2021 Emmy Noether Awards - Silver Medalist, Paige Delsa: Paige Delsa is a graduate of the Louisiana School for Math, Science, and the Arts, a public, residential high school in Natchitoches, Louisiana, and will be attending the University of Richmond in the fall to pursue physics. She left her hometown of Mandeville, Louisiana as a sophomore to explore her passion for physics, chemistry, and computer science at the Louisiana School of Math, Science and the Arts. Being surrounded by enthusiastic teachers and dedicated students, she further cultivated her passion for science and mathematics and was inspired to pursue a myriad of research opportunities, ranging from working with an oceanography department to a materials informatics lab. While not completing research, studying for her classes, or talking with her friends, Delsa is an avid powerlifter.

Support for the Atchafalaya Terrebonne Basin is and always has been of crucial importance to the Brown Foundation. The Brown Foundation has proudly awarded grants totaling $365,500 to the Atchafalaya Basinkeeper since our partnership began in 2010. Support has always aimed to protect the Basin, its wildlife, fisheries for commercial and recreational fishing, thousands of acres of cypress forests and protective wetlands. Monitoring happens by air, land and boat to promote environmental enforcement, prevent wetland degradation, and enhance health and longevity of our Basin. Special thanks to @johnchittyimages for the stunning photograph.

The final program we developed in 2020 was a partnership between the Brown Foundation and the LSU Health Foundation; we issued a planning grant for this program in 2019 and we couldn’t be prouder to see the project surging forward in 2021. We are giving the LSU Health Foundation a grant of $250,000 to implement a new pharmacy model to be rolled out in several cities in Louisiana. The LSU Health Foundation is working with PBM Solutions to create a pharmacy that would directly help organizations, such as municipalities, grappling with rising health care costs. The nonprofit pharmacy model offers an innovative, yet simple solution—a customized on-site pharmacy—that minimizes costs, while maximizing value. The pharmacy project will entail the employment of a licensed pharmacist and the purchase, on the wholesale and generic market of low cost, high quality pharmaceutical medications which will then be sold under the health benefit plans of the institutions to the employees through the newly created non-profit pharmacy. This should save both institutions (initially the City of New Orleans and LSUHSC) millions of dollars annually from their current plans. The pharmacy will have small logistical operations on both the LSUHSC campus and City Hall and will utilize a proven prescription drug mailing model for timely distribution. Timing will include contracts and startup models occurring over the next 12-18 months at both locations.

The primary benefits of an on-site pharmacy include: (1) Convenient access to a one-stop shop for health care and pharmaceutical needs, (2) Immediate and long-term savings with lower pharmacy costs and copays, and (3) Improved health outcomes for employees over time. The Brown Foundation is enthusiastic about the LSU Health Foundation roll out this program into additional cities in the near future. “With the grant from The Joe W. and Dorothy Dorsett Brown Foundation, the LSU Health Foundation plans to move forward in taking crucial steps to explore, initiate and open the pharmacy in New Orleans Health Sciences Center in 2022. We are extremely proud of expanding and improving our mission related services through the utilization of cutting-edge entrepreneurial initiatives like this one,” says LSU Health Foundation President and CEO Matthew Altier (featured in the photo above along with LSU Health Foundation Chairman Henry Miller). “The LSU Health Foundation is both proud and grateful to our partners like the Brown Foundation who recognize innovation as a way to grow and help the community where and when most needed.”

After completing a successful fundamental science program in oncology research back in 2019, the Brown Foundation decided that the next area of basic research we would focus on would be the related field of healthy aging. After a significant amount of due diligence, the Foundation selected fifteen organizations to compete within the 2020 Healthy Aging Program. After reviewing a larger pool of contestants, three principal investigators from each of the fifteen research institutions received $11,000 in support of their laboratory and for professional development while the competitive analysis was undertaken by our program officers and review team. Five of the invited fifteen research institutions were selected to receive the first place award of $100,000 on December 8, 2020 to further the research of their winning laboratory, after a competitive evaluation process complete with COVID-19 compliant interviews and presentations. One of the five organizations, Tulane University, is among the oldest partners of the Brown Foundation and we were deeply honored to support at the $11,000 level, principal investigator Tracy Fischer, Ph.D. for her project: Microglial senescence in Alzheimer’s disease. Her task was to study how microglial senescence is an early event in the development of Alzheimer’s disease, and to define the senescence-associated secretory phenotype of microglia within the vicinity of and away from pathology in archived brain specimens from aged patients with and without late-onset Alzheimer’s disease. The Brown Foundation was also deeply honored to support at the $11,000 level principal investigator Malwina Czarny-Ratajczak, Ph.D. for the project: Contribution of synovial fluid-derived exosomes to healthy aging of joints.

