The Virginia and D.K. Ludwig Chair Fund at MIT will begin sponsoring UROP projects in cancer research this summer. The new UROP funding was announced by Dean of Science Robert J. Birgeneau and Richard O. Hynes, director of the Center for Cancer Research (CCR).
"We are pleased that MIT's role in cancer research has been recognized by Mr. Ludwig's generosity," Dean Birgeneau said. "We are especially gratified that income from a portion of the Ludwig Chair Fund principal, equivalent to about $1 million in endowment, will beused to support undergraduate research. This support recognizes in a concrete way the unique role that our undergraduates play in the research and educational enterprise here at MIT."
"Some of our most stellar alumni/ae in the past have been UROP students and we look forward to seeing this support foster the careers of the next generation of young scientists entering cancer research at MIT," said Professor Hynes. "The potential for fundamental advances in understanding this disease is greater than it ever has been, and MIT offers great opportunities for students to become involved in research projects in basic cancer research. This generous support will enhance that."
Daniel K. Ludwig, a New York real estate magnate who was once the world's richest man, established with the bulk of his estate the Virginia and D.K. Ludwig Fund for Cancer Research to benefit six institutions: MIT, Memorial Sloan-Kettering Cancer Center, and the medical schools at Harvard, Johns Hopkins, Stanford and the University of Chicago.
The Ludwig Chair Fund at MIT provides financial support for the pursuit of basic science and research into, and the advancement and diffusion of, knowledge regarding the causes, origin, prevention and cure of cancer and other neoplastic diseases. In 1997, Professor Robert A. Weinberg, a founding member of both the CCR and the Whitehead Institute for Biomedical Research, was appointed the Daniel K. Ludwig Professor for Cancer Research; Dr. Tyler E. Jacks was named a Daniel K. Ludwig Scholar.
The Ludwig Cancer Research UROP program will be administered through the CCR. Interested students and faculty should direct inquiries to Maija K. Ahlquist in CCR headquarters, x3-6402, maija@mit.edu.
A version of this article appeared in MIT Tech Talk on February 24, 1999.
