British author J.K. Rowling said she donated $15.5 million to the University of Edinburgh to establish a multiple sclerosis research clinic.

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The creator of the wildly popular "Harry Potter" series said the funds were to help attract top researchers to find a cure for the disease, the BBC reported Tuesday.

Potter's mother Anne had MS and died at age 45.

A goal of the Anne Rowling Regenerative Neurology Clinic will be to put patients at the core of the research, she said. Work at the new clinic also will focus on other degenerative neurological conditions, such as Alzheimer's, Parkinson's disease and Huntington's disease.

"I cannot think of anything more important, or of more lasting value, than to help the university attract world-class minds in the field of neuro-regeneration, to build on its long and illustrious history of medical research and, ultimately, to seek a cure for a very Scottish disease," Rowling said in a statement.

Scotland has one of the highest MS rates globally, with about 10,500 people with the condition, the BBC said.

The author said she knows her mother would prefer her name attached to an MS research clinic, "so this donation is on her behalf, too, and in gratitude for everything she gave me in her far-too-short life."