The first place winner from Tulane University, who received a total in $111,000 in grant support for his laboratory out of the Brown Foundation’s 2020 Healthy Aging Program was Assistant Professor Sangkyu Kim, Ph.D. out of the Department of Medicine and the Tulane Center for Aging at the Tulane University Health Sciences Center. Dr. Kim’s project involved using the healthy-aging index and multidimensional molecular data (multi-omics) to identify biological pathways of healthy aging in rhesus monkeys. Dr. Kim’s task funded, in part, by the Brown Foundation is to explore in rhesus monkeys the longitudinal integrative analyses of high-density metabolite (metabolomics) and gene expression (transcriptomics) date in association with the healthy-aging index. One of the primary goals of our healthy aging program is to help establish up and coming researchers with new ideas and new approaches and there are few young researchers with as promising of a future as Dr. Kim. For more information on the work of Dr. Kim please visit: https://medicine.tulane.edu/departments/tulane-center-aging/faculty/sangkyu-kim-phd

Basic research in the field of Healthy Aging was the primary focus of the Foundation’s health and science department in 2020. When considering prospective partners to invite to compete for grants in this program we knew Duke University, which consistently ranks among the very best of research oriented universities in the United States, was going to be a powerful participant. The Duke Center for the Study of Aging and Human Development is a multi-disciplinary hub for the promotion of healthy aging across the lifespan and management of medical complexities in late life. With more than 126 affiliated faculty members from across the University and Medical Center, and millions of dollars annually in aging-related research funding, the Center is a vital national resource for the study of aging. In December of 2019 we selected our three competing laboratories and made the initial round of three grants each in the amount of $11,000 to provide planning monies for the three principal investigators to put toward the project they would present to us in the fall of 2020 with an eye toward the $100,000 first place prize. These three laboratories included: (1) The Molecular and Cell Biology Lab of Gregory A. Taylor, Ph.D. for his project Exploring a New Target for Age-Related Declines in Muscle Function and Sarcopenia (2) The Molecular Translational Medicine Lab of Virginia Byers Kraus, M.D., Ph.D. for her project Enhancing Endogenous Human Cartilage Repair to Prevent and Treat Osteoarthritis. The Foundation couldn’t be prouder of it’s $22,000 in support issued to support the efforts of Dr. Taylor and Dr. Kraus.

At the end of a vigorous review by our program officers and competing presentations from the three principal investigators, the third (3) and winning laboratory from Duke was the Biology of Aging Lab under the leadership of James White, Ph.D. On December 8, 2020, the Foundation issued the $100,000 for Dr. White’s project: “Young blood rejuvenates both mind and body." An innovative proteomics analysis may reveal how we have demonstrated the rejuvenating effects of young blood on cognition and physical function in aged mice. This project aims to identify the circulating proteins that drive this “youthful” tissue function. Dr. White’s laboratory utilizes a novel protein-labelling transgenic (MetRS) mouse, allowing proteomic analysis of young and old circulating proteins via mass spectrometry. Dr. White plans to use this proteomic discovery tool as a first step to develop anti-aging therapeutics. As background on Dr. White, he is an Assistant Professor in Medicine, Division of Hematology and Senior Fellow in the Duke Center for Aging and Human Development. He earned a Ph.D. in Exercise Science, specializing in skeletal muscle biology, at the University of South Carolina, Columbia, followed by a postdoctoral fellowship in the lab of Bruce Spiegelman at Harvard Medical School. There he worked in the areas of muscle metabolism and metabolic disease. His laboratory studies mechanisms of age-related functional decline of stem cells within skeletal muscle, vasculature and the immune system. His research program employs a wide range of investigation including in vitro cellular assays, mouse models and human studies. The overarching goal of this work is to elucidate mechanisms of stem cell function in their respective tissues and rescue/prevent age-related dysfunction. For more information on Dr. White please copy and paste this address: https://dmpi.duke.edu/faculty/james-white-phd

The Joe W. & Dorothy Dorsett Brown Foundation continued the matriculation of its Excellence Award program in 2020 and divided up the excellence awards into multiple categories. One of these categories – The Hope Against Hunger Award – was issued in December of 2020 to Beauregard Parish’s own Artie Carhee Hickman for her dedication to the development of Soul Soup. Soul Soup, which also won the Greater Beauregard Chamber of Commerce’s Non-Profit of the Year designation earlier in 2020, received a $10,000 award from the Foundation as part of the award. Soul Soup is an outreach ministry that provides dinner, everyday, free of charge to help those in the community who are experiencing financial burdens, low or fixed incomes or no incomes, no questions asked. Soul Soup enjoyed its tenth year anniversary in 2020 and has established dozens of partnerships throughout south-west Louisiana to further its mission under the tireless leadership and dedication of Artie Carhee Hickman.

