MIT gets $100m cancer research grant

Industrialist David H. Koch is giving the Massachusetts Institute of Technology a $100 million gift to fund cancer research, the university said today.

The gift will be used to create the David H. Koch Institute for Integrative Cancer Research, which will bring together MIT scientists and engineers from various disciplines to work at a new research facility expected to open in 2010.

Researchers will try to develop new ways to detect, diagnose, treat and manage cancer, including through the use of nanotechnology, the emerging field of changing or creating materials at the atomic and molecular level.

"David Koch's extraordinary generosity will make possible a level of collaborative, cross-disciplinary research and training unparalleled in the world," MIT President Susan Hockfield said. "The convergence of life sciences and engineering enabled by his gift will chart a new course for cancer research, for which we are deeply grateful."

Koch, who holds bachelor's and master's degrees in chemical engineering from MIT, is an executive vice president and board member of Koch Industries, Inc., a Wichita, Kan.-based company with 80,000 employees and about $90 billion in annual revenue. The privately held firm and its subsidiaries are in such industries as commodities trading, petroleum, chemicals and fertilizers. Koch is a son of company founder Fred C. Koch.

The $100 million is to be spread out in awards over 10 years, said Tyler Jacks, an MIT biology professor who will serve as the Koch Institute's director. (AP)