Rita Allen Foundation Announces 2021 Scholars
The Rita Allen Foundation has named its 2021 class of Rita Allen Foundation Scholars, celebrating five early-career leaders in the biomedical sciences whose research holds exceptional promise for revealing new pathways to advance human health. The selected Scholars will receive grants of up to $110,000 annually for a maximum of five years to conduct pioneering research in the fields of cancer, immunology, and neuroscience—including investigating the role of microglia in postnatal brain development and disorders, the ability of the innate immune system to provide protection against new infections, and how proteins maintain the stability of the genome.
“We welcome this class of remarkable scientists seeking novel solutions to complex problems at the frontier of biological knowledge,” said Elizabeth Good Christopherson, President and Chief Executive Officer of the Rita Allen Foundation. “As we are seeing the importance of decades of biomedical research in confronting the COVID-19 pandemic, the fundamental research these scientists are leading will lay the groundwork for tomorrow’s transformative medicine.”
Since 1976, the Rita Allen Foundation has invested in more than 190 biomedical scientists at the early stages of their careers, enabling them to pursue research directions with above-average risk and promise. Scholars have gone on to make fundamental contributions to biomedical research—including discoveries that have fueled gene therapy and gene editing, innovative treatments for cancer and neurological disorders, and new ways of studying neurons. They have won recognition including the Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine, the National Medal of Science, the Wolf Prize in Medicine, the Lasker-Koshland Award for Special Achievement in Medical Science, and the Breakthrough Prize in Life Sciences.
The 2021 Scholars were nominated by research institutions in the United States and selected by the Rita Allen Foundation’s Scientific Advisory Committee of leading scientists and clinicians.
The 2021 Rita Allen Foundation Award in Pain Scholars will be announced later this year.
The members of the 2021 class of Rita Allen Foundation Scholars are:
Joshua Modell, Johns Hopkins University (Milton E. Cassel Scholar)
Lucas Cheadle, Cold Spring Harbor Laboratory
Ellen Foxman, Yale University
Guosong Hong, Stanford University
Viviana Risca, The Rockefeller University