In December of 2020, the Joe W. & Dorothy Dorsett Brown Foundation awarded Pontchartrain Conservancy Executive Director Kristi Trail with the inaugural Environmental Impact Award and issued a $10,000 grant to the Pontchartrain Conservancy. The funds will enable Pontchartrain Conservancy - a leader in coastal sustainability, water quality and environmental education for more than three decades - to continue its mission of driving environmental sustainability and stewardship through scientific research, education and advocacy. “I’m humbled and deeply honored to be the inaugural recipient of the Brown Foundation’s Environmental Impact Award,” said Trail. “As our region faces increasing environmental threats and challenges, we greatly appreciate the Foundation’s support of Pontchartrain Conservancy’s programs, which have never been as vital to Louisiana — and to the nation — as they are today.”

In September of 2020, the Brown Foundation issued an aggregate total of $249,135 in grants to 21 different organizations out of our SupportSTEM program. Since we launched this program in 2018, we have issued $711,519 in total awards out of our SupportSTEM program for STEM curriculum implementation or STEM instruction support for K-12 schools. In 2020, awards under this program ranged from as little as $1,409 to develop the "Science Squad" at Cabrini High School to our maximum award amount of $20,000 that was issued to groups such as the Central Creativity Foundation for their program implementing the NASA curriculum. We are pleased to announce that we will be operating our SupportSTEM program again in 2021! For more details, visit the SupportSTEM webpage inside the Education section of our site for more details. Grants under this program are growing ever more competitive year over year, which we view as a positive indication that STEM is becoming a higher educational priority across Louisiana and Mississippi.

In the face of the global pandemic multiple reports are emerging of the cardiovascular system being significantly affected in patients with COVID-19. The underlying pathophysiological mechanisms are not known. Thus, there is an unmet need to urgently and globally assess the clinical course and outcomes of COVID-19 patients with cardiovascular disease. In September of 2020 we pledged $422,823 to the Tulane School of Medicine to accomplish the following aims: (a) Determine the incidence and predictive factors of early and delayed cardiovascular complications in COVID-19 diagnosed patients using wearable health technology, (b) Determine if COVID-19 can induce sustainable cardiac structural and functional remodeling in infected patients using advanced cardiac imaging, and (c) Investigate the pathophysiological mechanisms of COVID-19 related cardiovascular complications using biomarkers and analysis of post-mortem human tissues. This pledge represents the largest gift pledged by the Foundation in 2020 and falls jointly under our emergency response program as well as our health and science program.  

We first began working with the University of Mississippi Medical Center (UMMC) as a contestant in our 2019 Oncology Program. We were so impressed with the UMMC’s basic research in 2019 that we invited the organization to compete in the Brown Foundation’s 2020 Healthy Aging Program. The University of Mississippi Medical Center, located in Jackson, is Mississippi’s only academic health science center. UMMC includes seven health science schools: medicine, nursing, dentistry, health related professions, graduate studies, population health, and pharmacy. Words alone cannot reflect how impressed the Brown Foundation’s program officers were with the three principal investigators we were evaluating from UMMC throughout 2020, so the UMMC became the only institution that received awards for its two runner up principal investigators to go along with the first price award of the additional $100,000 in research support. As of December 8, 2020, the Brown Foundation has $36,000 in grants to the Computational Medicine Research Center under the leadership of John Clemmer, Ph.D. for his project: Integrated computer model of aging physiology for disease analysis. Additionally, the Brown Foundation has issued $36,000 in grants to the Women’s Health Research Laboratory under the leadership of Nita J. Maihle, PhD for her project: Serum Proteins, Human Aging, and Disease Risk.

