Cornell University: Riney Canine Health Center awards $1.3M for new research

The Cornell Margaret and Richard Riney Canine Health Center (RCHC) recently awarded more than $1.26 million to fuel seven internal research studies led by faculty across the College of Veterinary Medicine. While advancing the understanding of canine diseases, these two-year projects will also explore new avenues for diagnosing chronic pain and develop new models for testing therapies catered to dogs’ immune systems.

“Our goal is to create a significant and sustainable source of funds to support canine research using a rigorous and efficient peer-reviewed process. This reduces the amount of time researchers need to spend writing grant proposals and allows them to focus on what they do best — pursuing innovative research to help dogs,” says David E. Lee ’88, D.V.M. ’94, M.B.A. ’99, the associate dean for external programs, RCHC interim director and director of the Center for Veterinary Business and Entrepreneurship.

The annual RCHC internal grants program provides support for a wide range of canine health studies, including issues that span aging, behavior, cancer biology, genetics and genomics, infectious diseases, immunology and nutrition. This funding can be used for any phase of the research pipeline, as the RCHC intentionally helps close the gap between basic discoveries, exploratory work, and translational and clinical research.