $42 million Biomedical Research and Education Center for stem cell discoveries and a new home for the UT Dental Branch (completion estimated for 2010). The new dental school likely will cost at least $90 million – but $78 million already is in hand, including $60 million in state Tuition Revenue Bonds and $18 million in UT System Permanent University Funds. The remainder will be solicited from foundations and private individuals in the “Open to Health” fundraising initiative.