In addition to the $11,000 in grant support issued to each of the three initial contestant laboratories selected from UMMC, the winning laboratory for the $100,000 research support grant was the Sensory Neurobiology Lab led by Brad Walters, Ph.D. for their efforts to determine the role of Pou4f3 in age-related hearing loss. Sensorineural hearing loss is one of the most common long-term disabilities not only in Louisiana and Mississippi, but throughout the world. It has been estimated that as many as 1 in 5 adults under the age of 65, and more than 50% of adults over the age of 75 suffer a significant level of hearing loss. Age related hearing loss is one of the most common long-term disabilities and its primary cause is the death of sensory cells in the inner ear. In Dr. Walters’ investigations with mice, who also suffer from age related hearing loss, the UMMC has found that a gene critical for the survival of these cells, called Pou4f3, is expressed at lower and lower levels in the sensory cells with age. The Sensory Neurobiology Lab has made a conditional knockout model where they can delete this Pou4f3 gene and have found that the loss of its expression does indeed lead to sensory cell death. Dr. Walters’ hopes to determine what this gene is doing by comparing cells that are able to survive the deletion against those that become sick and die off. Dr. Walters will do this using RNA sequencing to see what downstream genes and pathways are changed when Pou4f3 is deleted. For more information about the incredible work of Dr. Walters please visit: https://www.umc.edu/som/Departments%20and%20Offices/SOM%20Departments/Neurobiology/About-Us/Faculty1/Brad-Walters-PhD.html

On September 8, 2020 The Joe W. and Dorothy Dorsett Brown Foundation issued its first ever Human Services Award to Pastor Charles Johnson of Way Maker Ministries. The Human Services Award is issued to one individual who personifies the displays of leadership, skill, ability and service in an exemplary manner. Throughout the COVID-19 crisis, Pastor Johnson has demonstrated he values service to others above his own personal interest, even risking his own health on a day-to-day basis. He fights on the front lines, enabling perseverance for those with little. Since initial efforts commenced in 1990, under Pastor Johnsons leadership and direction, Way Maker Ministries has acquired dozens of certifications and specialized licenses to help those in need and has been one of the more flexible nonprofits in the Greater New Orleans area for disaster relief efforts. Serving as a Louisiana State Certified Emergency Shelter for Women, hundreds of people have sought refuge at Way Maker Ministries over the years while tens of thousands have received meals from the pantry and food services overseen by Pastor Johnson. Way Maker Ministries has run many camps and after school programs for disadvantaged children and even has support groups for children whose parents may be addicted to narcotics. The economic impact Way Maker Ministries has had in the Greater New Orleans community is challenging to measure but readily apparent in the sheer number of people they have helped obtain employment and the tireless efforts to help people reenter society or recover from addiction issues.

In October of 2020 the Brown Foundation emergency response program issued two grants totaling $52,500 to the United Way of Southwest Louisiana in response to Hurricane Delta, the second major storm to hit the same southwest region of our state over just a six week period. Ripping tarps from already damaged roofs and scattering massive piles of storm debris in the wind and water, Hurricane Delta inflicted a new round of destruction in Louisiana communities still reeling along a path Hurricane Laura carved just six weeks earlier. After interviewing several exempt organizations responding to this catastrophe, our program officers determined that the United Way branch that services this decimated region was best suited to immediately utilize this emergency support money to restore people to their homes. We have plans to provide further aid to this specific community over the coming weeks and months.

The Brown Foundation’s 2020 initiative focusing on basic science in Healthy Aging led us to work with many elite institutions we had hitherto not provided support for. One of these organizations was Cold Spring Harbor Laboratory (CSHL), which received a total of $133,000 in grants out of our competitive 2020 Healthy Aging Program. CSHL has been home to eight scientists who have been awarded the Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine. CSHL is ranked among the leading basic research institutions in molecular biology and genetics with Thomson Reuters ranking it #1 in the world. CSHL was also ranked #1 in research output worldwide by Nature. We were proud to support the Molecular Biology and Neuroscience Lab of Linda Van Aelst, Ph.D. for their project, Defining New Targets Underlying Stress-related Depressive Behaviors, as well as the Structural Biology and Neuroscience Lab led by Hiro Furukawa, PhD, for their project, Decoding Molecular Representation of Memory.

After a competitive analysis of the three laboratories that were competing for the $100,000 first place prize from CSHL, our program officers selected the Cancer and Cell Biology Lab led by Jason Sheltzer, Ph.D. As everyone knows, 2020 has been a fluidic year in philanthropy where emergencies needed to be analyzed and prioritized. Dr. Sheltzer did this and changed his laboratory’s focus to gleaning why the single greatest risk factor for dying from COVID-19 is old age. Dr. Sheltzer noted the cellular features that cause an increase in coronavirus susceptibility among elderly individuals are poorly understood. The Cancer and Cell Biology Lab proposed to combine in silico and cell-based assays to identify gene expression changes in aging lungs that are capable of promoting SARS-CoV-2 infections. Dr. Sheltzer will determine whether aging influences the expression of the SARS¬ CoV-2 receptor ACE2 or other mammalian proteins that have been found to influence viral dissemination. The functional importance of these gene expression changes will be validated using a SARS-CoV-2 pseudoparticle reporter system. Additionally, this research funded, in part, by the Brown Foundation will generate and analyze populations of senescent lung epithelial cells, which may serve as a cell-based platform to investigate aging-associated SARS-CoV-2 infections. In total, the experiments described in this project funded, in part, by the Brown Foundation will shed light on why elderly individuals are at such high risk of dying from COVID-19. This work will facilitate the identification of biomarkers that can predict COVID-19 susceptibility and the development of treatment strategies to protect populations that are vulnerable to severe infections.

