The Chancellor’s Gap Fund provides opportunities for promising innovations discovered by University of Pittsburgh investigators to advance towards commercialization.
The program, administered by the Office of Innovation and Entrepreneurship (OIE), provides:
Funding for key technical/scientific milestones and business development milestones
Chancellor’s Gap Funds can be used for a variety of pre-commercialization activities, including technology de-risking, prototype optimization, consulting support, and market assessment or validation. Projects must be focused on advancing technologies towards tech transfer events and the use of innovations outside of the academic environment.
The program is intended to provide financial support that cannot be obtained from traditional sources of funding, including government funding agencies, foundations, or an investigator’s department or school.
The Chancellor’s Gap Fund does not support basic research.
Applicants are encouraged to engage with their licensing managers, the New Ventures team, and/or OIEP to identify “killer experiments” informed by industry and/or customer feedback that could be supported by the Gap Fund.
About the Chancellor’s Gap Fund
Awards from the Chancellor’s Gap Fund are granted in amounts of up to $75,000. Most awards will be in the range of $25,000 to $50,000.
Work should be completed within 12 months of the project start date. Applicants should ensure that the timeline is appropriate for the proposed milestones and that the resources are available to meet the Gap Fund requirements and timeline.
Funding is released according to a milestone-based plan developed in collaboration with OIE. Each project will have 2-4 quantifiable research and development milestones and 1-2 business development milestones.
Awardees are required to communicate and engage with OIE regularly to track project progress and to complete business development milestones. Communications include a project kickoff meeting, progress reports, update meetings, working sessions, and a final report.
Gap Awards should enable a tech transfer event within 1-2 years.
Desired outcomes of funded projects include:
Option or license of Pitt technology to an external company
Sponsored research from an external partner with the purpose of developing Pitt intellectual property for the external party to option or license
Impactful use of Pitt technology outside of the lab
While not required, applicants with support from an industry partner, venture capital group, entrepreneur, and/or OIE team member will receive priority review.
The Chancellor’s Gap Fund is open to Pitt faculty, postdocs, and students. Postdocs and students must identify a Pitt faculty member to serve as the PI.
Projects must support the further development or validation of intellectual property assigned to Pitt. An invention disclosure must be on file with the Innovation Institute prior to submitting a letter of interest (LOI).
Under certain circumstances, Gap Funds may be used to advance IP co-owned by Pitt and another institution. Investigators are encouraged to connect with their licensing manager regarding the ownership of their IP prior to submitting a LOI.
The Pitt technology must be unencumbered from other obligations that would prevent the University from moving forward with commercialization. The technology should be available for licensing to a Pitt LSC or external third party.
Projects with funding from another source to complete the same work are not eligible.
Letters of Interest (LOIs) are accepted on a rolling basis and are reviewed monthly. Potential projects are brought to the Chancellor’s Gap Fund by OIE licensing managers, New Ventures EIRs, and OIEP.
Projects are also solicited through formal requests for proposals (RFPs), with defined timelines and review of LOIs and full applications as described below.
Investigators with compelling LOIs that are a fit for the Gap Fund and OIE’s resources are invited to submit full applications.
LOIs and full applications are reviewed by OIE and the external advisory board. The advisory board consists of industry experts, investors, and experienced entrepreneurs.
Final technical/scientific and business development milestones are developed in collaboration with OIE.
Eligibility and fit for the Chancellor’s Gap Fund
Status of the intellectual property
Technology stage of development
Market opportunity Customer and/or industry feedback
Feasibility of the proposed project
Commercialization plan and anticipated outcomes
Team
Funds from the Chancellor’s Gap Fund should only be used for the activities outlined in the approved project plan and budget. Gap Funds may only be used for the direct costs of a project and should tie directly to specific project milestones. Non-faculty personnel costs will be considered, but it is preferred that personnel costs are limited.
Eligible expenses include:
Lab supplies, research animals, prototyping supplies, fabrication or manufacturing expenses, and trial costs,
Postdoc, student, and technician salaries
Consultants, CROs, and service providers. All providers are required to assign IP rights to the University prior to beginning work.
With prior approval from OIE, travel costs related directly to meeting an approved milestone.
Ineligible expenses include:
Overhead/indirect costs
Faculty salaries
Tuition
Travel
Capital and computer equipment
Publication costs
2024 Spring Request for Proposals Key Dates
Round 1 Letter of Interest Deadline: March 24, 2024
Round 2 Full Application Deadline (invitation only): April 28, 2024
Anticipated Notification to Awardees: June 7, 2024
Past Awardees of Chancellor’s Gap Funds
“Novel Low-Profile Fully Retrievable Foldable Epidural Lead Array (FELLA) System”
Principal Investigators:
Gaurav Chauhan, Assistant Professor, Department of Anesthesiology and Perioperative Medicine Trent Emerick, Associate Professor, Department of Anesthesiology and Perioperative Medicine
This project is aimed at developing a new spinal cord stimulation device for controlling chronic pain that eliminates the need for a more invasive surgery to insert the stimulator leads. Current implantation techniques may require a surgery known as a laminectomy and a larger incision that can result in a higher risks of complications including bleeding, nerve damage, and spine instability.
