Phil and Penny Knight on Tuesday announced they have given $500 million to the University of Oregon to advance scientific research, the second time they have given that amount to further the university’s scientific work.
The couple gave the university $500 million in 2016 to create the Phil and Penny Knight Campus for Accelerating Scientific Impact. The goal of the campus is to speed up the process of turning new scientific discoveries into tools, treatments, and developments to improve people’s lives.
Before today’s donation, they had given the university a total of about $1.1 billion. Phil Knight, who co-founded the Nike sportswear company, earned a bachelor’s degree in business from the university in 1959 and an MBA from Stanford in 1962.
The Knights have also donated some $2 billion to other higher-education institutions and nonprofits, including Oregon Health & Science University and Stanford University. That puts them among the Americans who have given the most to charity in recent years. They have appeared on the Chronicle’s annual Philanthropy 50 list of the biggest donors eight times since 2006.
Phil Knight, who is 83, said in 2016 that he would like to give away the bulk of his wealth while he is still alive. With a net worth pegged at more than $57 billion, it is unlikely the Knights will be able to empty their coffers anytime soon. But they may have a few surprises in mind for the nonprofit world in the future.
Using Science to Improve Lives
Today’s donation will further enhance the center’s bioengineering and applied scientific research programs and training efforts, provide more aid for students, and pay for the center’s second building. This latest gift will also be used to hire 14 to 16 additional faculty members and their research teams in bioengineering, regenerative medicine, biomedical data science, and other applied interdisciplinary sciences.
To date, scientists and others at the center have created a number of new technologies, including high-resolution 3D-printing methods that they hope will eventually make possible advanced medical implants like artificial blood vessels, bone and tendon repairs, and nerve regeneration.
Other new medical inventions developed at the center include sensors that allow doctors to monitor the progress of bone regeneration in trauma patients, new methods of designing proteins and synthesizing genes to fight disease, as well as new strategies to deliver proteins to repair damaged tissues.
