In This Issue



• 2023 NYC RING Convocation November 14th
• ICTR Project on Disability Inclusive Research
• Einstein 2030 Seed Fund Application Available
• New Funding Opportunities

The 2023 NYC RING Convocation of Practices, an annual gathering of clinicians, researchers, and investigators from across our network of partner sites, will take place on Tuesday, November 14^th at the Price Center/Block Research Pavilion at Albert Einstein College of Medicine, featuring a keynote address from Dr. Rowena Dolor, MD, MHS, FACP. The poster session showcasing a wide variety of practice-based research and quality improvement activities is an excellent opportunity for NYC clinicians, researchers, and scholars to connect, share ideas, and discuss future collaboration. Click here to RSVP now.

The NIH recently designated people with disabilities (PWDs) as a population with health disparities. Adults with disabilities, especially those with developmental disabilities (PWDDs) have higher rates of diabetes, heart disease, GI diseases, obesity and other conditions. DDs span a continuum that includes ADHD, autism, cerebral palsy, Down syndrome, intellectual disability, and hearing/vison impairment. Further, this designation explicitly recognizes the intersectionality of disability with gender, racial group, class and sexual orientation. Our ICTR’s E project, Disability as Diversity: Reducing Researcher Roadblocks (D2/R3) applies translational science to reduce these roadblocks.

Dr. Karen Bonuck leads the D2/R3 project, which is a mixed-methods, PWDD-engaged study of researcher-level perceived barriers and capacity to conduct disability-inclusive research. It will develop and test an intervention, informed by Prosci’s ADKAR® model of change management. The team is partnering with nine other US sites with: Clinical and Translational Science Awards (CTSA), Intellectual and Developmental Disabilities Research Centers (IDDRCs) for basic/clinical research, and University Centers of Excellence in Developmental Disabilities (UCEDDs). To learn more about this project, click here.

Do you have an upcoming grant and would like to request a Letter of Support from the Institute for Clinical and Translational Research? The ICTR has created a portal where investigators can now submit a request for a Letter of Support. When filling out the request form make sure to have available your: 

• Research Funding Announcement (RFA) Number
• Submission Deadline
• Project Title
• Specific Aims (attachment)
• Listing of PI's & co-PI's
• Letter of Consideration Draft (if applicable)

Please join the D. Samuel Gottesman Library for its second annual Library Fest on Wednesday, October 18th from 3-6pm in the library. Some of the library's vendors/publishers will be on hand to show students, postdocs, and faculty how to get the most out of the library’s subscriptions to their products: ScienceDirect/Elsevier (Brian Smith), Ovid, Dynamed/EBSCO, PolicyMap, AccessMedicine, uCentral, and UpToDate. Librarians will be on hand to introduce/remind folks about other resources and services we provide. There will be snacks, swag, and raffle prizes. (To be included in the raffle, you have to visit all 7 vendors AND talk to one library staff member.) This event is for students, postdocs, faculty, and staff. To learn more, click here.

One new initiative funded by the recent $100 million anonymous gift to Einstein is the establishment of the Einstein 2030 Seed Fund.This fund will provide about $700,000/year to support studies by investigators that will enable them to generate the critical data and proof of concept studies that will serve as a pathway toward NIH funding.  

While preference will be given to funding early or mid-career faculty, these seed funds are available to all Einstein principal investigators engaged in basic research to be utilized to support start-up efforts and new lines of research that show significant promise. The individual awards will range from $50,000-$150,000, with funding at the $150,000 level reserved for outstanding projects with well-justified budgets. Investigators can include funding for their effort on the project and these awards may be renewable based on strong evidence of significant progress. 

The primary purpose of the Einstein 2030 Seed Fund is to support basic science research with potential translational applications and to bring discoveries to their next phase of evidence-based findings that will generate funding from NIH or other external sources. Review criteria used during the review process will be based on the reviewers’ assessment of the likelihood for the project to have a high impact and powerful influence on the research field(s) involved and strong potential for the proposed studies to generate results that will support the submission of a research project that will ultimately be funded by the NIH. 

