Dear New York Tech Faculty and Staff,

I am excited to share impressive news about Akinobu Watanabe, Ph.D., NYITCOM assistant professor of anatomy, who has been granted a National Science Foundation (NSF) Faculty Early Career Development Program (CAREER) award—a prestigious “first” at New York Tech.

Dr. Watanabe is principal investigator for “CAREER: Evo-Developmental Interactions of Craniofacial and Brain Anatomy,” a project for which he hopes to receive $710,855 in NSF funding over five years.

This is a historic day for our institution. The CAREER award is one of the most prestigious and competitive grants awarded by NSF. Principal investigators can receive this award once in their career and can only submit a proposal up to three times. Aki’s very first submission to the program was selected, making him the first New York Tech researcher to win this award, and I am sure he will not be our last. We are very proud of this accomplishment!

This award, and the impressive body of work behind it, exemplifies our mission and the research and scholarship we encourage all of our faculty to pursue as they serve as ambassadors for our institution and role models for our students. Such grants open doors for scientific discoveries that are critical in advancing our vision to innovate and reinvent the future. This award will help elevate New York Tech’s reputation within the scientific research community as well as our standing among peers.

In the past few weeks alone, New York Tech has announced significant grant awards from the National Institutes of Health (NIH announcement) and the New York State Energy Research and Development Authority (NYSERDA announcement). Our talented faculty researchers are working tirelessly to serve our students and pursue funding for their groundbreaking research, and I salute you all.

At the same time, I commend other faculty who have or are continuing to pursue CAREER awards and other prestigious grants. In all cases, these successes would not be possible without the support of their deans, colleagues, and OSPAR, for which I and our entire community are most grateful.

Please join me in congratulating Aki on this tremendous win!

Sincerely,

Hank Foley, Ph.D.
President, New York Institute of Technology