Biosciences
Twelve University of Colorado research teams competed for a combined $1.6 million in startup funding grants in this year’s Lab Venture Challenge (LVC). Judges from CU's entrepreneurial network heard Shark Tank-style pitches across two nights at the Dairy Arts Center in Boulder, one for innovations in biosciences and another for physical sciences and engineering.
Carson Bruns, associate professor of mechanical engineering at CU Boulder, led development of PhotoTat, a full-color tattoo ink that appears under UV light and fades with visible light.
Internationally renowned cardiac researcher and serial entrepreneur Leslie Leinwand has revolutionized understanding of the heart on her decades-long mission to bring innovations from the lab bench to patient bedsides — and with billion-dollar “unicorn” spinouts Myogen, MyoKardia and, most recently, Kardigan.
CU Boulder's Lab Venture Challenge has announced the 2026 finalists of bio- and physical sciences innovators to pitch their ideas to a live audience at the Dairy Arts Center for more than $1 million in awards.
Modendo, a CU Boulder spinout, has been awarded a $3 million Small Business Innovation Research (SBIR) Phase II grant from the U.S. National Institutes of Health (NIH) for a project to provide researchers with powerful new tools to study brain circuits at scale.
CU Boulder College of Engineering and Applied Science—CU Boulder's BioServe Space Technologies is being recognized for decades of contributions to the International Space Station with a NASA Space Flight Awareness Supplier Award. Housed within the Ann and H.J. Smead Department of Aerospace Engineering Sciences, the center has been designing, building and flying microgravity life science research experiments and hardware since 1987, with six payloads launching less than two months ago.
Venture Partners capped off its fifth Ascent Deep Tech Accelerator with the 2026 Ascent Deep Tech Community Showcase, where research-based startup teams pitched innovations originating from CU to an audience of investors, entrepreneurs and fellow researchers. The showcase featured ventures developing breakthrough solutions in health, robotics, advanced materials and more.
Colorado BioScience Association (CBSA)—The presenting companies selected for the 2026 Rocky Mountain Life Sciences Investor & Partnering Conference feature close to 50 companies from Colorado and the Rocky Mountain West, including eight from CU Boulder.
The Colorado Office of Economic Development and International Trade (OEDIT) has announced that eight CU Boulder researchers and four startups received funding through the latest round of the Advanced Industries Accelerator Program. The awards, granted through the Proof of Concept and Early-Stage Capital and Retention programs, represent one of the university's strongest performances to date.
NASA—Research led by Tobias Niederwieser, assistant research professor in CU Boulder's BioServe Space Technologies, is exploring how microgravity can enable the large-scale production of high-quality blood stem cells aboard the International Space Station. The work could improve treatments for blood cancers, immune disorders and other diseases by creating more reliable supplies of stem cells for patients on Earth.