RCSA’s Philanthropy Honored at UC San Diego Event
Early investment in the work of promising scientists can pay big dividends over time, participants said at a February 19, 2020, symposium honoring RCSA for its longtime support of science at the University of California San Diego.
The event, “Anticipating the Future of Science: A Look Back and a Look Ahead,” brought together university officials, RCSA-funded scientists, and representatives from other philanthropies to celebrate the role foundations play in driving scientific research.
RCSA has provided research grants to UC San Diego faculty almost since its founding in 1960. In addition, 10 Cottrell Scholars and nine Scialog participants have been from the university.
UC San Diego Vice Chancellor for Research Sandra Brown said private philanthropic funding is especially important for early-career faculty because they may be looking into new ideas that governments or industry may not be funding.
“To do high-risk, high-payoff science, we have to be able to take risks, and we want to have creative, bold scientists,” she said. “They need that kind of support” to get their research off the ground, she added.
Maria Pellegrini, Executive Director of Programs for the W.M. Keck Foundation, said in her keynote address that although RCSA is not the biggest science philanthropy, it has had “far-reaching influence.”
Emphasizing the importance of both undergraduate teaching and science research through the Cottrell Scholar program, putting multidisciplinary teams together through Scialog, and partnering with other funders in innovative ways are models and methods that advance science, she said.
RCSA-funded researchers shared the long-term impact of RCSA’s early support.
2010 Cottrell Scholar Rae Anderson, a professor of physics at the nearby University of San Diego, explained how her original RCSA award created growing cycles of opportunity over time. Her original research led to publications, which led to new funding and new avenues of research, resulting in new collaborations, more new funding, and new discoveries.
She also said the Cottrell Scholar experience built relationships and networks that have not only advanced her career but created a community of support for her work. “It feels very much like a family,” she said.
Scialog: Chemical Machinery of the Cell Fellow Gulcin Pekkurnaz, assistant professor of neurobiology at UC San Diego, praised the Scialog experience. “You don’t have to think about funding or how to structure a grant -- you just explore your ideas. It captures the pure joy of being a scientist. As a junior faculty member, this early support also helped me gain confidence that my ideas were valuable.”
She said Scialog’s open-discussion format and cross-discipline approach to doing science has changed her research techniques and tools, and made critical connections between ideas. These ideas have led to new research, new collaborations and new funding, she said.
In his closing remarks, RCSA President and CEO Daniel Linzer said it is important to support “curiosity-driven research” of early-career faculty who have a passion for understanding how the world works.
“Who knows where it’s going to lead, but it’s going to give us interesting and important insights that at some time in the future will reap new benefits,” he said.
View the symposium by presentation on the UC San Diego Foundation Relations’ YouTube channel.
