Updates from the Office of the SVPR
Second Fall Research Symposium
Following last year’s success, our office hosted the 2nd annual Fall Research Symposium this year on October 18th. The day was fun and engaging for the entire Downstate community, and we were happy to see attendance from faculty and students across schools.
In our morning session, we heard 9 research talks from our 2022 and 2023 Seed grant awardees. In 10 minutes, they described the progress on their research projects thus far and potential applications of their research for the future. Each talk was followed by a highly engaged Q&A with the audience.
After lunch, we transitioned to the Trainee Research Slam. We had 10 trainees compete back-to-back, each with just 3-minutes on the clock.  We were happy to invite our judges from last year back again this year: Dean Allen Lewis (School of Health Professions), Dr. Miriam Feurerman (School of Graduate Studies and College of Medicine), Dr. Elka Jacobson-Dickman (College of Medicine), and Dr. Elizabeth Helzner (School of Public Health). The 4 judges voted on a first, second and third place winner. Additionally, all audience members received a ballot to vote for their favorite presentation for the “People’s Choice Award.” Monetary prizes were awarded for the top ranked participants ($500 for first, $350 for second, $250 for third, and $250 for “People’s Choice”). It was impressive to see the creative ways our trainees were able to present their research work in such a short amount of time, and the judging was tight!
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Congratulations to all our winners! Read more and view the winning presentations here.
Winners of the 2024 Research Slam​
Daniel Mishan (First), Charlotte Banayan (Second) and Riley Morrone (Third and People's Choice)
We held our 4th Annual Research Open Forum, an event in which our team presented updates and progress from the past year and answered questions from the research community, on December 5, 2024.
Initiatives from our office
We would like to remind the Downstate community of some of the initiatives we offer, as we continue to work to provide an environment to facilitate researchers' abilities to make discoveries. ​
Seed grants - We will not be offering seed grants this year. After four consecutive years of seed grant awards, we are pausing that initiative while we allow more time for the previously funded projects to mature and achieve extramural funding. We will continue to track their progress so that we can report back to all of you on the ROI of those awards and so that we can gauge the effectiveness of the program as we consider the possibility of future seed grant competitions.​
TriNetX - TriNetX has been integrated with Downstate systems to support investigators in advancing clinical research. Investigators can request access to TriNetX by emailing the Clinical Trials Office at ClinicalTrials@Downstate.edu. Our team will guide you through the onboarding process, including training and ongoing support to help you make the most of this valuable tool. For more information, please visit the Clinical Trials Office website. Dr. Jeremy Weedon, (biostatistician at Downstate) is also available to help investigators design and analyze studies using data from TriNetX.​
Shared Equipment - Recently added listing of shared equipment, their location and point of contact.
Pivot - a tool for faculty and students to provide curated access to funding opportunities, find collaborators, and more. Please take a few minutes to adopt your Downstate Pivot profile. Find information on creating a profile and using Pivot on our website. Pivot’s value increases for all of us as its utilization grows!
Grant Writing Support - two ways to assist with grant writing support. Faculty can request external consultants or request funds to compensate a mentor for their time and effort towards grant-writing help.
Research Support Services - Biostatistics support and scientific computing resource.