The Broad Institute in Cambridge, Massachusetts. Credit: R. Friedman/Corbis

The Broad Institute of MIT and Harvard, a prominent genomics and chemical-biology research centre based in Cambridge, Mass­achusetts, has received an endowment of US$400 million from philanthropist Eli Broad that sets it on a course to becoming an independent, non-profit organization.

Set up in 2004 as a unique collaboration between the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) and the Whitehead Institute for Biomedical Research, both also in Cambridge, Harvard University and its affiliated hospitals, the institute now has a more secure future. Earlier gifts — two $100-million donations from Broad — had an expiry date: the funds had to be used within ten years; beyond that, the future of the institute was uncertain.

However, this new gift will be invested and used to support the institute over the long term.

Launched to unite the clinical expertise of Harvard's medical school with academics and engineers at MIT and Harvard, the institute has grown to encompass 1,200 affiliated scientists. It is renowned for its genomics projects, which span the gamut from sequencing the genomes of a menagerie of mammals to looking for genetic factors underlying conditions such as schizophrenia and autism. The centre's chemical-biology programme, meanwhile, screens for small molecules to study and treat diseases. The new endowment will not alter the institute's core research focus, says founding director Eric Lander.

From the start, Broad, a former businessman based in Los Angeles, viewed the institute as an experiment in scientific collaboration. The new donation, announced on 4 September, signals the end of the experimental phase. "We want to see this become permanent, and to have permanence you need to have an endowment," he says.

Faculty members of both MIT and Harvard will continue to hold adjunct positions at either institution, and the two universities will have representatives on the Broad Institute's governing board. "It will continue as an entity of MIT and Harvard," says Lander. "This won't affect how any of the collaborations work."