Happy New Year, Baltimore! We hope you had a wonderful and restorative end to 2023. For our first newsletter of 2024, we're highlighting an opportunity for the stem cell science-focused among you. 

In the 2023 fiscal year, 39 scientists affiliated with research institutions and companies in Maryland received grant awards totaling over $14.1 million. State-affiliated funder TEDCO administered these grants across five categories: Launch, Commercialization, Discovery, Post-Doctoral Fellowship and Manufacturing Assistance. 

According to the aforelinked release, by way of its funding, the TEDCO-affiliated Maryland Stem Cell Research Fund (MSCRF) and its accompanying commission helped address medical conditions ranging from cancer to bone, digestive and nervous system diseases.  

In FY23, MSCRF provided those monetary resources to companies engaged in the production of cell therapy products through human stem cell research. Notable awardees included scientists from institutions like Johns Hopkins University; University of Maryland, Baltimore County; University of Maryland, College Park; and University of Maryland, Baltimore. 

Those interested in applying for FY24 MSCRF funding can do so until Jan. 22. The seven categories, including two new supplements to the prior five, are defined as follows: 

• Clinical: For companies, universities and research institutions with an investigational new drug that might want to conduct human stem cell-based clinical trials in Maryland. A 1:1 match of non-state money is required. 
• Commercialization: For any Maryland-based established or startup companies to develop new human stem cell-based products.
• Validation: This pot of funds is for faculty at Maryland-based universities or research institutions that aren’t federal labs. For this, an applicant would need  induced pluripotent stem cells, or cells where a small number of genes have been introduced. 
• Launch: This funding is also for faculty who aren’t working in federal labs, but specifically for those new to the field of human stem cell research. Applicants cannot have previously benefited from any of the MSCRF programs.
• Discovery: For faculty at Maryland-based universities and non-federal research institutions with ideas to develop novel human stem cell-based technologies and cures.
• Post-Doctoral Fellowship: For recent post-doctoral fellows who might want to conduct human stem cell research in academia or industry in the State of Maryland. The applicant must have completed the doctoral degree within the past three years.
• Manufacturing: A 1:1 match is required for this grant, which is available to Maryland-based companies that wish to advance good manufacturing practice production of their stem cell therapy products.