School of Medicine announces inaugural Cultivating Team Science awards

The School of Medicine announced today the first awardees of its new Cultivating Team Science seed grant program to incentivize collaborative science, which received 23 research proposals across departments and centers throughout UC Davis.

The awardees included:

• Principal Investigator Janine LaSalle, professor of Medical Microbiology and Immunology and co-director of the Perinatal Origins of Disparities Center. Dr. LaSalle and her team will study Precision Biomarkers of Fetal Neurodevelopment and Maternal Dietary Interventions in the Perinatal Origins of Disparities Center.
• Principal Investigator Stephen Henry, associate professor of Internal Medicine, General Medicine, Geriatrics and Bioethics, who will lead his team’s study, A Low-barrier, Generalist Model of care to Improve Treatment for Complex Patients with Opioid Use Disorder.

The Cultivating Team Science Awards will provide $100,000 annually per team, totaling $200,000 in two-year seed funds for planning, preparation and submission of large team-based applications. The awarded teams will be required to submit an initial application for a program project, U01 or equivalent grant to NIH or other federal funding agency with direct costs of at least $2 million annually by June 2022.

“We are really impressed by the outpouring of innovative multidisciplinary research proposals that were submitted,” said School of Medicine Dean Allison Brashear. “Our new Cultivating Team Science program is designed to foster this spirit of collaboration and create a launching pad for research breakthroughs that will improve public health.”

Program Directors Amy Brooks-Kayal, professor and chair of the Department of Neurology, and Luis Fernando Santana, professor and chair of the Department of Physiology and Membrane Biology, led the launch of the effort in collaboration with the School of Medicine’s Office of Research. More than 40 faculty members reviewed this year’s proposals.

Next year, the School of Medicine is planning three Cultivating Team Science Awards.