Urbana-based University of Illinois has signed a 10-year research affiliation agreement with Urbana-based Carle Health System that aims to spur new biomedical advancements at the new Carle Illinois College of Medicine, according to The News-Gazette.
The two parties completed a new set of agreements and policies Friday that cover joint research practices and governance that will apply to the entire Carle campus, not just its medical school.
The updated research affiliation agreement is meant to create a more robust research collaboration that will play up to each entity's strengths — Carle in patient care and clinical research and the University of Illinois in biological, engineering, behavioral, physical and computational sciences, according to the report. The focus of the research under the affiliation will be mostly on new biomedical devices and diagnostics.
Both parties will share the financial gains from any innovations resulting from the affiliation. Included in the agreement is an algorithm that weighs "which organization is supplying the intellectual power, and the proportion of a given project that is done by that person," a University of Illinois spokeswoman said.
Under a related agreement, Carle will pay the University of Illinois $1.5 million each year to coordinate "translational" research, prepare grant proposals, manage compliance and fund seed grants to draw in top scientists.
"We're all driving toward the same goal. We want to have an impact on the community, we want to have an impact on the world. We believe that we will do that with the framework we have built," said Lesley Millar-Nicholson, director of the campus Office Technology Management.
Officials from both systems hope to increase funding from the National Institutes of Health, as well as other federal agencies and corporate sponsors.