SPH faculty awarded Global Incubator Seed Grants

Five School of Public Health faculty members have been awarded funding through Washington University’s Global Incubator Seed Grant program. The program provides one-year grants of up to $25,000 to catalyze faculty-led international research and build relationships across disciplines and countries. 

The program has awarded nearly 100 grants over the past five years, including 11 this year. Funding for this year’s cycle is made possible with support from WashU Global and the Office of the Provost through the university’s “Here and Next” strategic plan.

The 2025 SPH recipients are:

• Rodrigo Reis, MS, PhS, a professor at the School of Public Health, for “Applying Artificial Intelligence to Assess Spatial Inequities in the Global South.”
• Jeffrey G. Catalano, PhD, a professor of earth, environmental, and planetary sciences in Arts & Sciences and a member of the SPH secondary faculty, for “Tunable Clays for Enhanced Lithium Recovery and Contaminant Sequestration.”
• Bo Li, PhD, the Stanley A. Sawyer Professor of Statistics & Data Science in Arts & Sciences and a member of the SPH secondary faculty, for “Quantifying Joint Health Effects of Extreme Heat and Wildfire Smoke on Older Adults using Statistical and Machine Learning Approaches.”
• Mary McKay, PhD, a professor at the Brown School, the executive vice provost at WashU, and a member of the SPH secondary faculty, for “The Intersection of Climate Change and IPV among Young Women Living with HIV in Uganda.” 
• Mitra Naseh, PhD, an assistant professor at the Brown School and a member of the SPH secondary faculty, for “Adapting and Enhancing Self-Help Plus (SH+) for Afghan Refugee Women in Türkiye.”

Read more about the 2025 Global Incubator Seed Grant awardees here.