The Community Foundation of Acadiana hosted the inaugural Louisiana Leaders in Law Enforcement Awards on Thursday, September 10, 2020 in Lafayette, Louisiana at River Ranch. This is a project envisioned and fully funded by the Brown Foundation under our Excellent Award Program and implemented and operated by the Community Foundation of Acadiana. First of the two Leaders in Law recipients: Ouachita Parish Sheriff’s Department received $25,000 because of their DMAC Program – Deputies Making A Change. The significantly successful DMAC Program is a mentoring program initiated to address the incarceration and school dropout rate among vulnerable male youth aged 9-18 in Ouachita Parish. This sheriff’s department is showing young men how to change their lives and create success for themselves. The Secon Leader in Law recipient: The 40th Judicial District Attorney’s Office of St. John the Baptist Parish was recognized and also received a $25,000 award for implementing their impactful Opportunity Now collaboration. Through education and meaningful employment offerings, Opportunity Now serves as a Criminal Justice System diversion program for low-risk, non-violent, first-time offenders by fostering intervention that is accountable to effectuate successful outcomes for individuals getting back on the right path and avoiding a life of crime. District Attorney Bridget A. Dinvaut recognizes that crime prevention, restorative justice and rehabilitation programs are vital to the public safety and future of her community in St. John the Baptist Parish. We are excited to see what is in store for Louisiana Leaders in Law, year two! The awards, underwritten by us and presented by The Community Foundation of Acadiana, aim to bolster morale, increase respect for public service, acknowledge improvements in operations, and encourage extraordinary performance among Louisiana’s sheriff’s departments and district attorney’s offices.

We wish to honor those departments who are making the most positive impacts in their communities. This year’s two recipients each received a $25,000 award to be used at their discretion to improve operations and continue to encourage extraordinary performance. Can you think of a deserving sheriff’s department or district attorney’s office in Louisiana? Let them know about this opportunity! The application process will be made available in March 2021 by the Community Foundation of Acadiana. All sheriff’s departments and district attorney’s offices from around the state are invited and encouraged to apply. Stay tuned to learn about an exciting and important expansion to this program coming in 2021!

Basic research in the field of Healthy Aging was the primary focus of the Foundation’s health and science department in 2020. Louisiana State University (LSU) is the flagship university of our home state, so an invitation to compete in our 2020 Healthy Aging Program was all but a certainty for LSU. At the beginning of this competitive grant project our program officers sorted through various contestant proposals from LSU, ultimately selecting three laboratories to represent LSU and instantly awarded $33,000 in grant support to three laboratories. In this initial round of support, we were proud to issue an award in favor of Alix DAngelo and Lucio Miele, M.D. Ph.D. for their Genetic Identification of Subjects project. They proposed first identifying a group of subjects with a known genetic risk for amyloidosis. The subjects would then be screened for pre clinical markers and potentially pathogenic proteins listed that may herald a future pathological change. The working hypothesis is that despite a genetic predisposition or other environmental stressors related to abnormal protein production, individuals who are active or very active have less amyloid genic abnormal protein production than the sedentary group. Additionally, in the initial round of support, we were also proud to issue an award in for the Assessment of Exercise and Activity Index led by Matthew Lammi, M.D. Frank Smart, M.D. and James Cairo, Ph.D. The activity index of various subjects will be separated based on the amount of METs activity performed over a given week and compared to a standard age based counterpart. Activity will not be corrected for BMI or other confounding parameters such as heart rate and maximal oxygen consumption. A subset of each of the groups will undergo cardiametabolic testing to assess their anaerobic threshold and maximal oxygen consumption in an effort to validate the selection by exercise METs.

