Pelin Cengiz, MD, professor, Division of Critical Care, was awarded $99,999 from the Meriter Foundation. Her project, “A New Nonhuman Primate Preclinical Model to Test a Promising Therapy for Hypoxic Ischemic Encephalopathy: Bridging the Gap from Bench to Bedside,” will support development of a new lab-based model of newborn brain injury. The project uses hippocampal neurons from newborn rhesus macaques (a nonhuman primate whose brain development is closer to that of humans than are rodent models) to accelerate the discovery of treatments for neonatal hypoxic ischemic encephalopathy (HIE). HIE is a major cause of long-term disability, despite current cooling therapy. This grant will begin July 2026 and will continue for one year.