Glenna Bett, PhD, Receives Gates Foundation Grant

GCE grants fund scientists and researchers worldwide to explore ideas that could lead to solutions for persistent global health and development challenges.

Bett will work to develop a device to treat postpartum hemorrhage that is suitable for use even when medical facilities are absent or minimal, and in non-sterile environments. If successful, the device has the potential to reduce perinatal deaths worldwide.

Bett’s co-principal investigator on the $100,000 grant is Randall Rasmusson, PhD, professor of physiology and biophysics.

The project is one of more than 85 GCE Round 6 grants announced by the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation.

“GCE winners are expanding the pipeline of ideas for serious global health and development challenges where creative thinking is most urgently needed. These grants are meant to spur on new discoveries that could ultimately save millions of lives,” said Chris Wilson, director of Global Health Discovery at the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation.

To receive funding, Bett and other GCE Round 6 winners demonstrated in a two-page online application a bold idea in one of five critical global heath and development topic areas: polio eradication, HIV, sanitation and family health technologies, and mobile health. Applications for the current open round, GCE Round 7, will be accepted through May 19, 2011.

GCE is a $100 million initiative funded by the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation. Launched in 2008, GCE grants have already been awarded to nearly 500 researchers from more than 40 countries. The grant program is open to anyone from any discipline and from any organization. The initiative uses an agile, accelerated grant-making process with short two-page online applications and no preliminary data required. Initial grants of $100,000 are awarded two times a year. Successful projects have the opportunity to receive a follow-on grant of up to $1 million.