Gates Biomanufacturing Facility Opens

(May 2015) In April, the Gates Center for Regenerative Medicine celebrated the grand opening of the Gates Biomanufacturing Facility, which will serve academic, clinical and commercial investigators looking to translate their laboratory discoveries into clinical-grade protein and cell-based products suitable for investigational use in humans.

The Gates Biomanufacturing Facility will be the only site within a 500-mile radius that complies with the U.S. Food and Drug Administration’s manufacturing regulations, creating a significant resource to researchers on the Anschutz Medical Campus.

The facility is an important investment in our faculty by a partnership that includes the Gates Center, the Anschutz Medical Campus, the School of Medicine, University of Colorado Health, Children’s Hospital Colorado and the Gates Frontier Fund. Diane Gates Wallach, a board member of the Gates Frontier Fund, described the fund’s support as “venture philanthropy,” a commitment of resources that seeks to spur significant growth in our community.

Dennis Roop, PhD, director of the Gates Center and professor of dermatology, says having a “Good Manufacturing Practice” site— the designation granted by the Food and Drug Administration for a manufacturing site that meets its rigid standards—is a competitive advantage for the Anschutz Medical Campus.

“Some of our young faculty who literally have developed new techniques for cell expansion—that no one else in the world has been able to do—would be lost to other institutions, because they’re driven to get (those technologies) into the clinic,” Roop explained to the Aurora Sentinel. “If we hadn’t had the promise of this facility, some of the new recruits that we’ve invested in, we would have lost.”