Beckman announces its renovated café will be called Ted's Café after Founding Director Ted Brown. A champion for the café and the community it offers, Brown is making a generous gift to the renovation. The cafe closed in 2023 for renovations. Brown, along with several campus collaborators, worked closely with benefactors Arnold and Mabel Beckman to create the Beckman Institute. The entire building, including the original café, was designed to bring people together.

Beckman's Speech Accessibility Project fuels improvements in Microsoft's Azure AI Speech platform as a part of its project making speech recognition technology useful for people with disabilities. Microsoft announces its accuracy gains range from 18% to 60%, depending on the speaker’s disability. The project recruits and records thousands of people with disabilities. Microsoft, Google, Amazon, Apple and Meta fund the project, and the data is also available to other companies, nonprofits and researchers.

Beckman researchers win two ARPA-H grants totaling $54 million. One, led by Stephen Boppart, will deliver an AI-powered imaging system to identify cancerous tissue in surgery. The second, led by Bill King, will apply digital manufacturing to grow consistent 3D tumor models for drug testing and personalized treatment.

Using funding from a Beckman outreach grant, Beckman partners with South Side Elementary in Champaign for a 2-year-long partnership. Each grade visits Beckman once during the school year. The visits complement what the students are already learning in their classes. During their visits, they connect with Beckman community members, learn about science and explore future careers.

Steve Maren, an Illinois alumnus and neuroscientist, becomes Beckman's director. Maren succeeds Nadya Mason and Interim Director Cathy Murphy. Maren studies the neurobiology of emotional learning and memory and was among the first students to study in the newly created Beckman Institute in the late 1980s.

The Beckman Institute adds a new X-ray microscope to its Microscopy Suite. The Zeiss Xradia 630 Versa micro-CT scanner — the first of its kind with life science applications in the U.S. — is available to University of Illinois investigators and may be used to support research projects around the world.

Beckman begins awarding the Staff Spirit and Dedication Award. The award celebrates staff members who embody the mission and core values of the Beckman Institute and demonstrate teamwork. Beckman gives the award each year at the same ceremony as its Vision and Spirit Award for researchers. They're given each April 10, the anniversary of Arnold Beckman's birth.

Beckman's Molecular Imaging Laboratory within the Biomedical Imaging Center acquires a new PET-CT scanner, which enables interdisciplinary research projects through ultra-high spatiotemporal resolution imaging of biological tissues in real time. The institute purchased the scanner with support from the Roy J. Carver Charitable Trust. It improves on the previous technology in several ways, including ultra-high spatiotemporal resolution, stationary detectors and simultaneous multi-isotope PET imaging modalities.

The Beckman Institute creates the Owl Patrol, its outreach committee. The group shares fun, educational science activities local schools, Scout troops and Boys and Girls Club participants. The activities take place within the community and at Beckman. The committee is named in homage to a 13-year-old Arnold O. Beckman. An inventor and innovator from the start, he created an unofficial Boy Scout troop — the original Owl Patrol — in his hometown of Cullom, Illinois.

Beckman researchers receive $30 million from the U.S. National Science Foundation to establish the NSF Science and Technology Center for Quantitative Cell Biology. The center will develop whole-cell models to transform our understanding of how cells function and share that knowledge with diverse communities through the popular computer game Minecraft. Professor Zan Luthey-Schulten leads the center.

Cathy Murphy becomes Beckman's interim director after Nadya Mason's departure to become dean of the Pritzker School of Molecular Engineering at the University of Chicago. Murphy is the the Larry R. Faulkner Endowed Chair in Chemistry and head of the Department of Chemistry.

The Beckman Institute for Advanced Science and Technology seeds its first projects as part of its new  research seed grants program. The program kick-starts bold scientific projects that reach across disciplines to answer questions that could not be addressed by individual researchers or departments. Seed grants are awarded annually through a competitive process.

Researchers begin using funding from the National Institute of Biomedical Imaging and Bioengineering at the National Institutes of Health to develop label-free optical imaging technologies for medical and biological applications. The Center for Label-free Imaging and Multi-scale Biophotonics, or CLIMB, is creating optical and computational imaging technologies that can serve as a resource for clinicians. The late Gabriel Popescu, a professor of Electrical and Computer Engineering, championed the project but died suddenly just before the notification of its funding.

Nadya Mason, the Rosalyn Sussman Yalow Professor of Physics at Illinois, becomes the new director of the Beckman Institute. Mason is an experimental physicist who works at the intersection of complex materials, superconductivity and nanotechnology. She succeeds Jeff Moore, Beckman's director since 2017.

Beckman faculty member Deana McDonagh opens the (dis)Ability Design Studio. She used funding from Beckman’s Vision and Spirit Award to create the space on Beckman’s first floor. McDonagh created the space to design assistive technology with people who have disabilities. She works with Adam Bleakney, head coach of the University of Illinois Wheelchair Track and Road Racing, and Susann Heft Sears, director of the university’s Beckwith Residential Community.

