{"id":2322,"date":"2026-04-30T11:51:01","date_gmt":"2026-04-30T16:51:01","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/uwm.edu\/drug-discovery\/?p=2322"},"modified":"2026-04-30T11:51:03","modified_gmt":"2026-04-30T16:51:03","slug":"midd-members-receive-several-faculty-industry-partnership-seed-grants","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/uwm.edu\/drug-discovery\/midd-members-receive-several-faculty-industry-partnership-seed-grants\/","title":{"rendered":"MIDD members receive several Faculty-Industry Partnership Seed Grants"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">The University of Wisconsin Milwaukee introduced a new internal grant program (FIPS) to foster faculty-industry relationships by supporting bold and translational ideas to lay the groundwork for impactful, externally funded collaborations. For this purpose, 19 internal grants were selected for funding by the <a href=\"https:\/\/uwm.edu\/officeofresearch\/\">UWM Office of Research<\/a>. Several MIDD members were among recipients.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\"><strong><a href=\"https:\/\/uwm.edu\/drug-discovery\/directory\/yang-ching-hong\/\">Ching-Hong Yang<\/a><\/strong>, Distinguished Professor, Department of Biological Sciences:  Commercialization of RejuPrime: A Novel Biostimulant for Enhancing Crop Resilience to Abiotic Stress<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">This project establishes a multidisciplinary partnership between the University of Wisconsin\u2013Milwaukee and agrobiotech companies to transition RejuPrime, a novel, patent-pending natural plant biostimulant, to the commercial market. RejuPrime is a natural metabolite produced by a <em>Pseudomonas<\/em> species that enhances plant growth and increases tolerance to abiotic stress at low concentrations. The collaboration focuses on proof-of-concept efficacy studies and the critical regulatory and marketing groundwork needed for a successful commercial launch.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\"><strong><a href=\"https:\/\/uwm.edu\/drug-discovery\/directory\/arnold-alexander-leggy\/\">Alexander (Leggy) Arnold<\/a><\/strong>, Professor, Department of Chemistry &amp; Biochemistry: Independent Functional and Physicochemical Benchmarking of Sustainable EcoFizz\u2122 Detergents as Alternatives to Tween-20 and Brij Surfactants.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">This collaborative project between <a href=\"https:\/\/www.thermofisher.com\/us\/en\/home.html\">Thermo Fisher Scientific<\/a> and the Arnold Group seeks to conduct an independent, data-driven evaluation of novel EcoFizz\u2122 detergent candidates designed to preserve functional performance while improving sustainability and regulatory alignment. The project integrates academic analytical rigor with translational industry objectives.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\"><strong><a href=\"https:\/\/uwm.edu\/drug-discovery\/directory\/cheng-qingsu\/\">Qingsu Cheng<\/a><\/strong>, Assistant Professor, Department of Biomedical Engineering: Scalable Automation for Organoid-Based Cancer Research<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Patient\u2011derived cancer organoids recapitulate the tumor microenvironment, but their high\u2011throughput utility remains limited by labor\u2011intensive manual procedures that introduce stochastic variability. To overcome this limitation, this project aims to develop a modular, robotic workflow that standardizes organoid handling and eliminates operator\u2011dependent variability. This system-engineering approach transforms traditionally variable biological protocols into reproducible, automated unit operations.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\"><strong><a href=\"https:\/\/uwm.edu\/drug-discovery\/directory\/premnath-priyatha\/\">Priyatha Premnath<\/a><\/strong>, Assistant Professor, Department of Biomedical Engineering, and <strong><a href=\"https:\/\/uwm.edu\/drug-discovery\/directory\/gopalakrishnan-sandeep\/\">Sandeep Gopalakrishnan<\/a><\/strong>, Associate Professor, Biomedical Sciences: Engineering of Selective p21 Inhibition with Radical Scavenging Hydrogel Matrices: A Strategic Academic-Industrial Partnership for Regenerative Wound Therapy<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">This multidisciplinary collaboration between University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee and RxOS Medical integrates expertise in biomedical engineering and wound biology in scavenger hydrogel formulations to develop a novel therapeutic modality for chronic, non-healing wounds. The strategy involved repurposing of known compound to optimized high specificity for p21 protein attenuation without the associated off-target kinase inhibition.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\"><strong><a href=\"https:\/\/uwm.edu\/drug-discovery\/directory\/dey-madhusudan\/\">Madhusudan Dey<\/a><\/strong>, Professor, Department of Biological Sciences, <strong><a href=\"https:\/\/uwm.edu\/drug-discovery\/directory\/mirza-shama\/\">Shama Mirza<\/a><\/strong>, Professor, Chemistry and Biochemistry, and <strong><a href=\"https:\/\/uwm.edu\/drug-discovery\/directory\/skwor-troy\/\">Troy Skwor<\/a><\/strong>, Associate Professor, Biomedical Sciences: Antimicrobial Compounds from the Bacterium <em>Xenorhabdus szentirmaii<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">This collaboration with the <a href=\"https:\/\/www.mdgbio.com\/\">Microbial Discovery Group<\/a> focuses on the identification and development of new bacterium-derived antibiotics. New research has shown that the <em>Xenorhabdus<\/em> <em>szentirmaii<\/em> genome encodes multiple non-ribosomal peptide synthetases responsible to the generation of new compounds with antibiotic properties. The work focuses on the culture, purification and characterization of these novel agents.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\"><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>The University of Wisconsin Milwaukee introduced a new internal grant program (FIPS) to foster faculty-industry relationships by supporting bold and translational ideas to lay the groundwork for impactful, externally funded collaborations. For this purpose, 19 internal grants were selected for &hellip;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":396,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":"","uwm_wg_additional_authors":[]},"categories":[8],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-2322","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-news"],"uwm_unpublish_requested":false,"yoast_head":"<!-- This site is optimized with the Yoast SEO Premium plugin v28.1 (Yoast SEO v28.1) - https:\/\/yoast.com\/product\/yoast-seo-premium-wordpress\/ -->\n<title>Milwaukee Institute for Drug Discovery<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/uwm.edu\/drug-discovery\/midd-members-receive-several-faculty-industry-partnership-seed-grants\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"MIDD members receive several Faculty-Industry Partnership Seed Grants\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"The University of Wisconsin Milwaukee introduced a new internal grant program (FIPS) to foster faculty-industry relationships by supporting bold and translational ideas to lay the groundwork for impactful, externally funded collaborations. 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