October 7, 2008 | Read Time: 1 minute
Hansjörg Wyss, a Swiss-born engineer and businessman has pledged $125-million to Harvard University to expand the university’s Institute for Biologically Inspired Engineering.
University officials said Mr. Wyss’s pledge will be paid out over the next five years. The money will endow seven professorships at the institution and support its operations.
Researchers at the institute will include biologists, chemists, engineers, mathematicians, physicians, and scientists from other disciplines. All will work collaboratively to attempt to uncover the engineering principles that govern life forms and use that knowledge to develop technologies they hope will be able to solve looming health-care and environmental issues.
Mr. Wyss earned an MBA at the university’s business school in 1965 and is the chairman of Synthes, an international medical-device company whose North American headquarters are in West Chester, Pa. He previously gave $25-million to the business school in 2004 for its Ph.D. program.
Mr. Wyss declined through a Harvard spokeswoman to be interviewed about his new pledge but said in a press release that he was “humbled” by the opportunity he has to contribute to work that may change the future of medicine and science.
“Little did I dream when I began my career in engineering that we would reach a point where engineers and biologists would be using nature’s templates to create solutions to our medical and environmental challenges.”
