Four members of the faculty of Indiana University School of Medicine-South Bend (IUSM-SB) are recipients of $50,000 Navari Family Foundation grants in support of their research.

The four were among eight faculty members who submitted proposals. The recipients were selected on the basis of outstanding assessments of their proposals by specialists in their fields. The grant program was open to full-time IUSM-SB faculty.

The recipients are:

Jeni Prosperi, assistant professor of biochemistry and molecular biology,  for a project titled APC regulation of Wnt-Independent signaling pathways in breast cancer

Molly Duman Scheel, associate professor of medical and molecular genetics, for High Throughput CIS Regulatory Element Discover in the Vector Mosquito Aedes Aegypti

Patrick Sheets, assistant professor of pharmacology and toxicology, for the project Dissecting Cortical Circuits of Fear

Tracy Vargo-Gogola, assistant professor of biochemistry and molecular biology, for Structure-based drug design; Cdc42 GTPases; GEFs, breast cancer, fibroblasts; microenvironment, tumor invasion and metastasis

The Navari Family Foundation is headed by Rudolph M. Navari, MD, Ph.D., his wife Jane and his sister Eleonora C. Buba.