Eligibility: Applicants must be tenure-track faculty members holding the rank of Assistant Professor or higher. 

For review of your application by Einstein’s Awards Committee, click here. Applications are due November 15th, 2023.

Einstein-Montefiore has been invited to submit 3 nominations (one in each disciplinary category of Life Sciences, Physical Sciences & Engineering, and Chemical Sciences) to the 2024 Blavatnik National Awards for Young Scientists. Please find full details of candidate eligibility and evaluation in the Blavatnik National Awards Nomination Guidelines. One winner in each category will be awarded $250,000 unrestricted funds. To learn eligibility of the applicants and how to apply, please click here.

The deadline for submission of preliminary applications for internal review by the Awards Committee is 5 pm, Tuesday, October 24^th, 2023.  

Our institution has been invited to submit two applications for the 2024 Gordon and Betty Moore Inventor Fellows Program. The Moore Inventor Fellowship supports early-career scientist-inventors who create new tools and technologies with a high potential to accelerate progress in the foundation’s three main areas of interest: Scientific research, Environmental conservation, and Patient care. The Moore Foundation recognizes a broad array of academic programs. Examples of such programs include, but are not limited to, environmental science and conservation, remote sensing, artificial intelligence, big data, climatology, emerging infectious diseases, oceanography, biology, engineering, physics, chemistry, materials science, neuroscience, and public health. They focus on supporting scientist-inventors at a critical prototyping stage of their innovations to support their work in ways that might be missed in the current research and development system. Each fellow will receive $200,000 per year from the foundation for three years. In addition, the foundation will provide the host institution with $25,000 each year to cover costs associated with administering the grant, resulting in a total three-year award of $675,000. Also, as required by the Foundation guidelines, the College will commit to ensuring that the nominee has at least 25 percent of their time to devote to their invention and $50,000 per year in direct support of the inventor’s work. This can be “in kind” as released time or access to special facilities for which there is normally a charge.  

The deadline for submission of preliminary applications for internal review by the Awards Committee is 5 pm, Monday October 30^th, 2023.  To learn eligibility of applicants and how to apply, click here.

The ICTR would like to congratulate two of its faculty members on their promotions:

Michal Melamed MD has been promoted to Associate Chief for Research in Nephrology

Kevin Fiori MD, MPH, MS, is now the Vice Chair for Community Health & Engagement in the Department of Pediatrics and inaugural Chief of the Division of Community and Population Health

Montefiore Einstein investigators continue to succeed in obtaining funding. Some of these investigators with new grant awards are (from left to right):

Lynn Holden MD, Professor, Department of Emergency Medicine, Juan Robles MD, Associate Professor, Department of Family and Social Medicine, Michal Melamed MD, Professor, Departments of Medicine (Nephrology), Pediatrics (Pediatric Nephrology), Epidemiology & Population Health (Epidemiology), Robert Kaplan PhD, Professor, Department of Epidemiology & Population Health, Robert Burk MD, Professor, Departments of Pediatrics (Pediatric Genetic Medicine), Microbiology & Immunology, Obstetrics & Gynecology and Women's Health (Gynecological Oncology), Epidemiology & Population Health (Epidemiology), Lucas Sjulson MD, PhD, Assistant Professor, Departments of Psychiatry and Behavioral Sciences and Neuroscience.

• Damara Gutnick and Cara Stephenson-Hunter on building community trust in research
• Joel Friedman and Chaim Putterman on treatment for lupus affecting the skin
• Cara Stephenson-Hunter on disparities in diabetes prevention referrals
• Mamta Fuloria and Maureen Charron on effects of COVID-19 related stress on families

The Block Institute for Clinical and Translational Research (ICTR) is part of the Clinical and Translational Science Award (CTSA) program funded by the National Center for Advancing Translational Sciences (NCATS) at the National Institutes of Health (NIH). Cite NIH funding in manuscripts, press releases, and other communication forums. All publications, press releases, or other documents that result from the utilization of any Einstein Montefiore CTSA resource are required to credit the CTSA grant and comply with NIH Public Access Policy (submission to PubMed Central). To learn more, click here.