Donors Enable Over 450 TPDA Awards to Neuroscience 2023
WASHINGTON – The Society for Neuroscience (SfN) is supporting a record 447 neuroscience trainees to attend Neuroscience 2023 through the Trainee Professional Development Award (TPDA) program. Over $500,000 in generous donations — the largest amount ever raised for this program — were contributed by individual donors to the Friends of SfN Fund, foundation and corporate supporters, and SfN Council.
“SfN is delighted to support a record number of trainees to benefit from the unparalleled opportunities at Neuroscience 2023 to present research, build career connections, and hone professional skills. SfN Council is proud to lead this fundraising initiative and is grateful for the support from SfN member donors and our foundation and corporate supporters to make this year’s record possible,” said SfN President Oswald Steward. “I especially wish to thank the Burroughs Wellcome Fund and the Gatsby Charitable Foundation for their new commitments to support TPDA over the next three years.”
The TPDA program provides funding support to promising undergraduate and graduate students and postdoctoral fellows to participate in Neuroscience 2023, followed by a year-long virtual professional development program. The 2023 TPDA recipients represent over 125 institutions across the globe, with 24% of awardees based outside of the United States. Almost two-thirds of awardees are female and more than 50% are from diverse racial and ethnic populations.
“The TPDA program enables so many young neuroscientists to attend their first SfN annual meeting, where they can experience the potent intermingling of people and ideas that can spark the next breakthrough in their field,” said Michael Lehman, PhD, TPDA program chair. “This award and the entire TPDA program would not be possible if not for the consistent generosity of the program’s donors.”
The 2023 TPDA program features three new multiyear TPDA supporters. The Burroughs Wellcome Fund and the Gatsby Charitable Foundation each committed $25,000 per year for the next three years and the new John I. Simpson Fund now provides $50,000 per year towards TPDA. In addition, the BrightFocus Foundation, Eli Lilly and Company Foundation, and Rainwater Charitable Foundation provided one-year contributions of $25,000. All of these contributions were matched by SfN Council as part of its continuing commitment to match TPDA contributions of $25,000 and above. SfN Council also matched donations by individuals to the Friends of SfN Fund which reached a record total of over $38,000 raised for the 2023 TPDA program.
Additional 2023 TPDA support is provided by the Nancy Rutledge Zahniser Fund endowment, Tianqiao and Chrissy Chen Institute, Developmental Studies Hybridoma Bank, and Science Translational Medicine/AAAS. In partnership with the Chen Institute, SfN is supporting four joint TPDA/Chen Science Writers Fellowship awards. The four awardees will write a meeting report to be published by the Chen Institute that summarizes discussions, highlights key themes, and shares innovative research from their Neuroscience 2023 experiences.
To learn more about how to support the TPDA program, visit the SfN website or contact development@sfn.org.
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The Society for Neuroscience (SfN) is an organization of nearly 35,000 basic scientists and clinicians who study the brain and the nervous system.
