Mississippi currently stands as the least healthy state in the U.S., plagued by alarmingly high rates of infant and maternal mortality and chronic disease. While pockets of improvement offer hope, the state still faces monumental structural and access issues. In 2016, the University of Mississippi Medical Center (UMMC) received a $19.8M phase I award from the National Institutes of Health (NIH) to support an Institutional Development Award (IDeA) Center of Biomedical Research Excellence. The IDeA program builds research capacity in states where levels of NIH research funding have historically been low by supporting basic, clinical, and translational research, faculty development and infrastructure improvements. Now in its second phase and tenth year of funding, the Mississippi Center for Clinical and Translational Research (MCCTR) is a collaborative partnership between five institutions: the University of Mississippi Medical Center, Mississippi State University, Tougaloo College, the University of Mississippi and the University of Southern Mississippi. The major focus of the MCCTR is to leverage an integrated clinical and translational (C/T) research program across UMMC and its partner institutions to address major chronic diseases (e.g., obesity, diabetes, CKD, hypertension, heart disease, cancer, maternal/fetal disorders and dementia) impacting Mississippians.

The center is funded by the IDeA Program Infrastructure for Clinical and Translational Research grant through the National Institute of General Medical Sciences under the award number U54GM115428.