Mayo Clinic Receives $7 million to Advance Imaging Research, The Opus Group Supporting Medical Research

Monday, November 14, 2005

ROCHESTER, Minn. - Mayo Clinic has received a gift of $7 million to support the Imaging Research Program. The gift comes from The Opus Group, a national, privately held commercial real estate development and management company based in suburban Minneapolis. The gift will support space for imaging research, with a special focus on expanding the range of tissue, organ and body-system characteristics that can be evaluated with magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) techniques.

The funds will finance construction of an imaging research center on the campus of Mayo Clinic Rochester. Research in this center will focus on discovery and development of new medical imaging technologies and integration of innovative imaging techniques into Mayo Clinic's patient care.

This gift complements a National Institutes of Health (NIH) capital grant of $2.4 million awarded to Mayo Clinic. "It is unusual for NIH to provide capital building funds, so this is a unique opportunity for us. Pairing those funds with The Opus Group gift will provide the resources to complete the first phase of the imaging center," says Stephen Riederer, Ph.D., a Mayo Clinic MRI researcher who wrote the grant application. "We are extremely fortunate to have benefactors who sincerely care about advancing the science of imaging that can lead us to breakthrough discoveries and applications for patient care."

"Much of medicine in the future will depend heavily on noninvasive imaging techniques," says Denis Cortese, M.D., president and CEO of Mayo Clinic. "We are grateful for this generous gift from The Opus Group, which will help us expand both our diagnostic and treatment capabilities through the findings of this research. Applying basic science research findings to patient care is what we do best, and we look for this activity to keep Mayo Clinic on the cutting edge of imaging."

"The projects now underway in this imaging research program are all related to improving patient care," says Hugh Smith, M.D., chair of Mayo Clinic Rochester Board of Governors. "It is not by chance that Mayo Clinic has three areas of focus: practice, education and research. We believe that linking them together provides the best tools to deliver high-quality patient care. The Opus Group gift makes it possible for us to take that care to a new level."

Some research will seek new methods for high-resolution MRI to show natural movement of body structures such as a beating heart. There also will be investigations into new techniques of ultrafast MR imaging and methods for noninvasive mapping of the vascular system, such as the carotid and coronary arteries. Additional studies will focus on high-detail imaging of the brain and will be used to study Alzheimer's disease. To date, studies of the basic physics of motion effects have led to the development of imaging techniques that are highly suited for examining structures that are in motion. Mayo Clinic researchers plan to use the imaging center to create the next generation of these techniques and technologies.

"This is truly an exciting time in medicine," says Richard Ehman, M.D., leader of the Cancer Imaging Research Program. "Advanced imaging technology is providing powerful capabilities for early diagnosis of disease, when treatment is most effective. We also are seeing the development of innovative, image-guided therapies that will allow patients to avoid the cost and pain of major surgery. The Opus Group gift is a significant boost to this research."

This gift recognizes the long-standing relationship The Opus Group and its employees have with Mayo Clinic. Construction of the building on the Mayo Clinic Rochester downtown campus will begin during the first quarter of 2006, with occupancy planned for the first quarter of 2007. ###

###

To obtain the latest news releases from Mayo Clinic, go to www.mayoclinic.org/news. MayoClinic.com is available as a resource for your health stories.