Kansas University and Children’s Mercy Hospitals and Clinics are partnering to form the Center for Physical Activity, Nutrition and Weight Management, an obesity research, treatment and community outreach center.

The center will have a special focus on childhood and adolescent obesity.

It will occupy the second story of the new Don Chisholm Center at Children’s Mercy, currently under renovation at the northwest corner of 22nd and Holmes streets in Kansas City, Mo.

The center will be directed by KU professor Joseph Donnelly, director of the Center for Physical Activity and Weight Management at KU’s Life Span Institute in Lawrence.

Funding for the renovation was a $4 million gift from the Hall Family Foundation to Children’s Mercy, which donated space for the center. KU aims to raise $5 million to fund center operations.