“A Novel Human Full Thickness Ski Perfusion Platform for Disease Modeling and Drug Discovery”
Principal Investigator:
Asim Ejaz, Assistant Professor, Department of Plastic Surgery
There currently is no reliable model system having a physiological and anatomical resemblance to human skin that can be used for studying the mechanism of skin related pathologies (radiation/chemical wound/fibrosis, allergies, aging, UV effects, melanoma and other skin cancers) and test therapeutics. Dr. Ejaz has developed a system that utilizes surgical tissues that can be kept viable for up to three weeks or longer.
“Prosthesis-Compatible Vibration Therapy for Phantom Limb Pain”
Principal Investigator:
Goeran Fiedler, Assosicate Professor, Department of Rehabilitation Science and Technology
A majority of people with limb loss suffer from phantom limb sensations or even phantom limb pain. Opioids have shown some effectiveness but come with severe side effects. This project introduces vibration therapy to preoccupy the nerve pathways that would transfer the errant pain signals to the brain, thus preventing the broken feedback loop that is believed to play a role in the dynamics of phantom limb pain episodes.
“ScOAPe- A Self-Cleaning Attachment for Nasal Endoscopes”
Principal Investigators:
Rohit Mantena, student, Pitt School of Medicine Kamil Nowicki, resident, Department of Neurological Surgery Adi Mittal, student, Pitt School of Medicine Michael McDowell, Assistant Professor, Department of Neurological Surgery
A nasal endoscope is a surgical tool with a camera and light at its tip, used during sinus and skull base tumor removal surgeries. During surgery, debris such as blood and mucus accumulates on the lens, blocking the view, which requires removal, cleaning and reinsertion of the lens each time visualization is lost. Dr. Mantena and colleagues are developing, ScOAPe, a self-cleaning endoscope attachment that will decrease surgical time, and therefore money, while reducing surgical errors.
This team is seeking to identify and develop compounds to treat osteoporosis and mineral ion disorders such as hypercalcemia, hyperparathyroidism. The technology has been published in Nature Chemical Biology and has a patent pending. The funding will assist in selecting the best compounds for further development through in vitro pharmacological characterization, efficacy and potency optimization of the selected molecules, and validation of the optimized compound in native cells.
“Small Molecule Inhibitor/Degrader of BCL11a for the Treatment of Sickle Cell Disease”
The team is working to identify a small molecule that inhibits the function of BCL11a, which has been demonstrated to increase production of fetal hemoglobin in people suffering from sickle cell disease leading to a resolution of their symptoms. The funding will be used to validate the affinity of hit molecules for action against BCL11a and to evaluate their characteristics.
“Engineered Fatty Acids for Treating Chronic Liver Disease”
Principal Investigators:
Francisco Schopfer, Associate Professor, Pharmacology & Chemical Biology;
Fei Chang, Research instructor, Pharmacology & Chemical Biology
The PIs are developing structurally engineered fatty acids to treat metabolic disorders and their underlying inflammatory conditions. Non-alcoholic steatohepatitis (NASH), their primary indication, is the leading cause of liver disease with no FDA-approved treatment options. The team’s lead candidate, FA-1101, showed promising anti-NASH effects in rodent models by modulating key enzymes in lipid metabolism. The funding will be used toward conducting proof-of-concept experiments to confirm the biological targets for the lead molecule.
“Development of a Novel Lead for the Chemical Modulation of Kv7 Potassium Channels”
Dr. Wipf’s lab is seeking to develop a new class of small molecules for engaging potassium ion channels that have potential therapeutic benefit for a wide variety of diseases, such as epilepsy, diabetes, tinnitus, neurodegeneration, and pain. These would represent an improvement over an initial class of drugs that were approved but eventually removed from the market due to significant side effects. Dr. Wipf plans to focus on early-stage clinical development of a new lead compound for epilepsy, and noise-induced tinnitus in collaboration with the Pitt Hearing Research Center.
“Reusable and Self-sterilizing 3D Printed HEPA Metal Filters”
Markus Chmielus, Assistant Professor, Mechanical Engineering and Materials Science
Development of a 3D printed porous metal filter that can be reused, sterilizes itself, is easily recyclable, and can be adapted to various filtration needs, from personal protection in masks, to room-based air filtration or large HVAC systems.
