Pritzker Institute Receives Funding to Develop the Neurotissue and Organoid Innovation Laboratory

The Pritzker Institute of Biomedical Science and Engineering at Illinois Institute of Technology has been awarded $1.5 million by the State of Illinois, matched by Illinois Tech, to renovate 2,770 square feet of existing Illinois Tech wet lab space to create a specialized multi-tenant laboratory called the Neurotissue and Organoid Innovation Laboratory (NOIL) for advanced research in translational neurotechnology.

“Our goal for the laboratory is to enhance the state of Illinois’s regional capabilities to attract, support, and facilitate growth of small businesses, startups, entrepreneurs, and university collaborators who are part of a rapidly growing ‘neurotech’ sector,” says Executive Director of the Pritzker Institute, Robert A. Pritzker Endowed Chair in Engineering, and Professor of Biomedical Engineering Philip Troyk. “From state-of-the-art visual prosthetics to Illinois Tech’s brain atlas project, this new facility will allow Illinois Tech and the state of Illinois to play a central role in the development of truly life-changing biomedical advances.”

NOIL is a crucial component of the newly formed Functional Neural Technology Center, which will provide “one-stop-shop” services to growing companies, entrepreneurs, and emerging academic collaborations that are pursuing cutting-edge clinical translation in the field of neurotechnology. 

The renovated wet lab will provide the facilities essential to advance the development of neural implant technology such as the world-leading visual prosthesis developed at Illinois Tech. It will also serve the emerging field of bioelectronic medicine, which promises to substitute traditional drug therapies by creating implanted neural-modulation medical device interfaces to nerves that control human organs. 

The remodeling of wet labs for specialized neural tissue and organoids will provide new fundamental and functional wet laboratory space for multiple users and create an unprecedented capability within Chicago for the support of collaborative neural technologies research. 

Photo: Robert A. Pritzker Endowed Chair in Engineering and Professor of Biomedical Engineering Philip Troyk, who is also the executive director of the Pritzker Institute,