MIT HEALS Seed Grant Call for Applications

MIT HEALS Seed Grant Call for Applications is sponsored by MIT Health and Life Sciences Collaborative (MIT HEALS). This program provides seed funding to support collaborative projects at the cutting edge of health and life sciences with the goal of catalyzing new interactions, developing new technologies and methodologies, generating core datasets, and accelerating discovery.

MIT HEALS Seed Grant Call for Applications – MIT HEALS MIT HEALS Seed Grant Call for Applications 2026 – 2027 MIT HEALS Seed Grant Applications – Now Open MIT HEALS Seed Grants Junior Faculty Workshops ​​The MIT Health and Life Sciences Collaborative (MIT HEALS) is now accepting applications for Seed Grants.

This program will provide seed funding to support collaborative projects at the cutting edge of health and life sciences with the goal of catalyzing new interactions, developing new technologies and methodologies, generating core datasets, and accelerating discovery. The proposed work must touch on a key aspect of health and/or the life sciences, consistent with the core mission of HEALS.

We encourage proposals from across all Schools, the College, Departments, and units at MIT. These grants are particularly designed to support teams of researchers whose work crosses traditional disciplinary boundaries and integrates diverse approaches to develop bold, paradigm-shifting ideas.

Break conventional disciplinary silos and merge expertise from multiple fields Ask new and ambitious scientific questions—not just incremental advances, but entirely new ways of understanding health and life sciences Develop solutions to critical problems or bottlenecks where new approaches are needed Harness cutting-edge technologies, methodologies, or theoretical frameworks to transform a field Build new partnerships between collaborators who haven’t worked together before and aim to try out new, potentially risky ideas Push beyond traditional research constraints, particularly those that struggle to fit within standard grant mechanisms Create a framework to generate tangible preliminary findings towards obtaining long term external funding support Have the potential to transform health and life sciences We will consider applications in any research area that touches on health and life sciences.

MIT HEALS New Connections Program The MIT HEALS New Connections Program is designed to foster interdisciplinary dialogue and encourage the development of new research collaborations across the university. The goal of the program is to identify shared interests and initiate partnerships that could lead to seed grant proposals .

If approved, MIT HEALS will provide small sums of funding for the following conversation types: Coffee Chats: Let us buy you coffee! Have a one-on-one meeting with a faculty member from another department to make new connections and explore overlapping interests. Joint Group Meetings: Have a group discussion to bring together two research groups or labs, build a deeper connection, and identify potential collaborative projects.

We’ll cover the food — you focus on the research. Submission will be reviewed on a rolling basis and reimbursement details will be provided upon approval.

MIT HEALS Seed Grants Funded Projects September 2025 Mapping the Multi-Body Multi-Organ Dynamics of the Maternal-Fetal System Polina Golland (EECS), Polina Anikeeva (DMSE), Tal Cohen (CEE), Alan Jasanoff (BE), Xuanhe Zhao (MechE) RNA-Binding Proteins in Health and Disease Chris Burge (Biology), Ankur Jain (Biology), Angela Koehler (BE), Armando Solar-Lezama (EECS), Michael Yaffe (Biology) Mechanophore Hydrogels for Probing How Matrix Toughness Impacts Cellular Behaviors Jeremiah Johnson (Chemistry), Ming Guo (MechE) Transforming Ovarian Cancer Treatment Graham Walker (Biology), Paula Hammond (ChemE), Michael Hemann (Biology) Building a Bridge Between Cancer Biology and Neurodegeneration Michael Yaffe (Biology), Li-Huei Tsai (BCS) Cytoplasmic Delivery Shuttles for Designer Miniprotein Drugs Amy Keating (Biology), Ron Raines (Chemistry), Dane Wittrup (BE) A New Platform to Investigate Cancer Cachexia-Associated Muscle Wasting Matt Vander Heiden (Biology), Ritu Raman (MechE), Paul Blainey (BE) A Synthetic Biomimic Platform Against Ovarian Cancer Paula Hammond (ChemE), Angie Belcher (BE), Stefani Spranger (Biology) Elucidating How Proteostasis Networks Enable Oncogene Mutagenesis and Tumor Evolution Joey Davis (Biology), Francisco Sanchez-Rivera (Biology), Matt Shoulders (Chemistry) AI-Powered Integration of Static Multiplexed and Dynamic Label-Free Imaging to Map Immune Regulatory Circuits at the Tissue Scale Harikesh Wong (Biology), Sixian You (EECS), Hernandez Moura Silva (Biology) An Affordable, Non-Invasive Diabetes Screening Method and Device for Low-Resource Settings Amos Winter (MechE), Loza Tadesse (MechE) Leveraging AI, Supply Chain Analytics, Empirical Methods, and Low-Cost Sensing of Food Contact Chemicals to Enhance Assessment and Mitigation of Health Risks Emerging from Processed Foods Retsef Levi (Sloan), Karen Zheng (Sloan), Ariel Furst (ChemE) Data-Driven Functional and Cognitive Assessments of the Cutaneous Mechaneuronal Interface (CMI) Hugh Herr (Media Lab), Nidhi Seethapathi (BCS) Identifying Anxiety Subtypes via Neurocomputational Phenotyping in Social Interactions Rebecca Saxe (BCS), Rahul Bhui (Sloan) Understanding How Hemodynamics Impact Fontan-Associated Liver Disease Through Computational and Liver-on-Chip Modeling Ellen Roche (MechE), Sangeeta Bhatia (EECS) Developing a Platform for In Situ Spatially-Resolved, Single-Molecule Protein Sequencing Sam Peng (Chemistry), Ed Boyden (BE) Textile-Based Personalized Ultrasound Wearable Device for Continuous At-Home Breast Monitoring Canan Dagdeviren (Media Lab), Dava Newman (AeroAstro) Microbiome Engineering via Programmable Cell Adhesion to Generate Novel Living Biotherapeutics Tami Lieberman (IMES), Ariel Furst (ChemE), Otto Cordero (CEE) Characterization of Metabolite Exchange in the World’s Most Abundant Photosynthetically Driven Microbial Communities Matt Vander Heiden (Biology), Penny Chisholm (CEE) HEALS Seed Grant proposals were reviewed by faculty from across MIT.

