About Us
What we do
The Mississippi Research Alliance is formed as a statewide alliance to connect critical elements across the research ecosystem with the mission to catalyze sustainable growth of a knowledge-based economy through strategic partnerships and investment in university-driven research and development (R&D).
The goals of the MRA include:
- Support a governance framework able to deliver strategic direction throughout the ecosystem’s diverse sectors.
- Strengthen physical and human infrastructure that underpins academic-led R&D.
- Foster collaborations to build strategic alliances that bridge comprehensive research universities, emerging research institutions, state agencies, and public and private organizations in Mississippi.
- Provide appropriate administrative support in key areas that will propel growth of the state’s science and technology priority areas.
By fortifying the state’s strategic governance, improving sustainable access to cutting-edge instrumentation, and fostering collaborations across institutions, the MRA accelerates advanced research by interdisciplinary teams, which leads to significant benefits for MS’s knowledge-based economy. These efforts will lay a solid foundation by which other investments can securely build on. As a statewide initiative, the MRA capitalizes on existing strengths, broadens networks, and creates new opportunities, all of which serve to advance MS’s R&D ecosystem.
Why the MRA?
The Mississippi Research Alliance (MRA) was developed in coordination with the Mississippi Research Consortium (MRC), which serves as the Science and Technology (S&T) Research Advisors for Mississippi's executive and legislative branches.
Established in 1986, the MRC is tasked by executive order with developing the state's S&T plan. In Fall 2021, the MRC appointed representatives from the research institutions and state economic development agencies to recommend changes to this plan, which included the need to focus on building research and development (R&D) infrastructure and capacity, increasing and diversifying human capital, and fostering innovation and entrepreneurship.
In 2023, we began mapping assets to identify priority areas with growth potential and concluded that the infrastructure required for identifying, maximizing, and efficiently accessing existing shared resources and expertise is critical for Mississippi's future success but currently lacking. The MRC agreed that foundational investments in research infrastructure to support collaborative networks across the ecosystem are essential. This led to the vision for the establishment of the MRA.
The MRA is a statewide entity that leverages existing strengths, expands networks, and creates new opportunities to advance Mississippi's R&D ecosystem. MRA will leverage new and existing networks across Mississippi to cultivate sustainable capacity in vital components of a healthy and robust R&D ecosystem, aligning directly with the goals of the Mississippi S&T plan.
