Announcing the Proof of Concept awardees

The University of Illinois Chicago Office of Technology Management is pleased to announce the awardees of the 2025 Proof of Concept Awards. These awards support the advancement of promising UIC innovations toward commercialization by providing critical early-stage funding, project guidance and opportunities for translation and impact.

This year's award cycle includes Phase I and Phase II projects, reflecting both emerging concepts and innovations demonstrating significant progress toward real-world application.

Phase I awardees

Phase I awards support early proof-of-concept activities, feasibility testing, prototype development and validation needed to determine a technology's commercial potential.

Congratulations to the 2025 Phase I awardees:

Didem Ozevin, College of Engineering
"Advancing the Commercialization Readiness of Multi-Frequency MEMS Acoustic Emission Sensor"

Arnon Lavie, College of Medicine
"Reprogramming T-Cell Fitness with a Novel Asparaginase to Transform Cancer and Immune Dysregulation Therapies"

Xue-Jun Li, College of Medicine Rockford
"Novel LXR agonists for the treatment of hereditary spastic paraplegias"

Tanvi Bhatt, College of Applied Health Sciences
"FRAT+: Multi-Domain AI-Powered System for Early Detection of Fall Risk, Frailty, Vestibular Disorders, and Mild Cognitive Impairment"

Phase II awardees

Phase II awards support technologies that have demonstrated promising feasibility and require additional development, optimization or validation to advance toward licensing, startup formation or industry collaboration.

Congratulations to the 2025 Phase II awardees:

Stephanie Cologna, College of Liberal Arts and Sciences
"The sigma-2 receptor as a target for Niemann-Pick Type C"

Pai-Yen Chen, College of Engineering
"Encryption Chips for Wireless and Mobile Devices"

Bin He, College of Medicine
"Nanoengineered Dendritic Cells for in situ Immunization against Glioblastoma"

The Proof of Concept program is designed to accelerate the translation of UIC innovations with strong commercial or societal impact potential. Awarded teams will work closely with the Office of Technology Management to advance their technologies, receive milestone-based funding and strengthen pathways to commercialization.

We congratulate all awardees and look forward to supporting their progress!

For questions about the program or future application cycles, please contact the Office of Technology Management at [email protected].

For more information, please contact:Tamira [email protected]