KTH Royal Institute of Technology has received a donation from Kerstin and Rune Jonasson of SEK 70 million (€7.7 million; $11 million). The figure represents one of the largest private donations in KTH’s history.
The new funding will be used primarily to acquire sophisticated medical imaging equipment to create a high-tech infrastructure platform for medical technology research collaboration between KTH, Karolinska Institute and Karolinska Hospital. Part of the contribution will be applied toward recruiting specialised competence in the field.
“The Jonassons’ extremely generous donation is a very welcome addition to our research in medical technology,” said Professor Peter Gudmundson, President of KTH. “This is a strategically important research area for KTH and one of our highest priorities. Together with our other efforts in the field, we can now create an extremely powerful platform that will take our research to a new level. At the same time it advances KTH’s position, this donation has the additional effect of strengthening collaboration between KTH, Karolinska Institute and Karolinska Hospital. It allows us to conduct research that will yield results far into the future with clear benefits for future patients.”
“It is a tremendous pleasure for us to be able to make a long-term investment that benefits broad, collaborative medical research,” Dr. Jonasson said of his and Mrs. Jonasson’s donation. “We hope this leads to improved diagnostic and therapeutic opportunities that will help a great many people.”
Dr. Jonasson went on to note that his support for KTH research is highly personal: “This donation is a way to thank the Royal Institute of Technology, where I got my degree in engineering physics in the late 1940s, and indirectly to Karolinska Institute, where I later received my medical training, and to Karolinska Hospital, where much of my professional career was at the unit for Clinical Physiology in the Department of Thoracic Surgery. Another purpose of the donation will be to promote research collaboration with South Korea, a country that has shown us great generosity since Kerstin served as a nurse at the Swedish field hospital in Pusan during the Korean War.”
“This is a sign of growing interest in KTH and the top-flight research conducted here,” said Philip von Segebaden, Head of Fundraising at KTH. “Donations of this type are critical to the university’s research efforts, because long-term financing allows researchers to take bolder, more far-sighted approaches. Private donations for technical research play an increasingly important role in strengthening Sweden’s position as a leader in scientific research.”
About the research
Medical technology research is a proud Swedish tradition that includes innovations such as pacemakers, artificial kidneys, ventilators and proton beam cancer therapies. Today, imaging technologies play a critical role in diagnosis, monitoring and evaluation of many medical treatments.
Research and development across the entire field of medical imaging is a central theme at KTH, including imaging of specific biological processes. This technology can be used to simulate individual cases, for example allowing surgeons to practise procedures in a simulator before operating on the patient. Predicted responses to pharmaceuticals can also be tested in the simulator. Fine-grained temporal and spatial resolution means that even rapid processes can be followed, providing evidence of disease in early stages. Two key development fields are risk factor diagnostics and individualised therapy, both of which are central to the provision of safe, modern health care.
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