Seed Grants Program

Our Seed Grants program sparks new collaborations between scientists from across the university to engage in innovative, collaborative research projects in the neurosciences.

Seed grant research projects should involve at least two independent co-PI's who combine their expertise in an innovative fashion to address important problems in basic and clinical neuroscience.

We encourage applications from teams forming unique connections between neuroscience and other bastions of disciplinary strength at Stanford (e.g.: engineering and the quantitative sciences, chemical and molecular biology, the social sciences, humanities and professional schools of education, law and business).

Open

Seed Grants 2025 - Applications open Feb 4 to Apr 25

Successful proposals will be awarded for a two-year period in the total amount of $300,000 ($150,000 per year).

Application Details (Stanford email log-in required)

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Funded Seed Grant projects

View all Seed Grants

Wu Tsai Neurosciences Institute

Seed Grant

2015

Massively parallel microwire arrays for deep brain stimulation

We will engineer next generation bundled microwires deep brain stimulation using microwires that are thinner than human hair. We will use a small LED display to deliver patterned stimulation by ‘playing a video’ on the display chip, where each pixel is connected to a microwire.

Wu Tsai Neurosciences Institute

Seed Grant

2021

Rapid brain-wide optogenetic screening with a noninvasive, dynamically programmable in vivo light source

We aim to develop a noninvasive method to produce on-demand and dynamically programmable light emission patterns throughout the entire brain of live mice. The emission patterns can be controlled by brain-penetrant focused ultrasound and switched with millisecond precision for rapid brain-wide optogenetic screening of different brain regions.

Wu Tsai Neurosciences Institute

Seed Grant

2017

Enabling faster and more responsive voltage imaging through computational biophysics

A computational biophysicist and a protein engineer will team up to improve voltage-sensing fluorescent proteins, proteins that can report electrical activity by changing their production of light. The goal is to visualize the electrical activity in neurons in real time.

Wu Tsai Neurosciences Institute

Seed Grant

2019

Ultrasonic neural control and neuroimaging in the awake, mobile, and behaving small rodent

We propose to design a lightweight, wearable system for integrated ultrasonic drug uncaging and fUS neuroimaging to noninvasively pharmacologically modulate a brain target and then image the resultant changes in neural activity without significant motion limitations.

Wu Tsai Neurosciences Institute

Seed Grant

2015

In vivo selection for gene mutations that counteract photoreceptor degeneration

To combat age related macular degeneration, we propose to identify genes that increase survival of the light sensing nerves of the eye.

Wu Tsai Neurosciences Institute

Seed Grant

2019

Quantifying auditory-vocal affect in human social communication

This proposal brings together faculty with this diverse expertise to develop the first gold standard test of auditory-vocal affect. Once developed, validated, and normed, we will deploy this test in the clinical context of autism to quantify impairments and direct neurobiological investigation.

Seed Grant Award Announcements

2023 - Neurosciences seed grants fuel research in childhood epilepsy, eating disorders, Alzheimer's and more

2021 - Wu Tsai Neurosciences Institute announces fourth round of seed grants

2019 - Wu Tsai Neurosciences Institute announces third round of seed grants

2017 - Stanford Neurosciences Institute awards second round of Seed Grants

2015 - Stanford Neurosciences Institute awards first round of Seed Grants