April 25, 2023 — CooperVision is accepting submissions for its 2023 Science and Technology Awards program, an effort to foster continuous advancement in contact lens research and development while translating innovative ideas into practical solutions.
 
CooperVision defines each year’s program with different areas of focus. This year, submissions will be considered for the following:
 

• Understanding childhood myopia development, including pathogenesis, mechanisms, and risk factors.
• New methods to prevent the onset of myopia, including prophylactic technologies and novel proposals for glasses, contact lenses, and interactive and combination therapies.
• Strategies to prevent the development of symptomatology in new contact lens wearers, with an emphasis on diagnosis and early intervention therapies, understanding biochemical changes in newly fitted wearers over time, and controlled release technologies for delivery of beneficial agents, as well as approaches to improve moisture retention.
• The impact of artificial intelligence on contact lens fitting and diagnosis, including applications for optometry and orthokeratology with technologies such as ChatGPT, Bard, and more.

 
Proposals may span proof of concept through translational stages. The CooperVision Seedling Award is intended for investigating early-stage concepts for a one-year period with a maximum grant of $100,000. For substantive projects, the CooperVision Translational Research Award is a two-year grant with funding up to $400,000.
 
Researchers with principal investigator (PI) status holding an O.D., M.D., Ph.D., or equivalent degree are eligible to apply. (Those with a waiver of PI status must submit appropriate documentation before receiving funding.) Interested applicants must submit a letter of intent before Friday, June 23.  Learn more and apply here.
 
Since its inception in 2014, the program has granted more than $2 million toward research that has led to advancements in product design and development as well as informing approaches in clinical care.
 
“CooperVision’s Science and Technology Awards program has been highly valuable to my career development and others for more than a decade. It was instrumental in my ability to employ my first dedicated contact lens research staff member in my laboratory in 2015,” says Laura Downie, BOptom, Ph.D., who built on findings from her award-funded contact lens discomfort research to pursue additional studies on the topic. “It has been fantastic to collaborate with leading scientists and clinicians at CooperVision to develop ideas and to pursue exciting research that has now evolved over several years into a substantial research program.”
 
For more information: coopervision.com.