The University of Minnesota has announced its strategic positioning plan, which is designed to make the University one of the top public research universities in the world within the decade. We believe that the Hormel Institute is extremely well positioned to work effectively with other University units to achieve the University’s goal. The Hormel Institute is rapidly becoming a recognized leader in scientific research showing that dietary factors modulate crucial cellular signal transduction pathways in cancer development and prevention. The Institute was one of the first to report the discovery of key molecular targets and mechanisms in tumor promotion. The Institute is gaining a solid reputation as a leading research institute making major contributions to the identification and characterization of natural chemopreventive agents that are nontoxic but highly effective as anticancer agents.

By focusing on cancer, the most important public health problem in the United States, the Hormel Institute has experienced a dramatic increase in external research funding even in the national environment of overall decreased funding for research. Currently, every section of the Institute has at least one R01 grant from the National Institutes of Health (NIH) and all sections have multiple grants from NIH and/or other funding agencies such as Department of Defense, Breast Cancer Research Foundation and Prostate Cancer Foundation.

The Hormel Foundation has provided consistent financial and advisory support to the Hormel Institute over the years since the Institute’s creation in 1942. The Foundation has recently recognized the success of the Institute and voted to provide major funding for an expansion of the existing Institute research facilities. The expansion will consist of the construction of a new two-story building that will house research laboratories and a new vivarium. In addition, the existing building will be completely renovated to accommodate a new library, media center, office, and research support space.

All of these accomplishments would not be possible without the generous ongoing support of the Hormel Foundation, Hormel Foods, the City of Austin and Mower County, Mayo Clinic, the Eagles Telethon, and the University of Minnesota. The Hormel Institute is a team project. By working together, we will help to lead our university in realizing the goal of becoming a top research institute worldwide.