Minnesota Partnership

What do you get when you combine two of the nation’s premier medical research institutions? One of the most exciting initiatives in medical history that promises to touch the lives of people across the world.

The Minnesota Partnership for Biotechnology & Medical Genomics is a state-funded collaboration between the University of Minnesota and Mayo Clinic.

The goals of the partnership are aggressive but within reach:

• Make important new medical discoveries
• Improve health care for patients
• Develop new business and jobs in Minnesota

Research teams consist of investigators from both institutions with background in a wide range of specialties: Alzheimer's disease, several types of cancer and cancer drug development, heart disease, obesity, infectious diseases, muscle diseases, nanotechnology, and addiction.
Results to date

• 6 patent applications
• 9 NIH grants
• 65 published papers supported through Partnership funding
• 34 public research abstracts published, providing other research and development teams with access to a top-line description of research and research findings (and raising interest in further collaborations and research leverage)
• 42 formal presentations by Partnership teams

Curing diabetes

In Fall 2010, the Partnership announced a huge initiative attracting national media attention: finding a cure for diabetes in the next 10 years. This initiative is called “Decade of Discovery: A Minnesota Partnership to Defeat Diabetes.”

How the University of Minnesota and the Mayo aim to accomplish the goal:

• Build on the research strengths of both institutions, which are national leaders in diabetes research and care
• Partner with private and state entities to secure the funds to make the research and clinical care possible
• Focus not only on the cure, but prevention, by working with health care providers

Visit the Minnesota Partnership web site to read more about the initiative.