Best Buy founder gives U $40 million
Thursday, December 11th, 2008
Best Buy founder Richard Schulze and his family foundation will give $40 million to University of Minnesota researchers who are intent on finding a cure for Type 1 diabetes, the university announced Thursday.
The money, the second largest gift in university history, will be paid over five years and provide about half the $20 million the university will spend annually on diabetes research. Officials said they hope it will provide the financial boost needed to defeat the disease.
“We must not settle for anything less than a cure,” said Dr. Bernhard Hering, who will head the project. “We only need to declare it possible.”
Schulze and his daughter, Debra Schulze, 40, who has had Type 1 diabetes for 28 years, said they chose the university’s program over a number of other research organizations, both public and private, after studying programs around the world. They chose the university because it seemed to be closest to finding a cure and was less focused on finding new treatments for symptoms, she said.
As many as 3 million people in the United States live with Type 1 diabetes, in which the immune system attacks islet cells in the pancreas, destroying the body’s ability to produce insulin and regulate blood sugar.
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U of M receives $40 million for type 1 diabetes research
Wednesday, December 10th, 2008
The Richard M. Schulze Family Foundation has pledged $40 million for diabetes research to the University of Minnesota. The gift, to be paid over five years, will capitalize on the University’s strength in diabetes research and aims to shorten the timeline for translating it into a cure for people with type 1 diabetes.
The gift is the second largest in the University’s history and the second largest by an individual or family foundation to diabetes research in the United States. In recognition of the gift and the future of diabetes research, the University will rename its Diabetes Institute for Immunology and Transplantation (DIIT) the Schulze Diabetes Institute.
“We have the capacity to cure this devastating disease and help people enjoy a happy and productive life no longer constrained by diabetes and constant fears and worries,” says Bernhard Hering, M.D., an internationally recognized diabetes researcher and scientific director of the Schulze Diabetes Institute. “Curing type 1 diabetes is possible. We only need to declare it possible, engage the brightest minds, be contagiously committed, and break all barriers. This gift is breaking big barriers by boosting resources, raising awareness, and injecting a sense of urgency and responsibility.”
Click here for the full article on the Minnesota Medical Foundation website »