The reviewers were: Mark Bear (Brain and Cognitive Sciences) Paul Blainey (Biological Engineering) Eliezer Calo Velazquez (Biology) Tal Cohen (Civil and Environmental Engineering) Connor Coley (Chemical Engineering) Bevin Engelward (Biological Engineering) John Gabrieli (Brain and Cognitive Sciences) Polina Golland (Electrical Engineering and Computer Science) Jonathan Gruber (Economics) Angela Koehler (Biological Engineering) Sebastian Lourido (Biology) Amy Moran-Thomas (Anthropology) Elizabeth Nolan (Chemistry) Katharina Ribbeck (Biological Engineering) Matthew Shoulders (Chemistry) Julien Tailleur (Physics) Michal Tal (Biological Engineering) We are looking for bold, cross-disciplinary research projects tackling major challenges or problems in health and life sciences.

The grant is open to all MIT faculty and PIs whose work aligns with the HEALS mission.

We encourage applications from those whose research: Bridges disciplines and integrates approaches from different fields and departments Explores new conceptual frameworks to tackle complex health challenges Develops cutting-edge tools, technologies, or methodologies, including collaborations that provide support to scientific core facilities Has the potential to transform health and/or life sciences All MIT faculty and PIs whose work aligns with the HEALS mission are eligible.

Although the work can involve collaborations with other institutions, no funds can be distributed to non-MIT collaborators. We particularly encourage applications from researchers whose work does not easily fit within traditional funding mechanisms but has the potential to make significant contributions to health and life sciences. Innovator Grant proposals will be funded for one year and should include 2-3 MIT PIs.

The budget should match the proposed work and needs of each research team within the collaboration, with average funding of ~$100k inclusive of indirect costs per lab or research group. However, based on specific budget needs and requirements, higher or lower funding levels will be considered. These grants are intended to seed new collaborations or provide proof of concept for future ambitious proposals.

Teams will be given the opportunity to apply to renew their research projects, with evidence of clear and effective collaboration and progress within the first year serving as key elements for consideration. In total, approximately $3M will be distributed to Innovator Grants for this coming year.

Collaborative Grant Framework HEALS seeks to provide not just funding, but to create an intellectual ecosystem where risk-taking, boundary-pushing, and paradigm-shifting ideas can thrive. We particularly encourage grant applications that create new research directions from teams of researchers that cross traditional disciplines and boundaries, including researchers in different departments, career stages, and disciplines.

We encourage the formation of new collaborations, connections, and research directions. Each individual research team that is part of the collaboration must be led by an MIT-affiliated faculty or PI. No funding can be distributed to collaborators outside of MIT.

Unlike traditional grants, HEALS-funded faculty are expected to be part of an intellectually vibrant and interdisciplinary cohort, with structured opportunities to collaborate, exchange ideas, and refine their scientific vision. Participating in these activities is a central expectation for receiving a grant from HEALS.

Quarterly meetings: Faculty will present their research, receive peer feedback, and participate in discussions on emerging topics in health and life sciences. Institute-wide symposium: Faculty will showcase their work at an annual symposium, engaging with the broader research community. Yearly grant report: 1 page describing accomplishments and follow on plans.

Oct 1, 2025 – Sept 30, 2026 Proposal of the planned research, with a total length of 2 pages per PI (e. g, a proposal from 3 PIs can be up to 6 pages), not counting figures or references. Sections should include: Goal of the research overall, including relevant context and background How the proposed work fits within the overall goals and mission of HEALS Why is each PI’s contribution needed?

How will the group work together over the course of the grant period? In what ways will the individual research groups depend on work from each other?

Individual research plans for each PI’s research group including a brief description of methods and any preliminary data, if available CV or biosketch from each applicant Budget and justification indicating how grant funds will be used (one per PI, using the attached template) 2-3 keywords to describe the research The selection committee will evaluate applicants based on: Scientific or engineering excellence and innovation Potential to impact health and life sciences Commitment to collaboration and constructive engagement in the cohort Interdisciplinary scope and creativity Nature of the proposed research team and the collaborative contributions of each team member for the success of the project Evidence to support the tangible interactions and collaboration between team members; we are not looking to simply fund individual labs or research groups to work separately.

Preliminary data is not required, particularly for projects that take a new direction, but a justification of feasibility or a description of the prior work that provides a foundation for the proposed experiments is encouraged. Partner with us to collaborate with top experts, industry leaders, and visionary researchers. Empower the future of health innovation— support MIT HEALS with your donation.