The Scintillation Materials Research Center (SMRC) is a unique multidisciplinary research facility formed in 2005 by a collaboration of the University of Tennessee College of Engineering and CTI Molecular Imaging. The mission of the center is to discover and develop new scintillation materials. The center combines the academic resources of the university with the scintillator research legacy of CTI to develop innovative materials for state-of-the-art radiation sensors and imaging systems. An operating agreement between UT and CTI Molecular Imaging Inc. was executed in November 2005 to establish the center, and formal announcement of the center’s establishment was made on March 22, 2006. The College of Engineering collaborated with Siemens Medical Solutions Molecular Imaging to establish the new center, located in the Science/Engineering Building, following purchase of CTI Molecular Imaging by Siemens in April 2005. Four UT College of Engineering graduates founded CTI in 1983. It became internationally known for the development of Positron Emission Tomography (PET) scanners, which use scintillator crystals to aid in the early detection of cancer and other conditions.