UM Tissue Bank Wins Prestigious Beacon Award
The University of Miami Tissue Bank, under the leadership of H. Thomas Temple, M.D., director, professor and vice chair of orthopaedic surgery, has received the Beacon Council’s prestigious Beacon Award in the Life Science category.
The Beacon Council, Miami-Dade County’s official economic development organization, honored the winners of its 10th annual awards at the new Marlins Park on April 25.
The awards recognize individuals, businesses or organizations for contributing to the local economy through job creation, business expansion, corporate citizenship and industry leadership.
One of the first occupants of the new University of Miami Life Science & Technology Park in Miami, the tissue bank employs approximately 140 people who recover, process and “bank” bones, tendons, cartilage, and other tissue from deceased donors for use in orthopaedic, neurological, plastic, general and dental surgeries across the nation. In the U.S. alone, more than a million such allografts are transplanted every year, and the UM Tissue Bank contributes approximately 100,000 of them.
Established in 1970, the UM Tissue Bank is the oldest institution of its kind and the only university-run tissue bank in the nation. It works closely with surgeons and medical science investigators to advance the field of bone and soft tissue transplantation by developing new products for use in oral surgery, orthopaedic tumor and spine surgery, and sports injury surgery.