After a rigorous competition and a round of COVID19 compliant Zoom interviews and follow up interviews, on December 8, 2020 the Foundation issued the $100,000 first place prize to neurologic assessment work of Yuhai Zhao, Ph.D. and Walter Lukiw, Ph.D. Doctors Zhao and Lukiw note that amyloid deposits in the brain have been associated with Alzheimers disease. In genetically at risk individuals, the ratio of two peripheral blood markers betaamyloid 42 and betaamyloid 40 have been associated with high brain amyloid deposits. Additionally CST3 will also be assayed. These LSU researchers have also identified microbiome changes associated with increased Alzheimers disease and increased brain amyloid plaques. In individuals with elevated beta amyloid. Gastrointestinal microbiome will be surveyed in the various groups. In any individual with elevated amyloid protein markers nerve conduction velocity will also be assessed to determine the effects on peripheral nerves. The Foundation notes that Dr. Zhao is a future elite researcher at LSU and we could not be prouder to help him establish his laboratory. For more information on Dr. Zhao and a list of his publications please cut and paste: https://www.medschool.lsuhsc.edu/neuroscience/faculty_yuhaizhao.aspx

Our service learning program is the Foundation’s longest standing project where we offer funds to schools via Service Learning Awards for a class, grades K-12, to link learning and intentional service to their community through an identified Service Partner. We have hitherto required our participant schools to identify their own outside Service Partner for their students to provide services to benefit others. That said, the challenges we have all faced in 2020 have been unprecedented and so – to reduce the burden on our participating schools and teachers - the Foundation has identified and funded numerous pre-approved Service Partners with suitable service learning projects that aim to be COVID-19 compliant and have sophisticated lesson plans for children of all age groups. These Service Partners include: (a) the World War II Musueum and their “Get in the Scrap” program, (b) UnCommon Construction for their rebuilding homes in NOLA and Lake Charles following the hurricanes, (c) Green Light New Orleans for their rain barrel program, (d) Louisiana Center for Afterschool Learning for connecting after school service learning with classroom work, (e) ARC of GNO for their bead sorting and recycling program. Of course, schools may still apply for their own programming with their own Service Partner.

The emergency response program at the Joe W. & Dorothy Dorsett Brown Foundation has, unfortunately, had a busy year in 2020. In response to the COVID-19 crisis and the unprecedented increase in the utilization of the services of food banks and food pantries, during the month of August we assisted ten (10) food pantries in Louisiana with financial support to help them acquire shelving, refrigeration, produce, and other needed items. Then - on August 28, 2020 - we issued a $47,500 emergency response grant to the Baton Rouge Area Community Foundation (for benefit of the SW Louisiana Community Foundation) to aid in the recovery from Hurricane Laura and the devastation it unleashed in southwest Louisiana. Hurricane Laura was one of the most powerful storms to make landfall in the United States in recorded history and the eye wall went through the center of Lake Charles – devastating this important Louisiana city. Our emergency response program officers are evaluating additional paths to aiding Lake Charles in its recovery efforts.

With over 18 million new cases in 2018 worldwide cancer is a common disease that affects, or will affect, all of us either directly or indirectly. Cancer is one of the main causes of death worldwide and was responsible for 9.6 million deaths in 2018. One of the goals of our 2019 Oncology Program was to provide support to up and coming researchers with new ideas. While investigating the trends in oncology oriented research, our program officers discovered that Institut Pasteur – one of the top infectious disease research centers on the planet – was launching a significant initiative into cancer studies. Through the Institut Pasteur’s U.S. based 501(c)3 support organization, the Foundation decided to aid in the Institut Pasteur’s efforts in launching this new initiative and added the Institut Pasteur to our 2019 Oncology Program, with the first three grants being issued on December 12, 2019 and the final grand prize award of $100,000 being issued on December 8, 2020. We were proud to support the Cellular Plasticity and Disease Modelling group, led by Han Li, Ph.D., for their project: Determining the impact of cellular senescence on postpartum breast cancer. We were also proud to support the Brain Plasticity in Response to the Environment group, led by Pauline Spéder, Ph.D., for their project: Investigating the interactions between healthy and cancerous cells. After the competitive evaluation process complete with COVID-19 compliant Zoom interviews and questioning, our grant review team selected as the $100,000 winner the Bioorganic Chemistry of Nucleic Acids group, led by Marcel Hollenstein, Ph.D., for their project: Development of Photosensitizing Aptamers for Selective Photodynamic Therapy of Colon Cancer. Delivery of anti-tumor chemotherapeutic agents and particularly of photosensitizers for photodynamic therapy (PDT) for the treatment of cancer is still a challenging task. Poor delivery of drugs is often associated with low accumulation in solid tumors and significant toxic side-effects (Nature Communications 2018, 9, 1410).