The Beckman Institute opens the Illinois MRI Exhibit in its atrium. It celebrates the invention of MRI, as well as the university’s foundational research in the 1940s and 1950s that led to this world-changing innovation. The exhibit features the first two human magnetic resonance imaging scanners, invented by late University of Illinois faculty member Paul Lauterbur. He won the 2003 Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine for the invention.

The Beckman Institute installs a Bruker 9.4 Tesla preclinical MRI system. The machine allows  researchers to look at organs and structures inside the body or object being scanned. It images small samples at high resolution. Beckman purchased the MRI with support from 18 University of Illinois colleges, departments and schools, along with a generous gift from the Roy J. Carver Charitable Trust.

The Beckman Institute celebrates its 30th anniversary with a performance of Quantum Rhapsodies in its atrium. It combines live music, narrative, and video to celebrate the quantum world. The institute also hosts several other events, including the 2019 Beckman Brown Lecture, a Science Showcase featuring graduate student research, and a 30-minute escape room for campus and community members.

Carle Health and University of Illinois agree to purchase a MAGNETOM® 7 Tesla magnetic resonance imaging scanner. They establish the Carle Illinois Advanced Imaging Center, which manages the scanner and allows both entities shared time for patients and research.

Jeff Moore, a professor of chemistry and materials science and engineering, is named director of the Beckman Institute.

In honor of the university's sesquicentennial, Beckman awards the first Vision and Spirit Award. It recognizes a researcher who exemplifies founder Arnold Beckman’s vision for the institute and has has fostered collaboration in their research.

In an article in the journal Psychological Science in the Public Interest, educational psychology Professor Liz Stine-Morrow and psychology Professor Dan Simon debunk brain-training companies' claims that their products improve cognition in daily life. Stine-Morrow is an expert in the field of aging and cognition, and her work includes the study of how people learn as they grow older. It especially focuses on the role of literacy and how effective reading is maintained into late life.

Psychology Professors Monica Fabiani and Gabriele Gratton patent a new optical imaging technique called Pulse-DOT. It measures and evaluates the health of arteries in the brain and can measure them globally and in different regions. Fabiani and Gratton are pioneers in cognitive neuroscience and neurophysiology of aging, as well as in developing tools for non-invasively mapping human brain function.

The journal Nature writes about the founding of the Beckman Institute and how it has set an example for collaborative, interdisciplinary research across the nation and the world.

Brad Sutton, a professor of bioengineering, pioneers studying the brain through fast, whole-brain magnetic resonance elastography. MRE gently vibrates the brain to measure its stiffness.

The Beckman Institute celebrates its 25th anniversary with a day-long symposium featuring former Beckman Postdoctoral Fellows. They were joined by former Beckman Institute directors and University of Illinois administrators. The institute also published a book celebrating the milestone.

Susan Schantz, a professor of comparative biosciences, wins a five-year, $8 million grant from the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency and the National Institute of Environmental Health Sciences. Schantz uses the money to study whether chemical exposure, including to bisphenol A (BPA) and phthalates, alters infant and adolescent physical development, cognition, or behavior. She publicizes the results with the goal of changing policy in order to protect children's health.

Researchers Klaus Schulten and Juan Perilla of the Theoretical and Computational Biophysics Group use the fastest supercomputers in the world to create a detailed molecular map of the HIV-1 capsid. This allows more effective therapies to target the virus. Schulten has been conducting research at Beckman since it opened, and is a leader and visionary in computational biophysics.

Art Kramer, a professor of psychology and neuroscience, is named director of the Beckman Institute.

Tamer Başar, a professor of electrical and computer engineering, is named Beckman's interim director after the departure of Pierre Wiltzius. Başar stayed in the role until mid-2010.

Bill Greenough, a professor of psychology, wins the FRAXA Research Foundation Dedication Award for his research involving Fragile X syndrome, the most common cause of inherited mental impairment and the most common known cause of autism. Greenough's breakthrough research created steps toward effective treatment of this disorder. Greenough is a pioneer in studies of brain development, the neural basis of learning and memory, and the effects of aging, exercise, injury, and environmental enrichment on the brain.

Beckman researchers find the brain has its own clock driven by the production and flow of chemical energy in cells. Certain reactions oscillate on a 24-hour cycle in the brain clock, and literally open and close channels of communication in brain cells.

The researchers, including cell and developmental biology Professor Martha Gillette, electrical and computer engineering Professor Todd Coleman, chemistry Professor Jonathan Sweedler, and pharmacology Professor Charles Cox, published their work in the journal Science.

Arthur F. Kramer, a professor of psychology and neuroscience, with Ed McAuley, a professor of kinesiology and community health, found moderate exercise increases brain volume in older adults. They published their findings in Journal of Gerontology: Medical Sciences.

Beckman faculty member Paul Lauterbur wins the 2003 Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine for being the first scientific researcher to produce an image with nuclear magnetic resonance.

He developed the technology in the 1970s at Stony Brook University, and helped develop Beckman's strong tradition of research using magnetic resonance imaging.

Pierre Wiltzius is named the third director of the Beckman Institute. He previously worked at AT&T Bell Laboratories, and was a professor of materials science and engineering and physics at Illinois.

