Yale Life Sciences Pitchfest
Event overview
The annual Yale Life Sciences Pitchfest is a one-day event held each December to showcase Yale faculty innovators presenting breakthrough research projects in therapeutics, medical devices, and digital health. Over the course of the day each Yale faculty-led team presents their projects in 5-minute pitches followed by a 3-minute Q&A with a panel of judges. Following a full-day of pitches, the judges deliberate to determine the faculty awards, recognizing the most exciting life science research coming out of Yale laboratories this year. Held in person at Alexion Pharmaceuticals in downtown New Haven,
The Yale Life Sciences Pitchfest serves as the quarterfinals for The Blavatnik Fund for Innovation at Yale. The Fund, supported by a grant from The Blavatnik Family Foundation, is a Yale Ventures accelerator for Yale faculty that supports the commercialization of applied research and technology in the life sciences. Since its inception over 7 years ago, The Blavatnik Fund for Innovation at Yale has funded 46 early-stage life science projects resulting in the creation of 12 ventures that have collectively raised $210M, many of which call New Haven home.
2022 Yale Life Sciences Pitchfest
Award Recipients
1st Place
Anthony Koleske, Ensign Professor of Molecular Biophysics and Biochemistry and of Neuroscience; Deputy Dean for Research, (Basic Science)
Project: A screen for small molecule regulators of TRIO GEF1 activity
2nd Place
Kevan Herold, C.N.H. Long Professor of Immunobiology and of Medicine (Endocrinology)
Project: Engineering beta cells for resistance to immune attack and reversal of diabetes
Farida Ahangari, Assistant Professor, Internal Medicine
Project: Targeting Profibrotic Macrophages Using Mir-33 Inhibitors, a Novel Therapeutic Approach for Pulmonary Fibrosis
3rd Place
Anton Bennett, Dorys McConnell Duberg Professor of Pharmacology and of Comparative Medicine; Director, Yale Center for Molecular and Systems Metabolism
Project: Allagium Therapeutics, driving change to better health
Ruslan Medzhitov, Sterling Professor of Immunobiology
Project: To identify a new class of therapeutics for inflammatory diseases
Ian Odell, Assistant Professor of Dermatology
Project: Epiregulin Inhibition to Treat Scleroderma Skin and Lung Fibrosis
4th Place
Nicholas Economos, MD/PhD student
Project: Hybridex Biosciences, enabling the next generation of safe gene editing therapeutics.
Rohan Khera, Assistant Professor, Cardiovascular Medicine and Health Informatics
Project: ENSIGHT-AI
One Year Free Bench Space c/o BioLabs New Haven
Choukri Ben Mamoun, Professor of Medicine and Microbial Pathogenesis
Project: Potentiators of AntiMicrobial Susceptibility
