The University of Texas Southwestern Medical Center has announced a $50 million gift from the Perot family, the Perot Foundation, and the Sarah and Ross Perot, Jr. Foundation in support of a physician-scientist training program.

The gift will provide a permanent endowment for the Perot Family Scholars Medical Scientist Training Program, which awards graduates a dual MD/PhD degree to strengthen the advancement of laboratory discoveries into the clinical arena. The gift will enable the program to increase the number of students admitted and expand the research disciplines in which they study to include biomedical engineering, computational biology, bioinformatics, and data science. The investment also will enhance the curriculum, improve student experiences, and increase efforts to recruit students from elite U.S. colleges.

Ross and Margot Perot invested $20 million in 1987 in support of the Medical Scientist Training Program as well as two Nobel laureates at UT Southwestern, and more than $23 million in 1996 for training and biomedical research. In addition, the family has supported the Perot Foundation Neuroscience Translational Research Center, mental health programs, and veterans’ research.

“This extraordinary gift provides a permanent foundation at UT Southwestern for this distinctive dual-degree program that will not only benefit top UT Southwestern students, but also help address a disturbing national trend in the diminishing number of fully trained physician-scientists,” said UT Southwestern Medical Center president Daniel K. Podolsky. “The Perot family’s beneficent support further cements their historical commitment to the continuous advancement of academic medicine and its benefits.”

(Photo credit: Sarah and Ross Perot, Jr. Foundation)