Researchers from chemistry and a variety of engineering departments, including Philippe Geubelle, Scott White, Nancy Sottos, and Jeff Moore, come together at Beckman to form the Autonomous Materials Systems Group. They go on to do pioneering work on self-healing properties of polymer composites along with other accomplishments. Their work leads to the product Rust-Oleum META Prime, which extends coating life on surfaces. White dies in 2018, but the group's work continues at Beckman.

Using an algorithm derived from research on how frogs separate sounds in a noisy environment, Albert Feng collaborated with researchers from speech and hearing science and electrical and computer engineering to create an intelligent hearing aid.

Karl Hess, a professor of electrical and computer engineering, is the first to use full band approach for Monte Carlo simulation for electron transport. His research makes significant contributions to the fields of computer simulation, optoelectronics, and quantum computing.

Thomas Huang, a professor of electrical and computer engineering, publishes "Locality-constrained Linear Coding for Image Classification" in the Journal of Visual Communication and Image Representation. The journal later recognizes it as the decade's most highly cited paper. Huang is frequently recognized as a highly cited and influential scholar, and is a pioneer in computer vision, pattern recognition, and human computer interaction.

Stephen Boppart, a professor of electrical and computer engineering, co-founds LightLabImaging, the first of  three start-up companies to commercialize and disseminate his innovative optical technologies for biomedical imaging. He also founds Diagnostic Photonics in 2008 and PhotoniCare in 2013.

The Beckman Institute hosts its first open house in conjunction with Engineering Open House. It starts as an annual event, and is now hosted every other year.

Electrical and computer engineering Professors Joe Lyding and Karl Hess found that by substituting deuterium they could improve the lifetime of silicon chips by as much as 50 times. This discovery can now be found in millions of cellphones and other devices.

Beckman's Illinois Simulator Lab opens with its first simulator, the CAVE. Until it closes in 2016, ISL is home to a variety of cutting-edge equipment, including a flight simulator; a driving simulator; and the Cube, an immersive, stereo-capable  3D visualization chamber.

Zhi-Pei Liang demonstrates what is considered an important advance in ultrafast magnetic resonance spectroscopy imaging (MRSI), known as SPICE. This technique can accelerate spectroscopic imaging experiments, making high-resolution metabolic imaging possible.

Jiri Jonas, a professor of chemistry, is named the second director of the Beckman Institute.

The Mosaic browser was created by the National Center for Supercomputing Applications, which was housed at the Beckman Institute.

R&D Magazine names the Beckman Institute the 1990 Lab of the Year. Sixteen years later, the institute's neighbor, the Electrical and Computer Engineering Building, wins the same award. The architectural firm SmithGroup designed both buildings.

The Beckman Institute hosts several activities to celebrate the building's completion, including dinners, concerts, ceremonies at the Krannert Center for the Performing Arts, and a reception in the Beckman Institute atrium. Research groups begin moving in later in 1989.

An open house at the unfinished Beckman Institute gives the community and campus a glimpse at many spaces in the not-quite-complete building.

A statue of Arnold Beckman by Peter Fagan is dedicated during a ceremony at the not-yet-open Beckman Institute.

Campus celebrates the completion of Beckman's steel framework with a traditional topping-out ceremony, in which a small evergreen tree is appended to the top of the structure. The building was 22% complete and on schedule, with more than 400,000 work hours left to complete the building.

Professor Ted Brown is named the inaugural director of the Beckman Institute. Brown is a professor of chemistry who was most recently Illinois' vice chancellor for research and dean of the Graduate College.

University of Illinois campus leadership and Arnold and Mabel Beckman break ground on the construction of the Beckman Institute. The space on campus' north end had most recently been home to Illinois Field, the university's baseball diamonds. It was also the location of campus' first building when the University of Illinois opened its doors in 1868.

J. Kathryn Bock, a professor of psychology, publishes "Syntactic persistence in language production" in the journal Cognitive Psychology. It goes on to create the foundation of research on structural priming and language production. Bock is also a pioneer in verb and pronoun agreement production. She becomes the first person to create experimental studies of language production, and later incorporates the use of eye-tracking equipment.

The University of Illinois selected the architecture firm Smith, Hinchman and Grylls (known today as SmithGroup) to design the Beckman Institute.

The University of Illinois and Arnold Beckman announce that the Arnold and Mabel Beckman Foundation will give the university $40 million, and the state of Illinois is pledging $10 million toward the construction of the building.

Campus leadership tasks two faculty committees — one from the physical science and engineering, one from the life and behavioral sciences — to propose a new idea for transcending traditional academic fields at the University of Illinois. Their eventual $50 million proposal was submitted to Arnold and Mabel Beckman in 1984.

Arnold O. Beckman is born in Cullom, Illinois. He goes on to graduate from the University of Illinois, then become a famous inventor, businessman, and philanthropist.

Learn more about Dr. Beckman in an exhibit on the first floor of the Beckman Institute, or by visiting Beckman Coulter's website.