Vanderbilt has announced seven awardees in the latest round of its Innovation Catalyst Fund, an initiative that supports translational research that has promising commercial potential. The fund, which is available to all university and Vanderbilt University Medical Center faculty, helps tackle real-world problems. It provides vital support in three key areas: proving ideas can be commercialized, supporting early-stage innovation projects, and furthering research that benefits the community and society.
Distinguished awardees from the latest funding cycle include:
- Jad Abumrad, Distinguished Research Professor of Communication of Science and Technology, for Waiting Room Stories.
- Panambur Bhandari, assistant professor of plastic surgery, for Intrinsic Glove: Saving Traumatized Hands.
- Lisa Fazio, associate professor of psychology and human development, for Developing a Novel Platform for Social Science Research Using LLM Persona-Agents.
- Scott Guelcher, professor of chemical, biomolecular and biomedical engineering, for Preclinical Testing of Resorbable Surgical Mesh.
- Eric Skaar, University Distinguished Professor of Pathology, Microbiology and Immunology, for A Stabilizing Agent that Enhances the Resistance of Probiotics and Recombinant Enzymes to Heat and Desiccation.
- Keivan Stassun, professor of astronomy and Stevenson Professor of Physics, for the Learning with Optimal Guidance for Autistic Navigators (LOGAN) Virtual Driving Instruction System.
- John Wikswo, University Distinguished Professor of Biomedical Engineering, for Accelerating the Development and Commercialization of a Robot Scientist/Self-Driving Biological Laboratory.
Full story: Seven Vanderbilt faculty research projects get innovation catalyst funding | Vanderbilt University
