22 April 2025

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School of Dentistry Top Recipient of 2024 NIH Grants

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In 2024, UCSF School of Dentistry was again the top recipient of National Institutes of Health (NIH) research grants.

The School of Dentistry received 57 NIH awards totaling $23,165,190. This achievement demonstrates the school's long-standing commitment to discovery and the dedication of its research faculty and staff. For decades, NIH funding has enabled researchers at the school and across UCSF to drive new breakthroughs that improve the health and transform patient care.

Thirty-three of the grants came from the National Institute of Dental and Craniofacial Research while the rest came from 10 other organizations within NIH.

"The number of grants we receive in the UCSF School of Dentistry shows how important the pursuit of ideas is here," said Sarah Knox, PhD, the interim associate dean for research. "We have an outstanding group of researchers in our school. They are dedicated to finding ways to improve patients' conditions, developing methods to bring new science to the clinic, and pursuing novel interventions that improve public health. It would be nearly impossible to achieve without these grants."

Some of the projects funded in 2024 include:

• "Research Coordinating Center to Reduce Disparities in Multiple Chronic Diseases (RCC RD-MCD)" - led by PI Stuart Gansky,MS, DrPH, and funded by the National Institute on Minority Health and Health Disparities. This ongoing project began in 2021.
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• "Signaling control and cellular basis of craniofacial morphogenesis and congenital disease" - led by PI Jeffrey Bush, PhD, and funded by the National Institute of Dental and Craniofacial Research. This ongoing project began in 2022.
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• "Sjögren’s Team for Accelerating Medicines Partnership (STAMP)" - led by PI Caroline Shiboski, DDS, MPH, PhD, and funded by the National Institute of Dental and Craniofacial Research. This new project began in 2024.
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• "Defining mechanisms driving salivary gland regeneration" - led by PI Sarah Knox, PhD, and funded by the National Institute of Dental and Craniofacial Research. This ongoing project began in 2018.
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• "Immune and transcriptomic biomarkers of progressive oral premalignant lesions" - led by PI Flora Momen-Heravi, DDS, PhD, MPH, MS, and funded by the National Institute of Dental and Craniofacial Research. This new project began in 2024.
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• "Using Informatics and Natural Language Processing to Develop a Clinical Decision Support Tool to Improve Intimate Partner Violence Diagnosis by Dentists and Assess its Feasibility and Acceptability" - led by PI Sepideh Banava, DDS, MBA, MPH, and funded by National Institute of Dental and Craniofacial Research. This new project began in 2024.

Source: https://dentistry.ucsf.edu/