Principal Investigator Pelin Cengiz, MD, professor, Division of Critical Care, was awarded a grant for $50,000 from the UnityPoint Health — Meriter Foundation to fund the project “Healthy Little Eyes.” Cengiz joins co-investigators Bikash Pattnaik, PhD, associate professor, Division of Neonatology and Newborn Nursery, and Ryan McAdams, MD, professor and division chief, Division of Neonatology and Newborn Nursery, and Division of Global Pediatrics, for the one-year project. Overall, the goal of this project is to institute novel techniques at birth to characterize eye function in order to diagnose and predict the outcomes of babies with hypoxic-ischemic encephalopathy (HIE). Cengiz’s team will utilize non-invasive handheld devices to examine the eyes of the babies during and after cooling to determine how retinal function correlates with the severity of HIE. The project began December 1, 2022, and will continue until January 1, 2024.