Whitehead Institute

Philosophy and History of the Whitehead Institute

Edwin C. Whitehead, a wealthy businessman and philanthropist, conceived the original vision of the Whitehead Institute. Whitehead recognized the value of direct research as a means to develop therapies to help cure some of the most intractable diseases. He searched for a major research institution with which he could partner to make this vision a reality. Finally, he contacted professor and well—known Nobel laureate David Baltimore of MIT. MIT is well recognized as an important research institution that has contributed widely throughout many scientific and engineering fields and is the birthplace of many advanced technologies.

The idea was to create a new kind of institution that allowed individual scientists the freedom to pursue their interests and specialties. At the same time, the goal of the Whitehead Institute is to provide the tools and infrastructure to allow scientists working in disparate fields to come together and collaborate, forming partnerships that normally would not be possible.

Another key component of the Whitehead Institute that would develop over the years is the institute's commitment to retaining highly engaged faculty. The institute also has sought to limit the number of faculty members and the size of the institution to facilitate increased cooperation and collaboration among the Whitehead community of scientists.

Biomedical Research Realized

The idea of the Whitehead Institute was fully realized in 1982, when an agreement was reached between Whitehead and MIT. MIT agreed to provide faculty for the institute, and Whitehead agreed to provide the largest individual gift to biomédical research at that time of $135 million. In 1984, the Whitehead Institute opened its doors in Cambridge, Massachusetts, in a $35 million state—of the—art facility.

[Page 621]The staff and faculty of the Whitehead Institute also study a wide range of disciplines. Staff and faculty members at the institute have included botanists, engineers, geneticists, molecular biologists, and many others from disparate fields. The goal of the institute in bringing all of these fields together is to create innovation and to foster cooperation that crosses academic lines in the interest of developing new techniques and partnerships to advance scientific research, and hopefully generate results that lead to more effective therapies.

Since its inception, the Whitehead Institute for Biomédical Research has been widely recognized as a pioneering and important institution. In 1990, after only 8 years in existence, the Institute for Scientific Information listed the Whitehead Institute as the top institution in the world in molecular biology and genetics. The research accomplishments of the Whitehead Institute are diverse and cover a broad range of specialties and fields within the biomédical arena. As the human genome project was conceived and accomplished, the Whitehead Institute was noted in particular for its prominent leadership role through Dr. Eric Lander and his research group, leading to the establishment of a new sister institution nearby, the Broad Institute, which focuses on genomic research.

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