History of Scripps Research

Scripps Research ranks third in the inaugural Cure Innovation Index, which recognizes the top-performing institutes and centers across the U.S. The Index measures how effectively U.S. biomedical institutions translate scientific discovery into real-world healthcare solutions and treatments.

The Skaggs Graduate School awards 61 doctoral degrees to its 33rd graduating class. The ceremony in June represented the largest graduating class since the doctoral program’s inception in 1989.

Executive Vice President Eric Topol, MD, is featured in the inaugural TIME100 Health list of most influential people working in global health, recognizing people who are spearheading efforts to improve health worldwide through scientific research and innovation.

The City of San Diego declares February 15 as Scripps Research Day in honor of the institute’s centennial year and scientific achievements.

Scripps Research establishes the Collaborative Innovation Fund to support new research that could lead to paradigm-shifting breakthroughs. Its inaugural recipients include chemists Ahmed Badran, PhD, Phil Baran, PhD and Jin-Quan Yu, PhD; neuroscientists Xin Jin, PhD and Li Ye, PhD, and molecular biologist Ilia Droujinine, PhD.

Scripps Research breaks ground on its East Campus for an 83,000-square-foot, ultramodern research facility destined to house collaborative teams of chemists, structural biologists and molecular medicine specialists focused on translating scientific insights into new drugs. Honoring one of the institute’s top glycobiologists, The Chi-Huey Wong Laboratories for Biomedical Research rises at the gateway to the life sciences community in San Diego.

Neuroscientist Ardem Patapoutian, PhD, receives the 2021 Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine for discovering receptors critical to temperature and touch.

Peter Schultz, PhD, is named chief executive officer and vice chair of Scripps Research. The following year, he is named president. He sets about implementing a novel model at the institute: basic research will seed drug discovery, new candidate medicines will be developed and advanced through pre-clinical and early clinical trials by the institute itself (thus capturing more of their value), strategic alliances will be formed with pharmaceutical companies to bring these novel medicines to market, and subsequent royalties will be reinvested in further basic research. Scripps Research thus creates a self-sustaining model for nonprofit research, amplifying the impact of federal and philanthropic support along the way.

Chi-Huey Wong, PhD, wins the prestigious Wolf Prize in Chemistry.

SURFAXIN (lucinactant): Stemming from two decades of work performed by Charles Cochrane, MD, Surfaxin is approved by the FDA to treat respiratory distress syndrome (RDS), a condition that strikes preterm infants whose lungs lack surfactant, a coating of rigid proteins that keeps the spherical air sacs in the lungs from collapsing. The drug subsequently helps thousands of premature infants.

The institute receives $3 million from Mark Pearson (who originally remained anonymous) to establish The Pearson Center for Alcoholism and Addiction Research at Scripps Research. The center combines biomedical research with clinical applications. George Koob, PhD, leads the new center.

Kurt Wüthrich, PhD, receives the Nobel Prize in Chemistry for his development of nuclear magnetic resonance spectroscopy for determining the three-dimensional structure of biological macromolecules in solution.

The Arnold and Mabel Beckman Center for Chemical Sciences, a 165,000-square-foot, state-of-the-art research facility, is completed with substantial funding from the Arnold & Mabel Beckman Foundation. A successful chemist and inventor, Arnold O. Beckman founded Beckman Instruments (now Beckman Coulter), a company that supports laboratory research around the world.

LEUSTATIN (cladribine): Ernest Beutler, MD, leads the team that tests the new anti-cancer drug, 2CdA (Leustatin) developed at Scripps Research by Dennis Carson, MD. It is characterized as one of the most promising chemotherapeutic agents developed and subsequently produces a large number of complete remissions in patients with hairy cell leukemia, as well as other leukemias and lymphomas.

The institute launches a graduate program, building on the institute's strengths in the integration of cell and molecular biology, structure and chemistry. The graduate program is later named The Kellogg School of Science and Technology in honor of philanthropists Janet R. ("Jean") Kellogg and W. Keith Kellogg II.

Richard Lerner, MD, chair of the Department of Molecular Biology, is appointed the research institute’s new director. Under Lerner’s 25-year tenure, research operations triple in size. He establishes a chemistry department that is soon recognized as one of the best in the world, and he recruits many notable faculty, including Velia Fowler, PhD, (1987); K.C. Nicolaou, PhD, (1989); K. Barry Sharpless, PhD, (1990); and Gerald Edelman, MD, PhD,

With a construction grant from the National Institutes of Health, along with many donor contributions, ground is broken for new research facilities on the Torrey Pines Mesa.

Microbiologist John Spizizen, MD, arrives from the University of Minnesota to establish and chair the Division of Microbiology.

Pioneering immunologist Frank Dixon, MD, and four of his colleagues (William Weigle, PhD; Joseph Feldman, MD; Charles Cochrane, MD; and Jacinto Vazquez, MD) arrive from the University of Pittsburgh on July 1, establishing a Division of Experimental Pathology. They are drawn to the institute by the freedom to pursue research without the administrative constraints of a typical university, as well as the beginnings of a biomedical research cluster in the area.

When Ellen Browning Scripps passes away at the age of 95, she leaves $300,000 (the equivalent of more than ~$6.6 million in today’s dollars) in her will to the Metabolic Clinic “preferably for research.”

Inspired in part by the discovery of insulin, philanthropist Ellen Browning Scripps founds the Scripps Metabolic Clinic on December 11, 1924. The clinic is poised to become a specialized facility to diagnose, treat, and investigate diabetes and other disorders of metabolism. The clinic is initially part of Scripps Memorial Hospital (founded in September of the same year), run by Dr. James Sherrill.