Here is some more detail about plans for a new Medical Devices Center at the University of Minnesota: The U plans to convert 8,000 square feet of a campus parking garage into the center's new home. Funding to build the facility is coming from the Minnesota Department of Employment and Economic Development, to the tune of $1.08 million, while the rest of the $2.2 million project is coming from the U's College of Science and Engineering. In addition to the construction costs, medical device companies are expected to have skin in the game by making in-kind donations for equipment. According to university officials, the four-year-old Medical Devices Center "has outgrown its current 5,000-square-foot space in the Shepherd Labs building on the East Bank. The new space will be in the Mayo Parking Garage, next to the Mayo Memorial Building at 420 Delaware St. SE in Minneapolis." Look for construction to start this fall and work to be finished in early 2013. DEED officials say the Medical Devices Center will increase medical device industry jobs in Minnesota. University officials claim a larger Medical Devices Center could help create from 80 to several hundred jobs in the state annually. According to the University of Minnesota, the Medical Devices Center's research fellows have filed 109 invention disclosures to the U of M's Office of Technology Commercialization, about half of which were filed this year. The invention disclosures have resulted in the university filing 37 patent applications, with another four under preparation.