NIH awards $6.5M to Banner Alzheimers Institute

Banner Alzheimer’s Institute has received a $6.5 million grant from the National Institutes of Health (NIH) for renovation and expansion of its research facility, providing an imaging resource for researchers throughout Arizona.

The grant was announced by Health and Human Services Secretary Kathleen Sebelius as part of $1 billion of American Recovery and Reinvestment Act funds awarded across the U.S.

The grant will provide almost 18,000 square feet in renovated and expanded research space for two PET imaging suites, a new MRI suite, a computational image-analysis lab, and the equipment needed to produce a broad range of PET radiotracers for researchers throughout the state of Arizona focused on Alzheimer’s disease, cancer, diabetes and other diseases, according to the Phoenix-based Banner Health.

The construction project will more than double Banner Alzheimer Institute’s research space and is predicted to generate and sustain more than 130 new jobs. It will permit Banner Health to acquire a new 3T MRI and other additional imaging equipment to support its research mission, added the organization.

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