Congratulations to research teams from the Woodruff Health Sciences Center (WHSC), and indeed across all of Emory, on another record-shattering year of research funding. Emory University achieved a new funding milestone of $944.5 million during FY2022. This extraordinary achievement breaks the institution’s previous record of $894.7 million last fiscal year and represents our first year exceeding $900 million. The units of the WHSC brought in $899.5 million—or 95 percent—of that record-breaking total. In the health sciences alone, that represents a phenomenal increase of more than $52 million over last year’s total, which was itself a new WHSC record.

This outstanding performance confirms what I’ve known since joining the Emory team and participating in the growth of this institution as a leading global research university. We have become one of the most collaborative, energetic, talented, industrious, resourceful, and successful research enterprises in the nation. This research has impact, saves and improves lives, and transforms the ways in which we prevent, detect, and treat disease.

Thanks to each of you for making this extraordinary achievement possible. I look forward to all that you will accomplish in FY2023 and beyond.

Please direct questions and comments to evphafeedback@emory.edu.

David S. Stephens, MD
Interim Executive Vice President for Health Affairs
Interim Executive Director of the Woodruff Health Sciences Center

A major feature of Emory’s new Health Sciences Research Building (HSRB) II is Lab2Launch, state-of-the-art laboratory space for start-up companies affiliated with Emory. The coworking environment is designed to support scientist-entrepreneurs in taking their discoveries from lab to market and to foster collaborations between scientists. Lab2Launch residents can get an assist in the former endeavor from Biolocity—a program within the joint Coulter Department of Biomedical Engineering that works with early-stage innovators across Emory and Georgia Tech through funding, project management, and consultation to help them commercialize their discoveries.

Lab2Launch is on HSRB II’s ground floor, dubbed the Raymond F. Schinazi Family Innovation Floor, as it was made possible by a generous gift from Schinazi. The floor will also feature a 3D printing and micromachining area, extended reality and artificial intelligence technologies, and seminar space. Also included within HSRB-II are several other core facilities that support research and development.

“In my experience, you need to create new companies to take discoveries from the laboratory to the clinic,” says Shinazi. “I believe that the modern tools and extensive resources available through the Innovation Floor will accelerate the ability of start-up companies to transform laboratory discoveries into drugs that prevent, treat, and ultimately cure life-threatening diseases.”

Lab2Launch, which is scheduled to occupy in early 2023, will be available to Emory scientists who already have a start-up company as well as to outside companies that hold licenses to and are commercializing Emory intellectual property. Applications will be open later this year. The laboratory has dry workstations with assigned desking, 48 benches, and three small private labs for companies in a later stage of development that need dedicated space.

“The space itself is amazing,” says Mike Cassidy, director, Emory Biomedical Catalyst, who has been involved in the development of the space. “Lab2Launch residents will have access to sophisticated core facilities that will be in HSRB II and are not typically available to start-up companies."

Lab2Launch is designed to be flexible. Scientists can just rent one lab bench if that is all they need to get started. This is a major benefit to start-up companies looking to be efficient with capital. “When start-ups are looking for incubator lab space, they often have to take a private laboratory that could be hundreds of square feet with many benches,” says Cassidy. “But a typical early-stage biomedical company often doesn’t need much more than a bench. This space is designed to let scientists bite off only what they can chew at the time, with the ability to take on more when they need to.”

Having many different scientists working shoulder-to-shoulder in a shared lab space is meant to build community and encourage collaboration. “The innovations they are working on may be very different, but they have many of the same challenges in bringing their discoveries to market,” says Harry Gerard, Lab2Launch manager and associate director of Biolocity. “The community nature of the space facilitates informal conversations that can, in turn, lead to partnerships and collaboration down the line.”

Biolocity will support the Lab2Launch space as well as offer its residents a variety of programs and services to support their efforts to commercialize their discoveries. Previously called the Coulter Translational Program, Biolocity has long worked with, and funded, early-stage innovators at Emory and Georgia Tech. “We work with researchers who are producing great science in the lab but may need some business expertise and support to secure intellectual property, which they can then either license or use to start their own company,” says Courtney Law, managing director of Biolocity. “Lab2Launch is a natural extension of that, providing a space for these researchers once they have formed a company.”

Louise Hecker toured the Lab2Launch space earlier this month. She says it’s just what she needs for the company she launched six months ago, PreClinico, which tests drug efficacy in sophisticated animal models. Hecker actually tried—unsuccessfully—to launch a company based on this concept a decade ago at a different university. “At that time, it was really challenging to figure out how to set up a company in an academic setting,” she says.

Now she sees the opportunity to make her company viable. “Emory values and promotes academic entrepreneurs,” she says. “This Lab2Launch space offers the resources we need in the way we need them in order to be successful. It’s great to have everyone moving in the right direction."

Scientist-entrepreneurs interested in learning more about the Lab2Launch space, including the application process, should contact Harry Gerard.

Thirty percent of Emory's current medical student population identifies as historically underrepresented in medicine (URiM). To address the unique needs of this group, the Office of Multicultural Affairs established the EMPACT program in 2019. With a recent gift from Barbara Williams 79M, the program received the long-term funding necessary to continue investing in addressing disparities and in expanding the future of medicine.

"There is no better area for me to direct my giving than toward the correction of the continuing inequities in health care for disadvantaged communities of color," explained Williams. "Those of us practicing medicine are acutely aware of not only the disparities in the delivery of good medical care but also in training physicians who can better deliver good care in an equitable way." Read more.

Rafi Ahmed, professor of microbiology and immunology, has been named a 2022 fellow of the Academy of Immuno-Oncology by the Society of Immunotherapy of Cancer

Brendan Lovasik, general surgery chief administrative resident, received the 20th annual American College of Surgeons Resident Award for Exemplary Teaching

Charles Staley, chief of the Division of Surgical Oncology, will serve a six-year term on the Complex General Surgical Oncology Board of the American Board of Surgery, and focus on defining the standards and expectations for formal certification of surgeons specializing in surgical oncology.

Cassandra Quave, medical ethnobotanist, received an inaugural Eric and Wendy Schmidt Award for Excellence in Science Communication by a Research Scientist. Read more.

Felipe Garcia Quiroz, a biomedical engineer, received a 2022 NIH Director’s New Innovator Award for his innovative molecular approaches to monitoring clumps of proteins associated with neurodegenerative diseases. Read more.