The Rita Allen Foundation in Princeton, New Jersey, has announced its 2023 class of Rita Allen Foundation Scholars. 

The annual program recognizes early-career leaders in the biomedical sciences whose research has the potential to reveal new pathways to advance human health. This year, nine scholars were awarded grants of up to $110,000 annually for a maximum of five years to conduct pioneering research in the fields of cancer, immunology, pain, and neuroscience—including gene expression regulation and dysregulation in cancers; the role of a distinctive brain structure, the choroid plexus, in supporting brain health; and the impact of autoantibodies in advancing pain in complicated diseases such as fibromyalgia. Two researchers selected for the awards in pain are supported by the foundation and two are supported by Margaret and William R. Hearst III.

The 2023 Rita Allen Scholars are Lucas Farnung (Harvard Medical School), Victoria Abraira (Rutgers University), Seungwon (Sebastian) Choi (University of Texas Southwestern Medical Center), Neil Dani (Vanderbilt University), Jesse Dixon (Salk Institute for Biological Studies), Emerson Krock (McGill University), Nicole M. Martinez (Stanford University), William Renthal (Brigham and Women’s Hospital, Harvard Medical School), and Hongying (Hoy) Shen (Yale University). 

“The scientists selected to join the Class of 2023 are asking bold questions and pioneering new approaches to understand the body’s vast and vital processes—research that informs strategies to prevent and treat diseases,” said Rita Allen Foundation president and CEO Elizabeth Good Christopherson. “We are especially pleased that Margaret and William R. Hearst III are making more opportunities possible with their support of early-career scholars engaged in pioneering research on the mechanisms of pain—advancing critical discovery science to provide deeply needed options for relief.” 

(Photo credit: Getty Images/skynesher)