In order to alleviate these limitations, Dr. Hollenstein strives to use short DNA or RNA oligonucleotides known as aptamers to serve as drug delivery systems since these nucleic acids are capable of binding with high affinity and specificity to a broad variety of targets including cancer cells (Advanced Drug Delivery Reviews 2018, 134, 3). Hence, aptamers could accompany photosensitizers to their intended targets and improve the efficiency of the PDT treatment and to reduce undesired side- effects. Dr. Hollenstein addresses the lack of specificity of PDT agents by two different yet complementary approaches: 1. Identification of aptamers binding to colorectal cancer cells that are directly modified within their sequence PDT agents; 2. Appendage by enzymatic synthesis of numerous nucleotides modified with a PDT agent. Modified aptamers stemming from both approaches are assayed for their efficiency in PDT first in vitro on colorectal cancer cells and then in vivo on tumor bearing CT26-Luc Colon Tumor 26 mice models. Dr. Hollenstein believes this project has the potential to significantly move the field forward to an aptamer driven PDT and thus offer a novel treatment modality. In addition, this approach can easily be expanded to other forms of cancer by changing the target in the selection protocol or by changing the nature of the aptamer. Congratulations Dr. Hollenstein on winning the $100,000 competitive grant from the Foundation in December 2020.

We were deeply saddened that COVID-19 resulted in us canceling our annual Emmy Noether Awards celebration that was scheduled for June 2020, but it certainly did not stop us from running our program and selecting our winners. Grace Sun, a graduate of Caddo Parish Magnet High School, is a member of the Massachusetts Institute of Technology Class of 2024. With a primary goal of helping other people, she enjoys conducting scientific research and community service. In the past, she has worked on ischemic stroke projects at the LSU Health Sciences Center-Shreveport and a placental calcification project at Tufts Medical Center during the Research Science Institute. She is also the founder of Spread the Success, a student organization dedicated to teaching underprivileged students life skills and motivating them to pursue their greatest dreams. As our gold medal winner, Ms. Sun stands to receive up to $75,000 in scholarship support for qualified post graduate fellowship studies.

The Foundation has been an ardent supporter of the Whistle Stop for over a decade. The Whistle Stop is a supervised visitation center serving children, their families, and communities in Southwest Louisiana. The center provides a safe and secure location for children to visit parents and other relatives they might not otherwise be able to visit due to custody disputes, difficult family transitions, or families in conflict. Its goal is to eliminate as much of the emotional hardship that children frequently have to endure when parents or relatives are in conflict and meet for visitation exchange. The Whistle Stop offers an environment where children can feel safe and secure, while still maintaining contact with the parents and family members they love. Our grant support we issued in April 2020 for the Whistle Stop is earmarked specifically for their on-site supervised visitation program. Over the years the Foundation’s aggregate support for the Whistle Stop has exceeded $250,000!

2020 marked the first year that we accepted applications from students in southern Alabama. Gabby Taylor, a resident of Mobile, Alabama, is a recent graduate of the Alabama School of Mathematics and Science, and an aspiring neuroscientist. During her time at ASMS, she was granted the opportunity to work as an undergraduate researcher at the University of South Alabama College of Medicine, where she immersed herself in designing a novel thermal imaging device which could accurately and almost instantaneously determine the severity of partial thickness burn wounds. Gabby was selected as a finalist in the 2020 International Science and Engineering Fair, and her project abstract was formally published by the Society for Science and the Public. In the fall of 2020, Ms. Taylor will attend the University of Alabama in Birmingham on a merit-based “full-ride” scholarship, where she intends to earn a B.S. in neuroscience and gain additional research experience. From there, she plans to attend graduate school and earn a PhD in neuroscience. As one of our silver medal winners, Ms. Taylor stands to receive up to $25,000 in scholarship support for qualified post graduate fellowship studies.

Emily Bush went to Baton Rouge Magnet High School, where she graduated summa cum laudi. She conducted a study that explored anti-homeless hostile architecture and the impacts of education about hostile architecture on its public perception. Along with conducting the research, she was the president of her school’s Interact Club, captain and All District goalkeeper for her school’s soccer team, a member of the National Honor Society, and Ms. Bush also held a part-time job as a supervisor at Chick-fil-a. Emily plans to attend Texas A&M University, where she will study civil engineering. She hopes to earn a master’s of engineering and develop new eco-friendly ways for transportation. As one of our silver medal winners, Ms. Bush stands to receive up to $25,000 in scholarship support for qualified post graduate fellowship studies.

