Regeneron Prize for Creative Innovation

Regeneron Prize for Creative Innovation

Internal Indiana University Deadline: Friday, February 21, 2025

To apply, submit the application items to Jennifer Barron, Graduate Fellowships and Awards Coordinator at ugsawrd@iu.edu

Mission

To honor Creativity and Innovation by graduate students and postdoctoral fellows in the Biomedical Sciences.

Prize details

• Two applicants are selected to receive the Regeneron Prize for Creative Innovation each year.
• Each winner receives a check for $50,000, which can be used in any way the winner chooses. It is a personal prize for the personal use of the recipient.
• Finalists are each awarded $5,000.
• The home institution of the winners will each receive a $5,000 donation to support the institution’s seminar series.
• Approximately 8-10 applicants will be selected for finalist status.
• Finalists may be invited to visit Regeneron for the onsite competition, travel expenses paid.

Eligibility

• Current PhD students and postdoctoral fellows are eligible to apply. Each institution may nominate no more than 2 PhD students and 2 postdoctoral fellows.
• The research must be within the field of biomedicine, broadly defined.
• Each submission must include a signed institutional endorsement form which will be collected of the final institution nominees.
• The research proposed must be within the field of biomedicine, broadly defined.
• The proposal should clearly define a specific experiment or series of experiments, and include a rationale, basic methodology/design (citing literature is fine), and discussion of how the experiment's results would advance the field

NOTE - These proposals are INELIGIBLE:

• Proposals that are not the applicant’s original idea or that appear in any publication or grant where the applicant is not the principal investigator
• Joint/team proposals
• Proposal that embody incremental advances from current projects by the applicant or their lab

Applicants should submit the items listed below to Jen Barron, Fellowships and Awards Coordinator, at ugsawrd@iu.edu

Application Components

1. Full academic CV
2. Dream Project (no more than 2 single-spaced pages, no smaller than 10-point font
   • References do not need to be included within the two-page limit, but any figures, etc. should be (Note that preliminary data is not necessary)
3. Up to 3 Publications as evidence of scholarly achievement

We will collect an institutional endorsement form signed by the applicant and institutional endorser from the eventual campus nominees. This is only required for the final nominees. You may view a WORD or PDF copy of the document.

Regeneron reserves the right to not award a prize if the judges decide that no application meets the requirements or standards.

View the Regeneron Prize Announcement in Word or PDF.

Regeneron Guidelines and Criteria

One of the primary criteria for selecting recipients is research productivity.

The CVs and publications of the applicants will be very important components of the selection process.

Regeneron recognizes that two trainees with similar records of productivity may not be equivalent in scientific caliber. Therefore, a mentor plays a big role in the development of a high-profile publication record.

The dream project component of the Regeneron Prize application is designed to be a differentiating exercise that allows Regeneron’s Selection Committee to distinguish between applicants who have excellent research records because of their mentors and those who have excellent research records because of their own scientific merits.

The research that is proposed is not necessarily meant to be conducted, nor is the prize meant as a funding mechanism for research.

Dream Project Guidelines

• The dream project proposal is a mechanism for evaluating a student’s scientific clarity, elegance, precision, and creativity.
• There is no need for preliminary data (although it is not prohibited).
• There is no need for the student to feel limited by time or resources for the research proposed.
• Novel research ideas and out of the box thinking are not only acceptable, but encouraged.
• The proposal should describe a research project the applicant wishes he/she could conduct (i.e. a “dream” project), and be performable within the fundamental limitations imposed by today’s technologies (e.g. don’t propose cloning Albert Einstein).
• Finalists may be invited to Regeneron for the onsite competition as the final step in the selection of the Regeneron Prize winners, and they should be prepared to explain and defend aspects of their proposal at that time. The intent of the proposal is not to conduct the research, it is to evaluate the applicants’ research prowess.

Additional Suggested Guidelines (not required)

You may include the following proposal sections (similar to a research proposal one might prepare for a funding source)

• background/rationale
• specific aims
• experimental design/methodology
• caveats/conclusions

The proposal can assume that recipients have access to the rich resources and technologies available at cutting edge biotechnology companies such as Regeneron. This includes access to most equipment used in biomedical research, any necessary supplies or reagents, and advanced genetic and/or protein engineering capabilities

Some applicants may be invited to conduct their research, or related research, at Regeneron. There is, however, absolutely no requirement that they accept this invitation – the prizes will be awarded before any such offers would be made.

Note: By submitting your proposal, Regeneron obtains no ownership rights in and to any of your proprietary data, results, or other information contained therein or any intellectual property that you may seek to obtain resulting directly from such information. By submitting your proposal, you acknowledge that its contents are not confidential information of any party and that Regeneron Pharmaceuticals, Inc. (and its affiliates) will in no way be restricted from pursuing its own research, development and commercial activities, which Regeneron may have previously initiated or may initiate in the future, including, without limitation, activities in areas relating to the subject matter of your proposal.

View the Regeneron guidelines document in Word or PDF