In 2018, the University of Iowa was ranked 30th in the country for the National Institute of Dental and Craniofacial Research (NIDCR) funding with just under $3.2M in funds granted. In 2020, this ranking increased to 10th in the country, and 2nd in the Big 10, and to over $6.4M, an increase of over 100% in two years.

“This remarkable achievement is a testament to the excellent faculty and staff at the college, and to Dean Xie’s leadership, and highlights our role as a global leader in oral and craniofacial research” Dean David Johnsen said.

These successes were made possible by recruiting and retaining excellent research faculty; developing support infrastructure for basic science, translational, and clinical research—including the Division of Biostatistics and Computational Biology, staff support, and establishing excellent facilities, labs, and technology; and making space for innovative clinical research. These developments have resulted in a record amount of external grants funds, and a record number of grant applications from the college.

“I want to thank our excellent team that made this success possible. We could not have done it without the great work that our faculty and research support staff have been doing, the support from Dean Johnsen and Dean Schneider, and the university administrative support. This is your success!” Associate Dean for Research Xian Jin Xie said.

Although these initiatives are beginning to bear fruit, the future is even brighter.

“As a college, we look forward to seeing these successes amplified with the P3-to-P50 grant and the college’s seed grant program,” Interim Dean Galen Schneider said.

The P3-to-P50 grant is a Public-Private Partnership (P3) grant to develop the infrastructure needed for a P50 oral cancer research-center grant application with National Cancer Institute and the National Institute of Dental and Craniofacial Research. The collegiate Seed Grant program , which began in 2020, is designed to support innovative projects from early career investigators so that they can be competitive for peer-reviewed grants from national funding agencies. Both of these initiatives point to greater research success on the horizon.