Molecular medicine centre to open in Helsinki

Capital beat out Turku to host international research institute

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People at the University of Helsinki gave a sigh of relief after the Ministry of Education confirmed on Friday that it had chosen Helsinki to be the site of a new international research institute focusing on molecular medicine, genetics, and epidemiology.
     
The ministry justified its decision by the University of Helsinki’s top level achievements in international multi-disciplinary research that covers all the disciplines of the planned institute. The Finnish Genome Centre within the university further enhances the Helsinki profile, the Ministry stated.
      The south-western city of Turku competed with the Finnish capital for hosting the headquarters of an organization best described as star-shaped. The aim is to utilise the know-how of the biocentres of Turku, Kuopio, Tampere, and Oulu to support the new Helsinki headquarters.
      The new centre will become part of the European Molecular Biology Laboratory (EMBL) network, and it will also have connections with other Nordic research institutes.
     
“Now we can bring together the research in the fields of molecular medicine, genetics, and epidemiology. We have brilliant individual researchers, but we’ve lacked an internationally recognised multi-disciplinary research body”, explains vice rector Marja Makarov from the University of Helsinki.
      “Biomedicum 2 is about to be completed. This will be the icing on the cake”, rejoices academy research professor Kari Alitalo of the University of Helsinki, Faculty of Medicine.
      “We should be able to set up the EMBL local laboratory in the new building.”
      According to Alitalo, it pays considerable dividends to invest in stem cell research, system biological research, and cancer research right now.
      The outgoings of the centre are estimated at EUR 10 million per year. In addition to the government, a few foundations have already expressed their interest in taking part in funding the research.


Links:
  EMBL
  University of Helsinki - Alitalo Lab

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