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Eight Researchers Receive Postdoctoal Matching Funds

December 18, 2023

Eight Researchers Receive Postdoctoral Matching Funds

Eight University of Oklahoma faculty have received additional funding to support postdoctoral research and creative activities through the Office of the Vice President for Research and Partnership’s Match Program. This diverse group of researchers from six different OU schools, departments and colleges received a 25 percent match based on the postdoctoral's salary and fringe budgeted for in an externally funded grant for one year.

Selected through a multidisciplinary peer review process, these researchers are the lead principal investigators on external grants awarded or currently pending review in FY24. This program, which is now in its third year, continues to drive enhanced research project outcomes and increase the number of postdoctoral researchers at OU in alignment with the Research Strategic Framework and Lead On Strategic Plan.

The principal investigator award recipients are:

  • Daniel Becker, an assistant professor in the School of Biological Sciences, for one of two projects, “Genomic characterization of hemotropic mycoplasmas of bats in the Americas and their zoonotic potential” and “Interrogating stress and viral shedding in a migratory bat model,” pending review by the National Institutes of Health.
  • John Clegg, an assistant professor in the Stephenson School of Biomedical Engineering, for the project, “Enabled by drug delivery: Studying the role of brain-resident and brain-infiltrating myeloid cell phenotype in brain damage associated with inflammatory disease,” funded by the National Institutes of Health.
  • Jason Furtado, an associate professor in the School of Meteorology, for the project, “RII Track-1: Socially Sustainable Solutions for Water, Carbon, and Infrastructure Resilience in Oklahoma,” funded by the National Science Foundation.
  • Sarah George, an assistant professor in the School of Geosciences, for the project, “The birth of longitudinal rivers in orogenic systems,” funded by the National Science Foundation.
  • Courtney Hofman, a President’s Associates Presidential Professor in the Department of Anthropology, for the project, “Exploration of how historical climate events impacted pacific cod (Gadus macrocephalus) evolution and fishery use,” funded by the National Science Foundation.
  • Gilby Jepson, an assistant professor in the School of Geosciences, for the project, “Trace element control on apatite fission-track annealing and its impact on basin paleotemperature estimation,” funded by the American Chemical Society’s Petroleum Research Fund.
  • Robert Lewis-Swan, an assistant professor of atomic, molecular and optical physics in the Center for Quantum Research and Technology, for the project, “Engineering and classifying quantum dynamical phases of matter,” funded by the Air Force Office of Scientific Research.
  • Stefan Wilhelm, an associate professor in the Stephenson School of Biomedical Engineering, for the project, “A novel framework for nanomedicine development,” funded by the National Institutes of Health.

Find more information about this and other VPRP-led internal funding programs.