Honors and Grants

Yu-Wen Alvin Huang, Molecular, Cell Biology and Biochemistry (MCB), received the 2024 Carney Institute Junior Faculty Excellence in Mentoring Awards. Established in 2023, these awards recognize junior faculty members for their outstanding research mentorship of undergraduate, graduate, or postdoctoral scientists, as well as medical students or residents. His research focuses on neuron-glial interaction in neurocognitive disorders, such as Alzheimer's disease.

Victoria Koenigsberger, medical student, received the Medical and Graduate Student Preceptorship from the Rheumatology Research Foundation. The purpose of this preceptorship program is to introduce medical and graduate students to rheumatology by supporting a 4-week or 8-week, full-time clinical or research experience in the broad area of rheumatic disease. Victoria received $5000 in support of a full-time research experience for the project "Moving Out of the Kid’s Rheum: Transitioning Pediatric Patients to Adult Practices in Rhode Island."

Martha Moe, Obstetrics and Gynecology, was selected by the OBGYN Chief Resident class to receive the Society of Academic Specialists in General Obstetrics and Gynecology 2024 Faculty Award in recognition of her commitment to excellence in clinical care of women and career development of academic specialists in obstetrics and gynecology.

Ariana Albanese, Psychiatry and Human Behavior, received $191,298 for “Towards a harm reduction approach to perinatal cannabis use” from the National Institute on Drug Abuse. Ariana also received $37,112 from the Rhode Island Hospital Injury Control Center of Biomedical Research Excellence (COBRE) - Core B.

Richard J. Bennett, Molecular Microbiology and Immunology (MMI) received $2,121,350 for “Investigating Candida spp. determinants of GI colonization.” The grant is a subaward through Sloan-Kettering Institute from the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases.

Valeria Brown, medical student, received $9,000 for “Investigating the role of long interspersed element-1 (LINE-1) in age-related clonal hematopoiesis of indeterminate potential (CHIP) driven by JAK2 V617F mutation” from the American Society of Hematology. Research mentor is Patrycja Dubielecka-Szczerba and co-mentor is John Sedivy. 

Marie Camerota, Obstetrics and Gynecology, received $349,908 for "Caregiving Influences on Attention and Executive Function in Children Born Very Preterm" from the National Institute of Child Health and Human Development.

Eleanor Caves, Ecology, Evolution, and Organismal Biology (EEOB), received $856,642 for “Cooperation in context: biotic and abiotic drivers of interaction outcome in cleaner shrimp-client fish mutualisms” from the National Science Foundation.      

Christina Cuomo, MMI, received $109,770 for “Fungal genomics: population and systematic studies to map determinants of virulence, unique biology, and drug resistance.” The grant is a subaward through the Broad Institute from the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases.      

Alethea Desrosiers, Psychiatry and Human Behavior, received $577,617 for “Harnessing culturally-appropriate, technology-assisted methods to advance suicide prevention among youth in Colombian school settings” from the National Institute of Mental Health.                     

Patrycja Dubielecka-Szczerba, Medicine and MMI, received $159,000 for “Characterization of the Evolutionarily Conserved Enzymatic Functions of Complement Factor I (CFI) and its Impact on Maternal Health” from the Howard Hughes Medical Institute.          

Wafik S. El-Deiry, Pathology and Laboratory Medicine, received $861,300 for “Characterization of MTAP-deleted and wild-type urothelial carcinomas and development of organoids from fresh specimens from MTAP-deleted urothelial carcinoma for drug screens” from the AstraZeneca International.             

Michael J. Frank, Cognitive and Psychological Sciences, Stephanie Jones, Neuroscience, and Christopher Moore, Neuroscience, received $1,341,879 for “Training Program for Interactionist Cognitive Neuroscience (ICoN)” from the National Institute of Mental Health.

Richard N. Freiman, Molecular, Cellular Biology Biochemistry (MCB), received $2,270,997 for “Regulating Establishment of the Mammalian Ovarian Reserve” from the National Institute of Child Health and Human Development.    

Matthew Fuxjager, EEOB, received $450,000 for IRES: Neurobiological basis of elaborate display evolution in frogs endemic to the Asian tropics from the National Science Foundation.    

