Boettcher Webb-Waring Biomedical Research Award

Five outstanding biomedical researchers at the University of Colorado are part of the Boettcher Foundation’s 2026 class of Boettcher Investigators, recipients of grant funding through the Boettcher Foundation’s Webb-Waring Biomedical Research Awards Program.

CU's 2026 Boettcher Investigators, from left, Alessandra Brambati, PhD; John Janetzko, PhD; Katherine Kissler, CNM, PhD; Kentaro Yomogida, MD; and Matthew Olm, PhD.

CU’s new Boettcher Investigators and their research topics are:

UNIVERSITY OF COLORADO ANSCHUTZ

Alessandra Brambati, Ph.D., Department of Pharmacology – Regulation of microhomology-mediated end-joining during cell division.

John Janetzko, Ph.D., Departments of Biochemistry and Molecular Genetics, Pharmacology, and Pharmaceutical Sciences – All swell doesn’t end well: investigating how GPCR signaling dysfunction affects cell-volume regulation in disease.

Katherine Kissler, C.N.M., Ph.D., College of Nursing – Dynamic digital physiological signatures of impending intraamniotic infection.

Kentaro Yomogida, M.D., Division of Rheumatology, School of Medicine – NK cell–fibroblast crosstalk in the pathogenesis of juvenile idiopathic arthritis.

UNIVERSITY OF COLORADO BOULDER

Matthew Olm, Ph.D., Department of Integrative Physiology – How diet and lifestyle shape the infant gut microbiome and immune disease risk.

The Boettcher Foundation Webb-Waring Biomedical Research Awards Program supports early career investigators whose research has a direct impact on human health. The biomedical research supported pursuant to this grant program will be designed to find ways to prevent disease and improve human health through basic and applied biomedical research. The intent of the program is to fund meritorious research that has the potential for new discoveries or advances a discovery to the proof of its potential value as an application to improve human health. This research will improve the understanding, treatment, and prevention of human disease. Awardees will carry the prestigious title of Boettcher Investigator.

CU’s eighty Boettcher Investigators have been awarded a total of $18,880,000 since the program was initiated in 2010. See all CU Boettcher Investigators.