[Left to right: Drs. Meher Antia (Washingnton Research Foundation), and Jesse Gray and Marion Pepper (Seattle Hub): 'Translating a novel and exciting platform technology into concrete applications.']
Washington Research Foundation (WRF) has pledged $10 million over five years in support of a new program led by UW Medicine’s Brotman Baty Institute (BBI) and the Allen Institute. The program, SeaBridge, will advance cell and genome reprogramming technologies developed at the Seattle Hub for Synthetic Biology (Seattle Hub) to help address a wide range of diseases. The grant is among the largest in WRF's 44-year history.
Seattle Hub is a collaboration among BBI, the Allen Institute, and the Chan Zuckerberg Initiative (CZI). Dr. Jay Shendure, BBI scientific director, leads Seattle Hub. He also holds faculty positions at the University of Washington School of Medicine and is a Howard Hughes Medical Institute investigator.
Building on core technologies developed at BBI, Seattle Hub opened in January 2024 to generate foundational datasets, models and molecular infrastructure to re-engineer cells to record their own histories and reprogram disease states into healthy functions. The Allen Institute and the CZI each committed $35 million in 2023 to establish Seattle Hub.
The purpose of the SeaBridge grant is to train a new generation of scientists, leverage the region's expertise in cell therapy, and launch startups to drive clinical applications that will improve health through advanced treatment options for diseases that include cancers, as well as neurological and immune disorders.
The SeaBridge program will recruit and train 40 postdoctoral fellows to further advance Seattle Hub’s technologies, which include the DNA Typewriter and ENGRAM created in Shendure's UW Medicine lab. In addition to Shendure, the SeaBridge program will also be led by Seattle Hub Co-Director Dr. Marion Pepper, chair of the UW Medicine Department of Immunology; and Dr. Jesse Gray, Seattle Hub Senior Director, Strategy and Platform, at the Allen Institute.
“This generous WRF grant enables Seattle Hub to establish a new postdoctoral fellowship training program, a program that will move Seattle forward as the epicenter of synthetic biology,” said Pepper.
The fellowship program will be administrated by BBI. Fellows will carry out their work at UW Medicine and other academic research institutions in the state. The hope is that researchers will advance several technologies to the point where new companies can be created locally to commercialize novel therapeutics, diagnostics or other cell-based technologies that address a variety of clinical conditions and diseases.
“Our vision is these new companies will bridge Seattle’s rich synthetic biology ecosystem and our enterprising fellows to create companies armed with new clinical interventions to improve patients’ lives,” said Gray.
Seattle Hub received a $105,000 planning grant from WRF last year to develop a detailed plan for the SeaBridge program.
WRF made the $10M award through its new BioInnovation Grant program, president and CEO Dr. Tom Daniel said, which the foundation launched in response to a key goal of its 2023 strategic plan: increasing support for big, emergent opportunities to advance Washington state's life sciences ecosystem and improve lives.
“This is beyond exciting,” Daniel said. “Large-scale grant partnerships can really help to accelerate critical life science initiatives in our region. SeaBridge is a great example of this.”
Additional support for the SeaBridge program includes commitments from BBI, CZI, the Allen Institute, UW Medicine, and the fellows' host institutions.
Dr. Meher Antia, director of grant programs at WRF, said, "WRF is delighted to support the SeaBridge program through our first BioInnovation Grant. SeaBridge fulfils many of the goals of the BioInnovation Grant program in translating a novel and exciting platform technology into concrete applications in a way that builds on the region’s strengths. The matching funds from CZI, BBI, UW Medicine and the Allen Institute make this a genuine partnership between WRF, the research institutions and other funders, which is also a key feature of the BioInnovation Grants.”
About Washington Research Foundation: Washington Research Foundation (WRF) supports research and scholarship in Washington state, with a focus on life sciences and enabling technologies. WRF was founded in 1981 to assist universities and other nonprofit research institutions in Washington with the commercialization and licensing of their technologies. WRF is one of the foremost technology transfer and grant-making organizations in the nation, having earned more than $445 million in licensing revenue for the University of Washington and providing over $170 million in grants to the state’s research institutions to date. WRF Capital, the investment vehicle for Washington Research Foundation, has backed 132 local startups since 1996. Returns support the foundation’s investment and grantmaking programs. For additional information, please visit wrfseattle.org.
About the Brotman Baty Institute: The Brotman Baty Institute leverages of Seattle’s culture of collaboration in genomics, bioinformatics, and data science through private and public funding. It builds on its successes in long-read and RNA sequencing, single cell profiling, and genomic variation analyses, among other areas of research with potential clinical applications. Since it was established in 2017 with philanthropic support from Jeff and Susan Brotman and Dan and Pam Baty, BBI has been recognized for its work at the intersection of technology and health in the Puget Sound region and beyond. Its scientists and researchers at UW Medicine, the Fred Hutchinson Cancer Center, and Seattle Children’s have broken barriers across organizational lines. Learn more at Brotmanbaty.org
