IBB bestows Hamill Innovation Awards

Rice’s Institute for Bioscience and Bioengineering (IBB) honored the Hamill Foundation for 30 years of support to Rice programs at the presentation of this year’s Hamill Innovation Awards at Keck Hall. From left, Executive Director Paul Cherukuri; IBB member Kathleen Matthews, Rice’s Stewart Memorial Professor of Biochemistry and Cell Biology; Tom Brown, grants director for the foundation; and Director Zachary Ball. Photo courtesy of the IBB

Rice faculty and Texas Medical Center collaborators earn grants to kick-start bio breakthroughs

Rice University’s Institute of Biosciences and Bioengineering (IBB) honored five teams of researchers with Hamill Innovation Awards Oct. 31 at Keck Hall.

The annual awards, in their 12th year, fund the initiation of collaborative research projects led by IBB faculty members at Rice. Collaborative research with the Texas Medical Center ties in with the goals of Rice’s Vision for the Second Century, part two.

Tom Brown, grants director for the Hamill Foundation, presented the awards and discussed the foundation’s 30-year history of support for the IBB.

“Trust is a big part of what we do,” Brown said. “We believe in leadership, management, mission and impact, and we know that Rice checks all those boxes.”

“In this era of declining resources, the ability to get seed funds from award programs is so important to build new research solutions,” said IBB Director Zachary Ball. “In addition to bringing us together today, the Hamill Foundation and awards they’ve created provide a pretty novel way to bring together researchers who wouldn’t communicate without the impetus that these awards create.”

This year’s honorees:

Junghae Suh and Peter Wolynes of Rice are developing a method based on energy-state modeling through a “frustratometer” to identify amino acid residues responsible for capsid structural changes in adeno-associated viruses (AAVs). These viruses show promise for antiviral therapeutics and gene therapies that use AAVs to deliver payloads. Suh is an associate professor of bioengineering. Wolynes is the D.R. Bullard-Welch Foundation Professor of Science and a professor of chemistry, biochemistry and cell biology, physics and astronomy and materials science and nanoengineering.

Ching-Hwa Kiang and Yizhi Jane Tao of Rice are developing an atomic-force microscopy method to understand the molecular mechanisms and dynamics of Orsay virus infection in Caenorhabditis elegans, worms that make up 80 percent of living creatures on the planet and an important model organism in studies of biological processes. Kiang is an associate professor of physics and astronomy. Tao is an associate professor of biochemistry and cell biology.

Marcia O’Malley of Rice and Qi Lin Cao of the University of Texas Health Science Center (UTHealth) plan to design, build and test a robotic manipulator for intensive therapy to the forelimbs of rodents that receive stem cell transfers after spinal cord injuries. The manipulator will provide accurate, programmable and repeatable motor training therapy the researchers hope will ultimately help humans. O’Malley is a professor of mechanical engineering and computer science. Cao is an associate professor in the Department of Neurosurgery and Center for Stem Cell and Regenerative Medicine.

Ashok Veeraraghavan and Ashutosh Sabharwal of Rice and James Suliburk of Baylor College of Medicine are developing PulseCam, a method to continuously monitor blood perfusion and tissue oxygenation at more than a single spot in the bodies of intensive-care patients. PulseCam will combine off-the-shelf cameras, lighting and a pulse oximeter in a noninvasive system to quantify blood flow just below a patient’s skin. Veeraraghavan is an associate professor of electrical and computer engineering. Sabharwal is a professor of electrical and computer engineering. Suliburk is an associate professor of surgery and chief of endocrine surgery.

Laura Segatori and Rafael Verduzco of Rice and Marco Sardiello of Baylor College of Medicine are developing a platform that uses nanoscale bottlebrush polymers to map physical and chemical relationships between engineered nanomaterials and the autophagy-lysosome system responsible for stabilizing cells. Segatori is an associate professor of chemical and biomolecular engineering, bioengineering and biochemistry and cell biology. Verduzco is an associate professor of chemical and biomolecular engineering and of materials science and nanoengineering. Sardiello is an assistant professor of developmental biology.