Dundee University has been given £12m funding by the UK Research Partnership Investment Fund (UKRPIF) to complete the construction and development of a new biomedical centre.

The Centre for Translational and Interdisciplinary Research (CITR) is a £38m project and is expected to create about 180 jobs

CITR is being developed as a means to reduce the costs of bringing safe new drugs to market.

Dundee University has already raised in excess of £26m and construction is scheduled to finish in autumn 2013.

The university said the project would expand its College of Life Sciences in several key areas, including drug discovery.

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Professor Michael Ferguson, dean of research at the college, said: "We have an excellent track record at Dundee of attracting investment from charities and business, particularly the pharmaceutical industry, and using it to deliver innovation and opportunity.

"I would like to pay tribute to all my colleagues, and their research teams, who have secured the match-funding that enabled us to obtain this UKRPIF award.

"It will greatly enhance and accelerate our ability to improve healthcare and contribute to the local and national economies."

Dundee University principal and vice-chancellor Professor Pete Downes said: "This funding confirms the great strengths we have in biomedicine in Dundee and Scotland.

"It will help create world-class capability and infrastructure for interdisciplinary work bringing together basic science, drug discovery, health informatics and mathematics.

"This is also, of course, a very notable boost to economic development of the life sciences sector within Scotland."

(IT/GK)