The Taking Flight Award (1.5 years / $125,000) seeks to promote the careers of early-career investigators to allow them to develop an independent research focus.
2026 Taking Flight Awardees
Patrick Davis, MD, PhD, Boston Children’s Hospital
By uncovering how the brain responds to different levels of stimulation, this research could help make neurostimulation more personalized, leading to better seizure control and reducing the need for trial-and-error treatment approaches.
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Federico Moro, PhD, Mario Negri Institute for Pharmacological Research
This project will test whether a treatment that lowers GFAP levels can reduce these harmful changes and help prevent epilepsy from developing or make it less severe. By focusing on this critical period before seizures start, the research could lead to a new way to prevent epilepsy after a traumatic brain injury.
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Justin Ryan, PhD, SUNY Upstate Medical University
Dr. Ryan will use mathematics and artificial intelligence to estimate breathing patterns from heart recordings that are routinely collected in EMUs. His team will be able to study breathing changes before, during, and between seizures in many more patients than was previously possible. The findings could lead to new heart biomarkers to help identify people at higher risk of SUDEP.
Learn MoreThank you to our generous supporters for making these awards possible. To be a part of the next wave of innovative epilepsy science, donate to CURE Epilepsy here.
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