James Byrne, MD, PhD an assistant professor in the Department of Radiation Oncology, and his research team have secured a Catalyst Award. Funding for the award is made available through the Dr. Ralph and Marian Falk Medical Research Trust – Catalyst Awards Program, and is intended to support high-risk, high-reward projects that address critical scientific and therapeutic roadblocks. The title of the grant that secured the award is "Novel materials to improve management of hypoxia tumors" and includes his groups research in gas-entrapping materials (GEMs) designed to deliver therapeutic doses of gases to tissues or tumors. 

Dr Byrnes was the only applicant from the University of Iowa to receive the award in 2023, and is only the third person at our institution to have earned the distinction so far. His lab received $353,233 in seed funding to "support translational research that can be transferred to clinical practice in the near term."