Pasadena : Caltech Gets $40 Million

The Arnold and Mabel Beckman Foundation has given Caltech $40 million to endow the Beckman Institute, which will research ties between biology and chemistry.

The institute will be built just west of Beckman Auditorium, which, along with the Mabel and Arnold Beckman Laboratories on Behavioral Biology and Chemical Synthesis, was a gift to Caltech. The new institute will be headed by Harry Gray, the Arnold O. Beckman professor of chemistry at Caltech.

Beckman, who lives with his wife in Corona del Mar, is founder and chairman of Beckman Instruments. He received a doctorate from Caltech in 1928 and was a member of the faculty until 1940, later serving as chairman of the board of trustees for 10 years.