The University of Vermont Office of the Vice President for Research announces the fifth year of SPARK-VT.

To launch the 2016/17 program, the office has issued a call for proposals for innovative projects and ideas that have a high commercialization potential. Emphasis will be placed on advances that have the potential to progress rapidly to a commercialization pathway.

Successful applications will likely involve interdisciplinary collaborations that bring together the requisite expertise to move the research toward commercialization. UVM faculty members active in scholarship, research and/or creative work are eligible.

Award amounts will range from $20,000 to a maximum of $50,000.

Completed PDF applications must be emailed to sparkvt@uvm.edu no later than midnight, Feb. 24, 2017. After initial review by the program’s consultant panel, the highest scoring applicants will be invited to present to the panel in the spring.

Interested parties are highly encouraged to attend the SPARK-VT workshop. Topics and dates will be posted under the workshops heading on the SPARK-VT website.

More information on SPARK-VT is available at the program’s website, here.

The SPARK-VT program has expanded from a program within the Department of Medicine to a program offered to select departments in the College of Medicine to its third year as a university-wide program. Since its initial launch, 45 novel project proposals have been submitted by UVM faculty and over 40 innovation-focused training workshops have been delivered to community members at UVM and Vermont’s growing field of entrepreneurs. Of those submissions, 14 have won awards totaling over $600,000.