UC Irvine (UCI) Beall Applied Innovation recently hosted an awards reception recognizing the first cohort of Faculty Innovation Fellows.
The program was established to acknowledge UCI faculty members who have a record of translating their society-impacting research as well as to make them ambassadors for UCI’s innovation culture. As part of the two-year appointment, fellows receive a stipend and will work toward increasing engagement and excitement around innovation across the campus community, which includes acting as advisors and knowledge experts for entrepreneurs and others within the university.
“Having faculty innovators in individual schools to serve as ambassadors to help connect faculty across the university to Beall Applied Innovation and to each other holds the promise of amplifying the innovation signal way beyond our abilities at Applied Innovation,” said Richard Sudek, UCI chief innovation officer and executive director of Applied Innovation.
Following a few words from the Vice Chancellor for Research Pramod Khargonekar, David Tiemeier, managing director of the Research Translation Group at Applied Innovation, introduced Distinguished Professor of Biomedical Engineering Kyriacos Athanasiou for his keynote presentation.
Athanasiou shared highlights from his career as a faculty member who has continually engaged in research translation efforts, even pointing out his assessment of UCI being the institution of choice for faculty looking to commercialize their research.
“I did a lot of things related to innovation and entrepreneurship, so it’s not a hyperbole if I state very, very strongly that UCI has the best ecosystem for promoting the spectrum of innovation and entrepreneurship all the way to commercialization,” said Athanasiou. “The Cove played a catalytic role in our decision to join UCI.”
Afterwards, Tiemeier, along with Associate Provost and Executive Vice Chancellor Jeff Lefkoff, announced the 17 Faculty Innovation Fellows.
Here are the 2020-2021 Faculty Innovation Fellows:
• An Do, Assistant Professor, Department of Neurology |School of Medicine
• Aimee Edinger, Professor, Developmental and Cell Biology | School of Biological Sciences
• Sunil Gandhi, Associate Professor, Neurobiology and Behavior | School of Biological Sciences
• Douglas Granger, Director, Institute for Interdisciplinary Salivary Bioscience Research Chancellor’s Professor, Psychology and Social Behavior, Public Health and Pediatrics | School of Social Ecology
• Vijay Gurbaxani, Taco Bell Endowed Professor of Information Systems and Computer Science | Paul Merage School Business
• Payam Heydari, Professor, Electrical Engineering and Computer Science | Henry Samueli School of Engineering
• Jesse Jackson, Associate Professor, Department of Art | Claire Trevor School of Arts
• Arash Kheradvar, Professor, Biomedical Engineering | School of Medicine
• Mari Kimura, Professor, Department of Music | Claire Trevor School of Arts
• Abraham Lee, Professor, Biomedical Engineering | Henry Samueli School of Engineering
• Emre Neftci, Assistant Professor, Department of Cognitive Sciences | School of Social Sciences
• Amir Rahmani, Assistant Professor, Nursing, Computer Sciences | Schools of Nursing and Information and Computer Sciences
• Patricia Seed, Professor, Department of History | School of Humanities
• Shauhin Talesh, Professor, Law and Sociology, Criminology, Law & Society | School of Law
• Gregory Weiss, Professor, Chemistry, Molecular Biology and Biochemistry and Pharmaceutical Sciences | Schools of Physical Sciences and Biological Sciences
• Sean Young, Associate Professor, Departments of Information and Emergency Medicine and Informatics | Schools of Information and Computer Science and Medicine
• Weian Zhao, Associate Professor, Department of Pharmaceutical Sciences | School of Pharmaceutical Sciences
Learn more about Applied Innovation.
