20 Years of Progress in Proton Therapy: The Groundbreaking

On January 21, 2003, the UF Health Proton Therapy Institute broke ground on the first proton therapy facility in the southeastern United States, the fifth in the nation. It was a visionary moment for the University of Florida, UF Health and for Jacksonville. Then UF President, Charles Young, College of Medicine Dean, Dr. Craig Tisher, and proton therapy champion and Medical Director, Dr. Nancy Mendenhall shared a common goal: bring cutting‑edge radiation technology to patients in North Florida, across the United States and around the world to advance cancer cure rate and improve quality of life.

Building the center was an engineering milestone as much as a medical one. The UF Health Jacksonville campus offered an ideal location to attract talented physicians, physicists and healthcare professionals while expanding oncology services across Northeast Florida. Making room for a nearly 100,000‑square‑foot facility required rerouting a roadway, designing a first‑of‑its‑kind building and installing a 440,000‑pound cyclotron—all while activating one of the largest power draws in North Florida to support proton delivery. These foundational milestones made it possible to offer life‑saving treatment to more than 12,000 patients since opening in August 2006, including more than 2,500 children, from every U.S. state and more than 30 countries.

As we approach August 2026—our 20th anniversary since treating our first patient—we will share a series of articles highlighting key milestones from our history. This first installment honors the groundbreaking and construction achievements that made the UF Health Proton Therapy Institute possible. We extend our gratitude to the thousands of hours and hundreds of minds that imagined not only the building, but the technology within it. Special thanks to Dr. Yves Jongen and Ion Beam Applications (IBA) for their partnership, ingenuity and commitment to advancing proton therapy.