This year, the Maryland Stem Cell Research Commission awarded 21 of its 26 grants to Johns Hopkins researchers. The grants will support projects contributing to cures for a wide range of debilitating diseases and conditions, including heart failure, stroke, multiple sclerosis, vascular diseases, Parkinson’s disease, schizophrenia, autism spectrum disorders and cancer. In all, this year’s grants to researchers in Maryland will total more than $8 million.

 

“We were very impressed with the quality of the applications for these important research grants,” says Avram Reisner, chair of the Maryland Stem Cell Research Commission. “Each of these awardees represents one of the keys to the future of regenerative medicine.”

 

Researchers with promising preliminary data were awarded Investigator-Initiated Grants. Six researchers from the Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine are among this year’s recipients:

 

Warren Grayson, Ph.D., targeting volumetric muscle loss

 

Guo-li Ming, M.D., Ph.D., targeting schizophrenia and autism

 

Loyal Goff, Ph.D., targeting Kabuki syndrome

 

Sharon Gerecht, Ph.D., targeting diabetic wounds

 

Gordon Tomaselli, M.D., targeting myotonic muscular dystrophy

 

Michael McMahon, Ph.D., targeting intervertebral disc degeneration

 

Eight researchers from the Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine who are new to the stem cell field or proposed exploratory projects that have little or no preliminary data received the Exploratory Research Award:

 

Cynthia Berlinicke, Ph.D., for age-related macular degeneration

 

Cyrus Mintz, M.D., Ph.D., for neonatal hypoxic-ischemic brain injury

 

Enid Neptune, M.D., for bronchitis and fatal asthma

 

Vasilki Machairaki, Ph.D., for Alzheimer’s disease

 

Amy DeZern, M.D., M.H.S., for aplastic anemia

 

Giorgio Raimondi, Ph.D., M.Sc., for transplant rejection

 

Peter Calabresi, M.D., for multiple sclerosis

 

Kathryn Wagner, M.D., Ph.D., for muscular dystrophy

 

Seven trainees at Johns Hopkins were given Post-Doctoral Fellowship Awards:

 

Hyunhee Kim, Ph.D., for Parkinson’s disease

 

Miguel Flores-Bellver, Ph.D., for age-related macular degeneration

 

Wei Huang, Ph.D., for schizophrenia 

 

Ziyuan Guo, Ph.D., for neurofibromatosis type 1

 

Allison Bond, Ph.D., for schizophrenia 

 

Ji Suk Choi, Ph.D., for soft tissue defects and cancer

 

Dhruv Vig, Ph.D., for vascular diseases 

 

All Maryland Stem Cell Research Commission-funded research must be conducted in Maryland and must involve human stem cells. For more details, visit http://www.mscrf.org/content/awardees/2016Awardees.php