“PACE-RTP: Perception-Action Coupling Evaluation for Return To Play”
Chris Connaboy, Assistant Professor, Sports Medicine and Nutrition
Many sports have introduced concussion diagnosis protocols. This project aims to reduce assessment time to between 2-5 minutes from the current period of 15 minutes.
” YouBiotics: Personalized Probiotics for Weight Management
Steven Little, Distinguished Professor, Chemical Engineering
This project seeks to help people manage weight by engineering their own microbiota to consume fat and re-administers the engineered bacteria as a probiotic supplement.
“LiDIA: Listening iDentification and Instant Amplification”
Catherine Palmer, Professor, Communication Science and Disorders
LiDIA directly addresses the main limitations of current hearing screening and amplification techniques. Instead of using an expensive set of calibrated headphones, the screening takes place with a set of inexpensive headphones that can be left on the user for immediate amplification purposes, and the screening may take place in noisy environments.
Vanish Therapeutics, Inc. ‑ Biodegradable Nerve Stimulator
Principal Investigators
Trent Emerick, Department of Anesthesiology and Perioperative Medicine; Tracy Cui, Department of Bioengineering; Raj Kubendran, PhD, Department of Electrical and Computer Engineering
A biodegradable nerve stimulator to treat acute and chronic pain. The stimulator is an injectable wire that is placed under the skin near the nerve of interest using ultrasound. The device does not require an incision or surgery to be implanted and is considered minimally invasive. The electrical stimulation would produce a soothing vibration in the area of interest. The device degrades over 3-6 months, however ample evidence exists in the medical literature that shows that temporary nerve stimulation can lead to long term pain relief due to brain plasticity and central nervous system changes at the level of the spinal cord.
Currently, many patients with refractory pain who have failed conservative therapies turn to permanent steel surgical stimulators as an option. These devices are costly and have an overall complication rate of 30-40%. These steel stimulators require surgery and an incision, which leads to higher health care costs from surgery/anesthesia, and many other complications that a biodegradable lead avoids. Compliance is also an issue with the surgical devices.
A prototype of the biodegradable device has been developed. The Gap Fund award will be used to develop a pain model to test the biodegradable stimulator versus a control. Additionally, it will be used to develop the conceptual framework and prototype for the external battery pack and circuitry design. A company, Vanish Therapeutics, was spun out of the University.
TVI
Principal Investigators
Michael Schnetz , Assistant Professor of Anesthesiology; Aman Mahajan, Chair, Department of Anesthesiology and Perioperative Medicine
A clinical decision support, software application system for clinicians to more safely manage blood pressure levels during surgery that enhances the quality of care while reducing its cost. More than 70% of all surgical patients are exposed to low blood pressure, increasing the cost of care approximately $2.9 million per 10,000 patients. The TVI algorithm uses individual patient characteristics to generate personalized blood pressure parameters associated with lowest risk of low pressure events. This technology makes it possible for clinicians to identify and therapeutically target the safest blood pressures according to patients’ individual characteristics. The current standard of care is for low blood pressure events to be treated after they happen and have already inflicted damage to vital organ systems.
A prototype TVI software application has been created from more than $100,000 in early investment from the Coulter Program at the Swanson School of Engineering and the Department of Anesthesiology and Perioperative Medicine at UPMC. TVI software application has been vetted by UPMC and approved for implementation and clinical testing.
Universal SNAP-CAR T Cell Therapy
Principal Investigators
Primary: Jason Lohmueller, Assistant Professor, Departments of Surgery and Immunology;
Secondary: Alexander Deiters, Professor, Department of Chemistry
Chimeric antigen receptor (CAR) T cell therapy provides a personalized treatment for cancer that has led to remarkable long-lasting remissions in patients who previously had no other option. The extraordinary successes of CAR T therapy has led to the accelerated FDA approval of two therapies in 2017: Kymirah and Yescarta. To build on this current success the goal of the CAR T field is to treat other cancers using CAR T cells targeting different antigens to treat solid tumor patients, who are the majority of cancer patients.
The investigators have developed the SNAP “universal” CAR T cell platform technology, in which SNAP CAR T cells can be tailored to treat any tumor when combined with tumor-specific antibodies. Instead of directly recognizing a tumor cell, the SNAP CAR T cells have a receptor that binds to the benyzylguanine (BG) tag molecule attached to the co-administered tumor-targeting antibody. For therapy, the SNAP CAR T cells will be co-administered with one or more tagged antibodies targeting patient-specific tumor antigens. SNAP CAR T cells are a platform technology that can be combined with any tagged tumor-specific antibodies to potentially target many different tumor types, including both blood cancers and solid tumors.
The ultimate vision is that clinicians will perform diagnostic tests to determine what antigens are present on a patient’s tumor, and then decide what antibody or antibodies to co-administer along with the SNAP CAR T cells.
