USC Libraries has received a $5-million donation to endow the Valerie and Ronald Sugar Dean’s Chair of the USC Libraries, the university announced Wednesday.

The donation was made by USC trustee Ronald Sugar and his wife, Valerie.

The endowment will be used to acquire new literary collections, expand the libraries’ digital archives and the creation of the Dean’s Challenge Grant, which will help fund pilot programs and encourage innovation and creativity.

Catherine Quinlan, the dean of USC Libraries, will be installed as the first Valerie and Ronald Sugar Dean’s Chair of USC Libraries.

The donation is the first to endow a chair in USC Libraries history and the largest endowment of a dean’s chair in USC history, will help support USC’s core academic mission.

Quinlan told the Daily Trojan the expanded digital and research collections will help USC’s rise as a leading research institution.

USC Libraries consists of 23 libraries and information centers. USC Libraries also launched USC Digital Repository, which offers cloud-computing consultation service, last year. This year, USC Libraries also launched an online librarianship master’s degree program.

Ronald Sugar, who earned his doctorate in engineering at UCLA in 1971 and is the former chairman and CEO of Northrop Grumman Corp., an aerospace and defence contracting company. He currently chairs the Academic Affairs Committee of the USC Board of Trustees and holds the Judge Widney Professorship in Management and Technology. He also serves on the boards of Apple, Air Lease Corp., Chevron and Amgen.

Valerie Sugar graduated from USC with a master’s degree in library sciences and has served on the USC Libraries’ Board of Directors, helping raise awareness of the libraries’ special collections.