The Simons Foundation Donates $10 Million To Institute For Advanced Study

Gift Will Support the Institute's Center for Systems Biology

November 21, 2005, Princeton, N.J. � The Simons Foundation has donated $10 million to the Institute for Advanced Study to support the Institute's Center for Systems Biology. The Center, established in 2003 under the leadership of Arnold J. Levine, Professor in the School of Natural Sciences, fosters research in the fields of systems biology. This challenge grant is intended to help support, along with future funds from additional donors, operational and building costs associated with the Center, as well as the establishment of an endowment fund. The grant will be paid as the Institute matches the funds. In recognition of this gift, the Center will be renamed The Simons Center for Systems Biology.

The Simons Foundation, established in 1994 by James H. Simons, Founder and President of Renaissance Technologies Corporation, and his wife Marilyn Hawrys Simons, was created to support advanced research in science and mathematics. James Simons has been a Trustee of the Institute since 2002, and, as a distinguished mathematician and former Member in the School of Mathematics (1972-73), has been actively engaged in the intellectual life and development of the Institute.

Peter Goddard, Director of the Institute, stated, "The Simons Foundation's grant will greatly facilitate the Institute�s new initiative in theoretical biology, comprising biologists and scientists trained in physics and in mathematical disciplines, working in close proximity to the Institute�s leading theoretical physicists and astrophysicists. This gift from a Trustee and former Member of the Institute is a testimony to lasting significance that the Institute holds for those who have worked here and the impact it has had on their lives. We are immensely grateful to The Simons Foundation for their generosity and their belief in the importance of the development of biology as a discipline at the Institute. We are confident that other supporters will rise to the Foundation's exciting challenge to join them in nurturing this crucial extension of the work of the Institute."

"During the past several decades developments in biology have made the field increasingly amenable to the methods and insights of physics and mathematics," stated James Simons. "The establishment of a kernel of outstanding biologists at IAS, where large numbers of equally outstanding mathematicians and natural scientists are continually in residence, is a perfect way to nurture this incipient development. Arnold Levine and his biological colleagues are eager to teach, and we believe many IAS Members will be eager to learn. Together, they may begin to attack and to solve some of the deepest and most important problems in the life sciences."

The $10 million gift from The Simons Foundation is part of the $50 million in total gifts and pledges made to the Institute this year. This figure includes additional, significant gifts received from supporters of the Institute, and it represents half of an initial goal of $100 million established by the Institute to strengthen its endowment and to fund existing programs. These gifts continue the strong legacy of support established by the Institute's founders, Louis Bamberger and his sister Caroline Bamberger Fuld. The sequence of Bamberger/Fuld gifts, made between 1930 and their deaths in 1944, amounted to more than $16 million and created the foundation for the Institute's endowment.

About the Institute for Advanced Study

The Institute for Advanced Study is one of the world’s leading centers for theoretical research and intellectual inquiry. The Institute exists to encourage and support curiosity-driven research in the sciences and humanities—the original, often speculative thinking that produces advances in knowledge that change the way we understand the world. Work at the Institute takes place in four Schools: Historical Studies, Mathematics, Natural Sciences and Social Science. It provides for the mentoring of scholars by a permanent Faculty of approximately 30, and it ensures the freedom to undertake research that will make significant contributions in any of the broad range of fields in the sciences and humanities studied at the Institute.

The Institute, founded in 1930, is a private, independent academic institution located in Princeton, New Jersey. Its more than 6,000 former Members hold positions of intellectual and scientific leadership throughout the academic world. Thirty-three Nobel Laureates and 40 out of 56 Fields Medalists, as well as many winners of the Wolf and MacArthur prizes, have been affiliated with the Institute.