Flavia Vitale Awarded Grainger Foundation Frontiers Grant for Bioelectronics in Tissue Engineering Research

Flavia Vitale, Associate Professor in Bioengineering and in Neurology, has been awarded $30,000 through the Grainger Foundation Frontiers of Engineering Grant Program from the National Academy of Engineering (NAE). The award recognizes promising interdisciplinary research emerging from the Frontiers of Engineering Symposium and provides seed funding to advance innovative collaborations.

Vitale, in partnership with Ritu Raman, Eugene Bell Assistant Professor of Mechanical Engineering at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, received the grant for their project, “Leveraging Bioelectronics for 4D Tissue Engineering.” The team aims to overcome the challenge of limited control over cell communication in lab-grown tissues by integrating flexible, high-resolution bioelectronic devices developed in the Vitale Lab with engineered neuromuscular tissue systems. Their approach will enable precise stimulation of motor neurons, creating more accurate and programmable models for studying disease, drug responses and regenerative therapies.

“This award is catalyzing a new collaboration between our lab at Penn and Dr. Raman’s group at MIT, allowing us to integrate our microLED-based bioelectronic technologies with engineered neuromuscular tissues in ways that weren’t previously possible,” says Vitale. “By embedding these high-resolution devices directly into living tissue models, we can precisely control how cells communicate, opening the door to studying disease progression, tissue degeneration and potential therapies with unprecedented detail. It also represents an exciting shift for our work, extending tools we’ve developed for the brain into synthetic tissues, where we can begin to actively program and understand complex biological systems from the ground up. I am very excited for the opportunity to work with Dr. Raman to advance integrated engineered tissue and bioelectronic platforms and generate significant preliminary data to support future joint grant applications.”

“The Grainger Foundation Frontiers of Engineering program fosters meaningful collaboration among early-career engineers and exposes them to cutting-edge ideas from across the profession,” says NAE President Tsu-Jae Liu. “We appreciate The Grainger Foundation’s support in ensuring that this transformative experience remains available to the engineering leaders of tomorrow. Congratulations to this year’s Grainger Grant recipients whose promising, interdisciplinary projects reflect the kind of innovation the program is designed to inspire.”

The Grainger Foundation Frontiers of Engineering Grants support early-career researchers pursuing bold, cross-disciplinary ideas sparked through collaboration. Read the full press release here.

Vitale’s work exemplifies Penn Engineering’s commitment to advancing cutting-edge research at the intersection of engineering, biology and medicine. Learn more about her lab’s work here.