UC research funding grows in FY 2021

Top federal sponsors in FY 2021, which ended this summer, included the U.S. Department of Education, National Institute of Neurological Disorders and Stroke, National Heart, Lung and Blood Institute and the National Science Foundation. Local and state supporters include the Harold C. Schott Foundation, Talbert House, the Ohio Department of Transportation, Ohio Department of Youth Services and others.

In FY 2021, 250 nonprofit, government and industry sponsors supported more than 800 UC investigators and scholars.

Three researchers, who exemplify UC’s vision that Next Lives Here, were featured by the UC Office of Research. Read the full story from the Office of Research.

• Jennifer Brown, associate professor in UC’s Department of Psychology and Department of Psychiatry and Behavioral Neuroscience, has 11 active sponsored research projects, all associated with addressing health disparities in populations vulnerable to substance use, reproductive health issues and infectious diseases. One project is the HEALing Communities Study, which is testing an integrated community-based approach to the opioid crisis across the nation, with a goal to decrease opioid overdose deaths in targeted areas by 40 percent in three years.

• Hazem Said, director of UC’s School of Information Technology, has nine active sponsored awards. One of Said’s efforts is to address the shortage of cybersecurity professionals in the world today. During the next six years, UC will offer the CyberCorps Scholarship for Service program, which provides full scholarships to students earning cybersecurity-related degrees from UC who then go on to work in a government cybersecurity position. Students can pursue relevant degrees from the School of IT in the College of Education, Criminal Justice and Human Service; Department of Electrical Engineering and Computer Science in the College of Engineering and Applied Science; and the Department of Political Science in the College of Arts and Science. Chengcheng Li, associate professor, is principal investigator on the project, which was awarded $4 million from the National Science Foundation. 

• To combat the economic and human suffering that results from flooding, Lilit Yeghiazarian, professor of environmental engineering, has brought together a diverse team of experts to create the Urban Flooding Open Knowledge Network. With the backing of $6 million in grants from the National Science Foundation, the network merges previously disconnected data from across urban infrastructure systems — including transportation, communication, water, power, sewage and sanitation. The network connects data into a digital tool that can make the information easily available for emergency response during a flood and as a prevention and design tool for preparing for potential future floods.