University of California, Davis Receives Multicampus, Multidisciplinary Grants
Two UC funding programs recently awarded nearly $17 million to 29 multicampus, multidisciplinary projects, eight of them with UC Davis researchers as the lead principal investigators.
The bulk of the money, $16.4 million, went to Multicampus Research Programs and Initiatives, or MRPI, with UC announcing Jan. 9 that it had selected 21 projects for funding in 2023. UC Davis researchers are the lead PIs on four of the projects — on the topics of reproductive justice, quantum information, diabetic retinopathy screening in underserved populations and air quality in low-income communities of color — and are involved in 12 of the 21 projects overall.
The Center for Information Technology Research in the Interest of Society and the Banatao Institute, known as CITRIS, awarded seed grants of up to $60,000 each to eight projects for 2022, as announced Dec. 14. Half of the projects have UC Davis researchers as the lead PIs. One project will build a remote platform for the monitoring of patients with Alzheimer’s Disease, while the others seek to improve upon electric-powered heavy-duty construction equipment, to lessen carbon emissions; restore speech communication with a multimodal decoder-synthesizer; and build remote sensing tools to assess ecosystem resilience after wildfires. UC Davis researchers, including some with the UC Davis Natural Reserve System, are involved in six of the eight projects.
MRPI
The university’s grants for Multicampus Research Programs and Initiatives are awarded every two years through a highly competitive application process — this year’s 21 winning projects emerged from 96 applications. To be eligible, proposals must draw on multidisciplinary academic expertise from at least three campuses, thus leveraging the renowned research capabilities of the UC system to develop real world solutions to significant problems facing California and the world.
The university has awarded more than 120 MRPI grants totaling more than $155 million since 2009, involving more than 730 UC faculty members.
Many of the projects funded this year bring into sharp focus the overlap between climate change and health equity and prioritize research projects designed to benefit vulnerable or historically marginalized communities.
MRPI lead PIs Brittany Chambers, Marina Radulaski, Glenn Yiu and Clare Cannon, headshoys, UC Davis faculty
UC Davis’ 2023 MPRI lead PIs, from left: Brittany Chambers, Marina Radulaski, Glenn Yiu and Clare Cannon.
UC Davis participants are listed here, by project:
Advancing Knowledge and Reproductive Justice: The UC Community Research Hub — Brittany Chambers (lead PI), assistant professor, Department of Human Ecology, CA&ES; in partnership with UC Berkeley and UC San Francisco. Grant: $1.3 million. The project will take a participatory approach to authentically engage community members as researchers and partners.
CIRQIT: Collaborative Interdisciplinary Research in Quantum Information Topics — Marina Radulaski (lead PI), assistant professor, Department of Computer Science and Engineering, College of Engineering, in collaboration with UC Berkeley, UC Merced and UC Santa Cruz. Grant: $300,000. The project will contribute to the development of quantum internet and distributed quantum computing, while engaging a diverse group of students in education and hands-on research.
The Collaborative UC Teleophthalmology Initiative for Diabetic Retinopathy Screening — Glenn Yiu (lead PI), professor of ophthalmology, UC Davis Health, in partnership with medical centers at UC San Diego, UC San Francisco and UC Los Angeles. Grant: $2 million. The goal is to expand eye care access for diabetics, particularly in underserved populations, for early detection and treatment of eye conditions such as diabetic retinopathy, the leading cause of blindness in adults. The project will use digital medical equipment for teleophthalmology, or remote ophthalmology. Read more about Yiu’s project in this news release from UC Davis Health.
Toxic Air Pollutants in California Environmental Justice Communities — Clare Cannon (lead PI), assistant professor, Community and Regional Development, Department of Human Ecology, College of Agricultural and Environmental Sciences, collaborating with UC Davis’ Anthony Wexler, a distinguished professor in two engineering departments and the Department of Land, Air and Water Resources, CA&ES, and researchers from UC Irvine and UC Merced. Grant: $1.1 million. Wexler, co-PI on this proposal, received separate funding from the California Air Resources Board and the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency to develop relatively inexpensive instruments to measure toxic metals and volatile organic compounds in the air. The MRPI grant will support researchers in bringing these tools to low-income communities of color where concentrations of hazardous air pollutants tend to be highest, and collaborating with residents and government agencies on efforts to improve air quality.
UC Davis researchers also are involved in MRPI-funded projects dealing with anti-Asian violence, dust storms, green buildings and the use of satellites for efficient water use and yield forecasting.