In 2000, Patrick J. McGovern ’59 and Lore Harp McGovern made a unprecedented gift to ascertain the McGovern Institute for Brain Research at MIT, driven by their deep curiosity concerning the human mind and their belief in the facility of science to alter lives. Their $350 million pledge began with a straightforward yet audacious vision: to grasp the human brain in all its complexity, and to leverage that understanding for the betterment of humanity.
Twenty-five years later, the McGovern Institute stands as a testament to the facility of interdisciplinary collaboration, continuing to shape our understanding of the brain and improve the standard of life for people worldwide.
To start with
“That is, by any measure, a very historic moment for MIT,” said MIT’s fifteenth president, Charles M. Vest, during his opening remarks at an event in 2000 to rejoice the McGovern gift agreement. “The creation of the McGovern Institute will launch probably the most profound and vital scientific ventures of this century in what surely shall be a cornerstone of MIT scientific contributions from the a long time ahead.”
Vest tapped Phillip A. Sharp, MIT Institute professor emeritus of biology and Nobel laureate, to steer the institute, and appointed six MIT professors — Emilio Bizzi, Martha Constantine-Paton, Ann Graybiel PhD ’71, H. Robert Horvitz ’68, Nancy Kanwisher ’80, PhD ’86, and Tomaso Poggio — to represent its founding faculty. Construction began in 2003 on Constructing 46, a 376,000 square foot research complex on the northeastern fringe of campus. MIT’s recent “gateway from the north” would eventually house the McGovern Institute, the Picower Institute for Learning and Memory, and MIT’s Department of Brain and Cognitive Sciences.
Patrick J. McGovern ’59 (fifth from right) and Lore Harp McGovern (on Patrick’s right) gather with founding faculty members and MIT administration on the groundbreaking of Constructing 46 in 2003.
Photo: Donna Coveney
Robert Desimone, the Doris and Don Berkey Professor of Neuroscience at MIT, succeeded Sharp as director of the McGovern Institute in 2005, and assembled a distinguished roster of twenty-two faculty members, including a Nobel laureate, a Breakthrough Prize winner, two National Medal of Science/Technology awardees, and 15 members of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences.
1 / 4 century of innovation
On April 11, 2025, the McGovern Institute celebrated its twenty fifth anniversary with a half-day symposium featuring presentations by MIT Institute Professor Robert Langer, alumni speakers from various McGovern labs, and Desimone, who’s in his twentieth 12 months as director of the institute.
Desimone highlighted the institute’s recent discoveries, including the event of the CRISPR genome-editing system, which has culminated on this planet’s first CRISPR gene therapy approved for humans — a remarkable achievement that’s ushering in a brand new era of transformative medicine. In other milestones, McGovern researchers developed the primary prosthetic limb fully controlled by the body’s nervous system; a versatile probe that taps into gut-brain communication; an expansion microscopy technique that paves the way in which for biology labs around the globe to perform nanoscale imaging; and advanced computational models that display how we see, hear, use language, and even take into consideration what others are pondering. Equally transformative has been the McGovern Institute’s work in neuroimaging, uncovering the architecture of human thought and establishing markers that signal the early emergence of mental illness, before symptoms even appear.
The McGovern community gathers in the form of the number 25 to rejoice the twenty fifth anniversary of the McGovern Institute.
Photo: Steph Stevens
Synergy and open science
“I’m often asked what makes us different from other neuroscience institutes and programs around the globe,” says Desimone. “My answer is easy. On the McGovern Institute, the entire is larger than the sum of its parts.”
Many discoveries on the McGovern Institute have relied on collaborations across multiple labs, starting from biological engineering to human brain imaging and artificial intelligence. In modern brain research, significant advances often require the joint expertise of individuals working in neurophysiology, behavior, computational evaluation, neuroanatomy, and molecular biology. Greater than a dozen different MIT departments are represented by McGovern faculty and graduate students, and this synergy has led to insights and innovations which are far greater than what any single discipline could achieve alone.
Also baked into the McGovern ethos is a spirit of open science, where newly developed technologies are shared with colleagues around the globe. Through hospital partnerships for instance, McGovern researchers are testing their tools and therapeutic interventions in clinical settings, accelerating their discoveries into real-world solutions.
Professor Nancy Kanwisher (center) with three of her scientific “children”: (left to right) MIT professors Evelina Fedorenko, Josh McDermott, and Rebecca Saxe.
Photo: Steph Stevens
The McGovern legacy
A whole lot of scientific papers have emerged from McGovern labs over the past 25 years, but most school would argue that it’s the people — the young researchers — that really define the McGovern Institute. Award-winning faculty often attract the brightest young minds, but many McGovern faculty also function mentors, creating a various and vibrant scientific community that’s setting the worldwide standard for brain research and its applications. Kanwisher, for instance, has guided greater than 70 doctoral students and postdocs who’ve gone on to turn into leading scientists around the globe. Three of her former students, Evelina Fedorenko PhD ’07, Josh McDermott PhD ’06, and Rebecca Saxe PhD ’03, the John W. Jarve (1978) Professor of Brain and Cognitive Sciences, are actually her colleagues on the McGovern Institute. Other McGovern alumni shared stories of mentorship, science, and real-world impact on the twenty fifth anniversary symposium.
Trying to the longer term, the McGovern community is more committed than ever to unraveling the mysteries of the brain and making a meaningful difference in lives of people at a worldwide scale.
“By promoting team science, open communication, and cross-discipline partnerships,” says institute co-founder Lore Harp McGovern, “our culture demonstrates how individual expertise could be amplified through collective effort. I’m honored to be the co-founder of this incredible institution — onward to the following 25 years!”
