Awardees were selected from a competitive pool of over 80 applications submitted by researchers across the United States.
| Applicant | Institution | Proposal Title |
|---|---|---|
Aditi Kothari, Ph.D. | University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill | Novel Molecular Biomarkers for Treatment De-Escalation in HPV-Associated Head and Neck Cancer |
Atefehsadat Monirvaghefi, Pharm.D. | University of Nebraska Medical center | Investigating Butyrylcholinesterase (BChE) as a Prognostic Biomarker and Therapeutic Target in Uveal Melanoma |
Andrew Norris, Ph.D. | BCN Biosciences | SSB2 as a Novel Target in Oncology |
Arafat Rahman Oany, Ph.D. | Texas A&M University | Targeting NR4A1/NR4A2 to Induce Ferroptosis in Triple Negative Breast Cancer: A Novel Therapeutic Strategy with Potential Application in Rhabdomyosarcoma |
Christopher Thomas Burns, Ph.D. | PGXL Technologies LLC | Biomarker Panel for Prediction of Delayed Graft Function of Renal Allografts |
Colleen Sedney, Ph.D. | Boston Children's Hospital | Human in vitro modeling to assess the adjuvating effect of BCG on HBV vaccination via Dectin-1 activation |
Elizabeth Christine Lee, Ph.D. Candidate | Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health | Fine-mapping neutralizing epitopes on the malaria vaccine candidate AMA1-RON2 complex |
Fredrick Rosario-Joseph, Ph.D. | University of Colorado Anschutz Medical Campus | Extracellular Vesicle Protein Signatures as Biomarkers and Therapeutic Targets in Fetal Growth Restriction |
Felix E. Rivera-Mariani, Ph.D. | Lynn University | Immediate Effects of Therapeutic Group Drumming on Affective States and Multimodal Stress Biomarkers in College Students |
Hon Wai Koon, Ph.D. | UCLA | Design of antibody-oligonucleotide conjugates for treating intestinal fibrosis |
Julie Boucau, Ph.D. | Massachusetts General Brigham | Impact of COVID-19 antiviral treatment on SARS-CoV-2 mucosal immune responses |
Jianhua Xiong, Ph.D. | Emory University | Targeting Inflammatory Cytokine Signaling for the Treatment of Aggressive Prostate Cancer |
Justin E. Silpe, Ph.D. | PumpKin Baby Inc. | Comprehensive Cytokine Profiling to Develop Quality Biomarkers for Stored Human Milk |
Subika Khatoon, Ph.D. Candidate | Albany Medical College | Mitochondrial RISP-Mediated ROS Signaling in COPD Exacerbated by Pseudomonas aeruginosa Infection: Biomarker Discovery and Therapeutic Targeting |
Ling He, Ph.D., D.D.S. | UCLA | Targeting Radiation-Induced Neuroinflammation in Human Brain Organoids to Mitigate Cognitive Injury |
Mattia Quattrocelli, Ph.D. | Cincinnati Children's - University of Cincinnati | DKK3 as biomarker for low-cardiac output syndrome in infants with congenital heart defects |
Max Friesen, Ph.D. | Whitehead Institute | Unveiling Novel Post-Translational Modifications in Insulin-Resistant Human Adipocytes |
Jarren Oates, Ph.D. | The University of Alabama at Birmingham | Temperature-Dependent Regulation of Microglial-Instructed CD4+ T Cell-Driven Neuroinflammation |
Otto Phanstiel, Ph.D. | The University of Central Florida | Turning cold tumors hot via immune checkpoint inhibitor adjuvants which target polyamine metabolism |
Eleftheria Michalaki, Ph.D. | Piezo Therapeutics | Translational Evaluation of Piezopen for Naked mRNA Vaccine Delivery in Non-Human Primates |
Sandip Ashok Sonar, Ph.D. | University of Arizona, College of Medicine | Proteomic profiling of aging mouse lymph node stromal cells: to uncover molecular drivers of immune decline |
Sunita Sharma, Ph.D. | University of Georgia | Identifying Molecular Biomarkers of Ciliary Length Regulation Using Transcriptomic and Proteomic Profiling in Chlamydomonas reinhardtii |
Teresa R. Johnson, Ph.D. | Via College of Osteopathic Medicine - Virgina Campus | Investigating the Antimicrobial and Wound Healing Properties of a Naturally Occurring Sap |
Victor Garcia, Ph.D | New York Medical College | Unraveling the impact of GPR75 on liver disease (NAFLD/MAFLD) |
Yasuko Iwakiri, Ph.D | Yale School of Medicine | Dissecting IL6 Trans-Signaling and Protein Acetylation Mechanisms in Alcohol-Induced Liver Endothelial cell inflammation |
Grant Program Overview
The RayBiotech Innovative Research Grant program invites applications proposing a wide range of basic and applied research topics in the life sciences. Awardees will receive credits applicable towards any RayBiotech products or services, including our large selection of assays, reagents, and custom assay development.
