February 6, 2020 | Nancy Tyrrell
CBC Information Session at UIC about the CBC Accelerator and Catalyst Award programs — a recap
The Chicago Biomedical Consortium (CBC) hosted an information session focused on the Accelerator and Catalyst award programs. The event was held on Tuesday, January 14, in the Molecular Biology Research Building (MBRB) at the University of Illinois at Chicago (UIC).
Luisa DiPietro, CBC Scientific Director for UIC, opened the program by acknowledging and thanking Dr. Brenda Russell, the CBC’s first Scientific Director for UIC. Dr. DiPietro then welcomed over 50 attendees including faculty members and technology transfer officers from UIC’s Office of Technology Management (OTM).
Karen Snapp, CBC Senior Associate Director, who runs the Catalyst Award program, presented a slide deck highlighting the program, which provides funding of up to $250,000 for one- or two-year new inter-institutional collaborative research projects that address fundamental questions of biological and biomedical research that are high-risk/high-reward, innovative and transformative. Karen described the eligibility requirements for the program emphasizing that research proposals must have Co-Principal Investigators from at least two of the CBC universities. The next CBC Catalyst Award application submission deadline is set for February 21, 2020.
Next, Nancy Tyrrell, CBC Associate Director, Translational Activities spoke to the audience about the Accelerator Award. She described how the program supports translational research in its initial, and therefore, highest risk, stage of commercially-directed research focused on the development of a therapeutic or an associated biomarker or diagnostic. Nancy discussed also the eligibility requirements of the Accelerator Award program and the application process which includes a Letter of Intent, a live presentation at a Chicago Biomedical Consortium Accelerator Network (CBCAN) event and a full proposal submission. The Accelerator Award does not require an inter-institutional collaboration and provides up to $250,000 for a two-year award. Letters of Intent for the next round of applications for the Accelerator Award are due by March 6, 2020.
The CBC’s Entrepreneurial Fellows (EF), Eric Schiffhauer and Carissa Heath, wrapped up the slide presentation with a brief description of the EF Award program. Eric and Carissa were effective at moderating a panel discussion that included Accelerator awardees, Steve Ackerman (UIC) and Arnon Lavie (UIC), Catalyst Award winners, David Eddington (UIC) and Michael Caffrey (UIC) and technology transfer officers, Michael Moore (Northwestern’s INVO) and Hyunjin Kim (UIC OTM). The panelists shared their experiences about applying for the award programs and how the CBC awards were instrumental in moving their research forward. They also described how their interactions with the university technology transfer representatives were extremely beneficial during the application process.
Lunch was served at the conclusion of the information session allowing the panelists, CBC representatives and attendees to engage in networking and Q&A.
Enjoy a photo gallery of the event!
See more:
▸ UIC Information Session Slide Deck (PDF)
▸ Accelerator Award RFA
▸ Funded Accelerator Awards
▸ Catalyst Award RFA
▸ Funded Accelerator Awards
▸ Entrepreneurial Fellows (EF) Award Program
▸ Funded Entrepreneurial Fellows