MADISON — A protein that could regenerate heart tissue and a new treatment for diabetes and obesity have taken top honors from WARF.
The first 2023 WARF Innovation Award has been given to the University of Wisconsin-Madison’s Ahmed Mahmoud, assistant professor of cell and regenerative biology; Timothy Kamp, professor of cardiology; and Youngsook Lee, associate professor of cell and regenerative biology; for their work, Regenerating and Renewing Heart Tissue.
The team discovered a protein, LRRC10, that activates heart renewal and regeneration in animal models. This discovery could lead to a therapeutic that restores cardiac structure and function in human heart failure patients.
The other winning team includes Samuel Gellman, professor of chemistry; postdoc Kyle Brown and graduate student Rylie Morris for their work, Potent New Drug for Type 2 Diabetes, Obesity.
With the commercial success of two well-known brands, pharmaceutical companies have an intense interest in additional therapeutics for the treatment of both obesity and type 2 diabetes. This team of chemists developed a synthetic peptide that uses a more simplified design to target the same mechanisms of the drugs currently on the market.
An independent panel of judges selected the winners from a field of six finalists drawn from several hundred invention disclosures submitted to WARF over the prior 12 months. The winning teams each receive an award of $10,000, with the funds going to the named UW-Madison inventors.
“Every year, our Innovation Awards cast a spotlight on exciting early-stage discoveries on campus,” says Erik Iverson, CEO of WARF. “We’re pleased to celebrate the nominees and all UW-Madison innovators working to discover and translate research with the power to impact lives.”
The other 2023 WARF Innovation Award finalists are:
New Therapeutic for Glioblastoma, the Most Lethal Form of Brain Cancer
•Mahua Dey (Neurological Surgery)
•Jacques Galipeau (Hematology-Oncology)
Novel Alloy Better Protects Jets at High Speeds, Temperature
•Dan Thoma (Materials Science and Engineering)
•Michael Niezgoda (Materials Science and Engineering)
Eavesdropping on Insects to Better Protect Crops from Infestations
•Emily Bick (Entomology)
Enhanced Valley Splitting in Silicon-Based Quantum Hardware
•Benjamin Woods (Physics)
•Mark Friesen (Physics)
•Mark Eriksson (Physics)
•Robert Joynt (Physics)
•Emily Joseph (Physics)
About WARF
Incorporated as a nonprofit foundation in 1925, WARF has a founding purpose “to promote, encourage, and aid scientific investigation and research at and within the University of Wisconsin-Madison.” Over 98 years the foundation has funded more than $4.4 billion in cumulative research grants to UW-Madison and the Morgridge Institute for Research (adjusted for inflation), has been issued more than 4,200 patents (with 2,200 active patents), generates an additional 375 invention disclosures and 55 revenue-generating licenses each year, and has helped create 190 startup companies based on UW-Madison technologies. For more information, visit warf.org and watch a video about how WARF stewards the Cycle of Innovation.