Research projects may include studies on model systems for biological processes, disease, therapeutic or medical device development, as well as pre-clinical and clinical studies, including veterinary research. Projects related to biomarker discovery, personalized medicine, toxicology, nutrition and food science are also welcome.
Every project submitted has a chance of being funded and will be reviewed based on the criteria outlined below.
Criteria for Evaluation of Grants
RayBiotech will instruct reviewers to use the following criteria for selecting award recipients (in order of importance):
- Overall chances of successful completion of the proposed research, as deduced from:
- Scientific merit of the proposed research plan to achieve the goals of the research
- Access to the critical resources (e.g., suitable biological samples, equipment, tools and expertise) necessary to complete the proposed research successfully and to interpret the resulting data sets properly (and/or evidence of the applicant’s recruitment of outside resources to help provide these critical resources)
- Qualifications of the applicant and the team
- Potential impact of the proposed research on science, medicine and/or society, if successful
- Degree of innovation exhibited in the application of RayBiotech products and/or services to the proposed scientific inquiry.
Important Information for Applicants
- Applications are due on or before June 30, 2025.
- Watch this page for additional announcements & grant program details.
- Between 10 and 20 grants will be awarded. Each award will be a credit toward RayBiotech products and/or services (between $5,000 and $20,000 value).
- Any intellectual property resulting from research funded, in whole or in part, by the awards of this program will remain solely with the researchers and/or their respective institutions or employers, according to the intellectual property policies of those institutions or employers.
Still have questions?
Instructions for Completing Application Form
All grant applications must be submitted using the online application form. Applications must be submitted no later than June 30, 2025. The completed application should include the following items:
- All required fields should be filled out in the online application form.
- Acknowledgement of the grant terms and conditions.
- Proposed Research Plan: A PDF or Microsoft Word document which should be uploaded to the application form page. Formatting guidelines for the research plan are described below.
- Applicant’s CV or NIH biosketch and if applicable, that of the principal investigator and/or other personnel who will be participating significantly in the research project. These documents should also be uploaded to the application form page.
Who is Eligible to Apply
Applicants must be actively enrolled or employed by an academic research institute in the US, a nonprofit or not-for-profit research institution in the US, a US government institution, or any US-based commercial entity affiliated with the life sciences or biomedical sciences. Applicants must have either earned a post-graduate degree (PhD, MD, DVM, MS or equivalent degree) in a biological, biochemical, biomedical or related field, or be currently enrolled in an accredited institution to earn such a degree. For more details, see the grant terms & conditions.
Format of Research Plan
The research proposal should be no more than 2000 words (excluding citations) and should be
structured as follows:
- Specific Aim(s)
A short statement of your hypothesis and objectives for the project. One specific aim is required; up to 3 is acceptable. - Background and Significance
This section should succinctly put into perspective the importance of the proposed research,
and include a brief summary of the current scientific understanding of the topic, and gaps in
knowledge which the research intends to address. Preliminary data may be included but is not
required. Please cite only a limited number of key references to support ideas presented in this
section. - Approach
This section describes the rationale for your research, your planned experiments, and data
analysis if applicable. Your protocol for using RayBiotech products, along with which specific
product or service will be used, is required in this section. We recommend including the
following:- Explanation of the experimental design, conditions and controls you plan to employ, including the overall workflow and timeframe of the investigation
- What type and number of samples you intend to test/analyze
- How and where the samples were collected (or will be collected), processed and stored
- What experimental and control groups/conditions will be used in the study, and how many samples will be tested from each group or condition
- Which specific RayBiotech products or services you intend to use, in which phases of the study they will be applied, and what information you hope to gain by using them.
- Future Directions
This section is optional.
Notices for Grant Awardees
RayBiotech will send the letter to award winners on or before October 31, 2025. Awards will be given as credits toward the purchase of RayBiotech products or services in the amount of: $5,000 to $20,000 each. The credits will be redeemable for 3 years after the award date.
In any publication of results obtained, in whole or in part, from these grant awards, award recipients must acknowledge the sponsorship from RayBiotech, Inc., and applicant is expected to send a PDF copy of the publication to info@raybiotech.com within 30 days of publication.
Grant awardees are under no obligation to share intellectual property resulting from research associated with RayBiotech, Inc., its subsidiaries and/or partners, or their employees.