Anne C. Hart, Neuroscience, received $22,411 for “Characterization of C. elegans AHC ATP1A3 models” from the Alternating Hemiplegia of Childhood Foundation. Anne also received $22,411 for “Characterization of C. elegans AHC ATP1A3 models” from Cure AHC and $22,411 from HOPE for Annabel.             

Carson Hedberg, EEOB, received $335,777 for “Finding a future using the past: Woodland caribou ecology in a changing Arctic” from the National Science Foundation.

Sheldon L. Holder, Pathology and Human Behavior, received $35,000 for “A Novel Story-Telling Program to Improve Community Engagement with Diverse Communities” from the Bristol Myers Squibb Foundation.

Aleksandr T. Karnick, Psychiatry and Human Behavior, received $166,040 for “Cannabis use, trauma, and self-regulatory cognitive processes: A multimodal study integrating biobehavioral markers and ecological assessment” from the National Institute on Drug Abuse. Sponsor is Leslie Brick.             

Karla Kaun, Neuroscience, received $769,794 for “Collaborative Research: NSF-BSF: State-dependent properties of co-transmitting neurons” from the National Science Foundation.                  

Zachary J. Kunicki, Psychiatry and Human Behavior, received $319,000 for “Defining rates of cognitive aging in adults with and without dementia using the CODA cohort” from the National Institute on Aging.

Anne Shee CC Lee, Pediatrics, received $2,084,130 for “Nutrition and Inflammation in Pregnancy: Impacts on Early Human Brain Development” from the National Institute of Child Health and Human Development.

Adam Levine, Emergency Medicine, received $141,331 for “Development of a Mobile Health Personalized Physiologic Analytics Tool for Pediatric Patients with Sepsis.” This is a subaward through Rhode Island Hospital from the Fogarty International Center.    

Diane Lipscombe, Neuroscience, received $83,306 for “Voltage-Gated Calcium Channels in Nociceptors and Mechanoreceptors” from the National Institute of Neurological Disorders and Stroke.                       

Sofia B. Lizarraga and Judy Liu, MCB, received $398,332 for “ASH1L mediated transcription networks in autism spectrum disorders – continuation” from the National Institute of Mental Health.       

Eric M. Morrow, Rich Jones, Qing Ouyang, Li Ma, and Kumar Gajendra, MCB, received $3,933,496 for “Pathogenic Mechanisms in Christianson Syndrome and NHE6-Related Disorders – continuation” from the National Institute of Neurological Disorders and Stroke.         

Nicola Neretti, MCB, received $50,250 for a SenNet Supplement - Consortium Benchmarking, a subaward through the University of Pittsburgh from the National Cancer Institute.

Sohini Ramachandran and Emilia Huerta-Sanchez, EEOB, received $1,648,080 for “Predoctoral Training Program in Biological Data Science at Brown University 2024-2029” from the National Institute of General Medical Sciences.           

Arthur R. Salomon, MCB, received $1,214,295 for the Acquisition of an Eclipse Tribrid Mass Spectrometer System to Advance Proteomics Research in Rhode Island from the NIH Office of the Director.                        

Carlos Giovanni Silva Garcia, MCB, received $148,000 for “Neuronal regulation of histone acetylation promotes longevity” from the American Federation for Aging Research.

James A Simmons, Neuroscience, received $275,000 “Cognitive Biosonar: Emulating perception and attention in wideband echolocation” from the Office of Naval Research.         

Maria Sullivan, Continuing Medical Education, received $5,000 for the “2024 RI Trans Health Conference” from the Rhode Island Foundation.

Kevin Turner, Neuroscience, received $224,868 for “Circadian control of the VTA: neural and BBB dynamics” from the National Institute of Neurological Disorders and Stroke. Sponsor is Christopher Moore.

Audrey R. Tyrka, Psychiatry and Human Behavior, received $239,551 for the COBRE for Stress, Trauma and Resilience (STAR) - Admin Core. The grant is a subaward through The Miriam Hospital from the National Institute of General Medical Sciences.

Gary M. Wessel, MCB, received $795,209 for Collaborative Research: EDGE FGT: In vivo and in vitro Tools for the Community of Echinoderm Researchers from the National Science Foundation.