The Instituto de Investigaciones Biomédicas Sols-Morreale (IIBM) is a joint centre of the Consejo Superior de Investigaciones Científicas (CSIC) and the Universidad Autónoma de Madrid (UAM) located on the campus of the Faculty of Medicine. This Institute had its origins in the Institute of Enzymology, which was created by Alberto Sols and which in 1971 moved from the Centre for Biological Research (CIB) to the Faculty of Medicine of the newly founded UAM, to take over the teaching of biochemistry. The Department of Biochemistry was then set up and the first CSIC-UAM agreement was signed. Later, in 1975, also from the CIB, Gabriella Morreale and Francisco Escobar moved to the Faculty with their Experimental Endocrinology group to a space provided by the Department of Morphology. Subsequently, in 1984, the IIB was created as a result of the merger of the Institute of Enzymology and the Experimental Endocrinology Group. The IIB was physically located in the aforementioned premises of the UAM, which it shared with the staff of the University, although it was administratively dependent on the CSIC.
In 1988 an agreement was signed between the CSIC and the UAM that covered, on equal terms, the activity of the CSIC staff and the lecturers of the Biochemistry Department, who at that time were mostly from the CSIC, from Alberto Sols' group.
In 1991, the IIB's own building was inaugurated, built in premises ceded by the UAM. The signed agreement lost its validity as a result of the approval, in 1993, of a new framework agreement between the CSIC and the UAM, so that in June 1998 the CSIC and the UAM approved the current agreement creating the Sols-Morreale Biomedical Research Institute, a Joint Centre that integrates the IIBM of the CSIC and the Department of Biochemistry of the UAM.
The current lines of research of the Joint Centre reflect its dual origin of Experimental Endocrinology/Enzymology and Molecular Pathology, expanded with those that have been derived from the incorporation of new research groups. Its researchers are integrated in one of the following Research Departments: Cancer Biology, Endocrine and Nervous System Physiopathology, Metabolism and Cell Signalling and Experimental Models of Human Diseases.
The staff of the Joint Centre carries out an intense teaching activity that is materialised, fundamentally, in the teaching of 20 subjects of the Degrees in Medicine, Biochemistry and Nutrition of the Autonomous University of Madrid and 14 subjects of the Masters in Biomedicine, Molecular and Cellular Biology, Biotechnology, Biophysics and Neurosciences of the same University. It also participates in the Doctorate in Biochemistry, Molecular Biology and Biomedicine, which has been awarded the Mention of Quality by the Ministry of Education.
The IIBM is currently actively involved in the actions of the Campus of International Excellence UAM-CSIC and especially in the initiative "Biocampus UAM CSIC" (BUC); in which the technological platform INNOTEC (Advanced technologies for the generation and characterisation of animal models) should be highlighted. Within this platform, the IIBM houses the first tri-modal equipment (microPET, microSPECT and microCT) to be installed in Spain. This equipment, together with the High Field Magnetic Resonance Imaging and Spectroscopy Service (SIERMAC) will make the IIBM an international reference centre in non-invasive Molecular Imaging.