{"411411":{"#nid":"411411","#data":{"type":"news","title":"Seeds of Collaboration","body":[{"value":"\u003Cp\u003EThree new teams of researchers are receiving a substantial boost for their early stage, interdisciplinary collaborative work, thanks to the Petit Institute Seed Grant Program.\u003Cbr \/\u003E\u003Cbr \/\u003EThe program committee is awarding two teams $50,000 a year for two years ($100,000 total), as well as a $25,000 grant for a third team to pursue further research into their topic.\u003Cbr \/\u003E\u003Cbr \/\u003EThe top awards went to Young C. Jang and Andr\u00e9s J. Garc\u00eda for their project entitled \u201cRejuvenation of aged skeletal muscle function by bio-functional hydrogel encapsulated stem cell transplantation,\u201d and to Christoph Fahrni and Craig Forest, whose project is called, \u201cElucidating the role of copper in the mammalian nervous system.\u201d\u003Cbr \/\u003E\u003Cbr \/\u003EThe third award went to Kostas Konstantinidis and Francesca Storici for their project, \u201cRibonucleotide incorporation into microbial DNA in the wild: profile, seasonal dynamics and role in adaptation to environmental perturbations.\u201d\u003Cbr \/\u003E\u003Cbr \/\u003EThese teams epitomize the goal of a seed grant program designed to stimulate new interdisciplinary research, especially between principal investigators (PIs) from the College of Sciences and College of Engineering who haven\u2019t previously worked together. So it brings together world-class researchers from diverse areas of expertise to work on projects with wide-ranging aims.\u003Cbr \/\u003E\u003Cbr \/\u003EFor example, Jang is an assistant professor in the School of Applied Physiology while Garc\u00eda is a Regents\u2019 professor in the Woodruff School of Mechanical Engineering. The outcomes of their work will serve as a vehicle for translating the basic sciences to the clinical setting, where engineered biomaterial will contribute to the treatment of traumatic muscle injuries, as well as degenerative muscle diseases, in an aging population.\u003Cbr \/\u003E\u003Cbr \/\u003EFahrni is a professor in the School of Chemistry and Biochemistry and Forest is associate professor in the Woodruff School. They hope to demonstrate the development and application of a suite of tools to enable more extensive research aimed at elucidating pathways and signaling functions of copper in neurodegenerative diseases. Then, they\u2019ll use the data from this project as a springboard to submit a BRAIN Initiative proposal next year.\u003Cbr \/\u003E\u003Cbr \/\u003EKonstantinidis, associate professor in the School of Civil and Environmental Engineering, and Storici, associate professor in the School of Biology, intend to use their award to discover new mechanisms in how the environment shapes the genome of its communities in the wild.\u003C\/p\u003E\u003Cp\u003E\u003Cstrong\u003ECONTACT:\u003C\/strong\u003E\u003C\/p\u003E\u003Cp\u003E\u003Ca href=\u0022http:\/\/hg.gatech.edu\/node\/jerry.grillo@ibb.gatech.edu\u0022\u003EJerry Grillo\u003C\/a\u003E\u003Cbr \/\u003ECommunications Officer II\u003Cbr \/\u003EParker H. Petit Institute for\u003Cbr \/\u003EBioengineering and Bioscience\u003C\/p\u003E","summary":null,"format":"limited_html"}],"field_subtitle":[{"value":"Petit Institute program awards new interdisciplinary research"}],"field_summary":[{"value":"\u003Cp\u003EPetit Institute program awards new interdisciplinary research\u003Cbr \/\u003E\u003Cbr \/\u003E\u003C\/p\u003E","format":"limited_html"}],"field_summary_sentence":[{"value":"Petit Institute program awards new interdisciplinary research"}],"uid":"28153","created_gmt":"2015-06-05 16:04:44","changed_gmt":"2016-10-08 03:18:29","author":"Jerry Grillo","boilerplate_text":"","field_publication":"","field_article_url":"","dateline":{"date":"2015-06-05T00:00:00-04:00","iso_date":"2015-06-05T00:00:00-04:00","tz":"America\/New_York"},"extras":[],"hg_media":{"411511":{"id":"411511","type":"image","title":"seed grant tree","body":null,"created":"1449254204","gmt_created":"2015-12-04 18:36:44","changed":"1475895142","gmt_changed":"2016-10-08 02:52:22","alt":"seed grant tree","file":{"fid":"202309","name":"bigstock-tree-3444336.jpg","image_path":"\/sites\/default\/files\/images\/bigstock-tree-3444336_0.jpg","image_full_path":"http:\/\/hg.gatech.edu\/\/sites\/default\/files\/images\/bigstock-tree-3444336_0.jpg","mime":"image\/jpeg","size":910861,"path_740":"http:\/\/hg.gatech.edu\/sites\/default\/files\/styles\/740xx_scale\/public\/images\/bigstock-tree-3444336_0.jpg?itok=i6ppQZHs"}}},"media_ids":["411511"],"groups":[{"id":"1292","name":"Parker H. Petit Institute for Bioengineering and Bioscience (IBB)"}],"categories":[],"keywords":[],"core_research_areas":[{"id":"39441","name":"Bioengineering and Bioscience"}],"news_room_topics":[],"event_categories":[],"invited_audience":[],"affiliations":[],"classification":[],"areas_of_expertise":[],"news_and_recent_appearances":[],"phone":[],"contact":[{"value":"\u003Cp\u003E\u003Ca href=\u0022http:\/\/hg.gatech.edu\/node\/jerry.grillo@ibb.gatech.edu\u0022\u003EJerry Grillo\u003C\/a\u003E\u003Cbr \/\u003ECommunications Officer II\u003Cbr \/\u003EParker H. Petit Institute for\u003Cbr \/\u003EBioengineering and Bioscience\u003C\/p\u003E","format":"limited_html"}],"email":["jerry.grillo@ibb.gatech.edu"],"slides":[],"orientation":[],"userdata":""}}}