Kenneth Rainin Foundation Awards Over $2 Million For Collaborative IBD Research Projects

Oakland, Calif., Feb. 04, 2019 (GLOBE NEWSWIRE) -- The Kenneth Rainin Foundation announced that it has awarded over $2 million in grants through its Synergy Awards program. This program encourages collaboration among researchers from different disciplines to advance the study of Inflammatory Bowel Disease (IBD).  By funding groundbreaking or unconventional hypotheses and methodologies, the Foundation aspires to support scientists in achieving major breakthroughs in this field.

The Foundation also announced it will accept Letters of Inquiry (LOIs) for its Innovator Awards program from February 4 through March 15, 2019. This grant program funds research that has the potential to improve the prediction and prevention of IBD. Organizations worldwide, both nonprofit and for profit, are eligible to apply for grants up to $200,000 per project. Priority is given to translational projects that can be applied to human samples. Visit krfoundation.org for more information.

“The Foundation’s health funding continues to focus on improving outcomes for IBD patients,” said Laura Wilson, PhD, Director of Health Strategy & Ventures. “Both our Synergy and Innovator Awards programs support innovative methodologies from researchers within and outside of IBD research that could lead to breakthroughs for this complex disease.”  

The complete list of 2019 Synergy Awards includes the following research teams:

• Charles Elson, MD, University of Alabama at Birmingham and Phillip Stafford, PhD, Arizona State University, for An IBD peptide immunochip for diagnosis, prognosis and immune monitoring in Crohn’s disease, $178,645.
• Yaron Fuchs, PhD, Technion - Israel Institute of Technology; Hermann Steller, PhD, Rockefeller University; and Jeffrey Milsom, MD, Weill Cornell Medicine, for A novel IAP antagonist strategy for the treatment of IBD, $300,000.
• Howard Hang, PhD, Rockefeller University; Ken Cadwell, PhD, New York University; and Thomas Walz, PhD, Rockefeller University, for Mechanistic analysis of NOD2 interactions with commensal bacteria muropeptides in Crohn’s disease, $300,000.
• Kate Jeffrey, PhD, Massachusetts General Hospital; Naama Geva-Zatorsky, PhD, Technion - Israel Institute of Technology; Irah King, PhD, McGill University; and Corinne Maurice, PhD, McGill University, for Revealing a direct immunomodulatory role for bacteriophages to mitigate intestinal inflammation, $300,000.
• Randy Longman, MD, PhD, Weill Cornell Medicine and Iwijn De Vlaminck, PhD, Cornell University, for Cell-free DNA as a non-invasive test of bacterial translocation, ileal inflammation and extra-intestinal Crohn’s disease, $200,000.
• Thaddeus Stappenbeck, MD, PhD, Washington University and Michael Diamond, MD, PhD, Washington University, for Virus-induced alteration of intestinal motility as a predisposing factor for IBD, $200,000.

“We are thrilled to start on this exciting research direction. By bringing together complementary expertise, it is our hope that our investigation will pave the way for establishing novel stem cell-targeted therapeutics for the treatment of IBD,” said Yuron Fuchs, PhD, Technion - Israel Institute of Technology.

Research teams who made significant progress in their first year of funding are eligible for up to two years of additional support. The Foundation will continue to support the following three Synergy Award grantees from 2018:

• Russel Vance, PhD, University of California, Berkeley; Karsten Gronert, PhD, University of California, Berkeley; and Jakob von Moltke, PhD, University of Washington, for The role of inflammasomes and tuft cells in eicosanoid release by intestinal epithelial cells, $300,000.
• Stephan Rogalla, MD, Stanford University; Sarah Streett, MD, Stanford University; Gary Nolan, PhD, Stanford University; and Aaron Mayer, MS, Stanford University, for Precision medicine to enable personalized therapy in IBD via biomarker analysis using CyTOF and multiplexed ion beam imaging, $300,000.
• John Chang, MD, University of California, San Diego; Gene Yeo, PhD, University of California, San Diego; and William Sandborn, MD, University of California, San Diego, for Elucidating molecular heterogeneity and new therapeutic targets for IBD using an innovative single-cell sequencing approach, $200,000.

As a complement to its grantmaking, the Foundation will host its eighth annual Innovations Symposium on July 13-15, 2019 in Honolulu, Hawaii. This event gathers researchers, trainees and clinicians to collaborate and advance ideas toward solving IBD. Register early, as the event has sold out the previous two years.

To learn more about the Rainin Foundation’s research grantees and its vision and strategy for solving IBD, visit: krfoundation.org/ibd.

About the Kenneth Rainin Foundation

Kenneth Rainin Foundation is a family foundation that collaborates with creative thinkers in the Arts, Education and Health. At the Rainin Foundation, we believe in taking smart risks to achieve breakthroughs. We support visionary artists in the Bay Area, create opportunities for Oakland’s youngest learners, and fund researchers on the forefront of scientific discoveries. Since 2010, the Foundation has awarded over $11 million for promising scientific research projects with the potential to impact treatment and prevention of Inflammatory Bowel Disease. More at krfoundation.org. 

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