We are proud to announce that as of our most recent gift in April 2020, our funding out of our grants program for New Orleans Mission has exceeded $1,000,000. When you include our program related investments for their physical plant, our total contributions are now $2,365,000. The services of New Orleans Mission are dedicated to the rescue, recovery and re-engagement of people facing homelessness, addiction, human trafficking or abuse in the Greater New Orleans area. Today, with our assistance, the Mission is serving more people than ever before. In addition to other needed services, over 38,000 delicious hot meals are served each month to the hungry in our region. Breakfast and lunch are served daily. Dinner is served Monday through Friday. The Foundation is very proud of this partnership that began with three successful program related investments to develop the Mission’s property on Oretha Castle Haley Boulevard in New Orleans.

Covid-19 has been disruptive for many, but we believe it is important to run our programs as we had planned and provide the funding we committed to provide promptly and fully. To that end, in April of 2020 we released our seventh grant award to HeartGift Louisiana. Their latest grant application won a $30,000 approval from our program officers. Since 2013, the Foundation has proudly funded Heartgift Louisiana in the aggregate amount of $155,000. Children with heart defects travel from China, Jamaica, Uganda (to name a few) to the Children’s Hospital New Orleans, and return home healthy. Since 2010, HeartGift Louisiana has provided over 60 children, from 17 different countries, with life-saving surgeries they could not get at home.

The Brown Foundation’s pilot Summer Camp Program was successfully launched in late 2019 and in March 2020 we issued our first approvals ever out of this program. Grant requests submitted to this first year pilot program were incredibly competitive and we were overjoyed to see so many quality applications for camps in Louisiana and Mississippi. This program was formed with the intent of serving children who are unable to attend most other camps due to special medical needs and further focuses on programming that promotes STEM, advanced learning and leadership. The pilot 2020 Summer Camp Program awarded an aggregate total of $110,000 to nine organizations this first year. We’re proud and appreciative of these groups that are adapting to COVID-19 restrictions on planned programming, working tirelessly to still have impact on their campers. We recognize the challenges these summer camp programs will face this year with many of them having to make the tough decision to not hold their planned face-to-face overnight camps and we at the Foundation are assisting them with the one time only transition to alternate programming.

Though we at the Foundation could not have predicted how devastating Covid-19 would be to our country and local community, our program officers began tracking the global emergency shortly after New Years’ Day. By early January, the Foundation was consulting with numerous leading scientists who would be at the front lines in the weeks to come in the fight against Covid-19. As of February 7, 2020, our Emergency Response Program has released $75,000 to launch three fundamental research programs against the virus that would cause the pandemic. Tulane University’s National Primate Research Center and the La Jolla Institute for Immunology received $25,000 each. At Tulane’s Research Center, the research is being led by Jay Rappaport, Ph.D. Dr. Rappaport is a professor in Tulane’s School of Medicine’s Department of Microbiology and Immunology and serves as the Director and Chief Academic Officer of the Tulane National Primate Center. At the La Jolla Institute for Immunology, we funded research led by Erica Ollmann Saphire Ph.D. Dr. Saphire is a Professor at LJI and part of a multi-lab task force investigating the virus.

On February 6, 2020 the Institut Pasteur publicly called for financial support for their coronavirus task force. On February 7, 2020 the Foundation answered this call through our emergency response program with a $25,000 expedited gift to support the task force. The Institut Pasteur is often regarded as the top infectious disease research center on the planet. It is not a surprise to anyone that the Institut Pasteur is taking the lead in researching and understanding the coronavirus strain that is currently terrifying communities everywhere. With the whole viral genome of coronavirus 2019nCoV having recently been sequenced at the Institut Pasteur, the isolation of strains of coronavirus 2019nCoV detected in France has now been successfully finalized, in a very short space of time, using the samples taken from the first confirmed French cases. Now that the Institut Pasteur scientists have access to coronavirus 2019nCoV, they can set out to improve scientific knowledge about the virus including a. serology or screening for the disease, b. development of specific treatments, c. developing a vaccination, and d. viral pathogenesis.

The Brown Foundation is proud to announce the winner of the $100,000 grant designated for MD Anderson, an invited participant to our 2019 Oncology Program, is the laboratory of Florencia McAllister, MD. Dr. McAllister is a physician-scientist who leads an up and coming basic and translational immunology laboratory with the goal of making discoveries that can result in effective cancer early detection, immunoprevention and immunotherapy. Her lab focuses on understanding the role of the immune system in immunosurveilance and immunoevasion and on dissecting the molecular and cellular mechanisms that regulate the immune responses to tumor initiation and progression with the goal of designing novel effective strategies to prevent and treat cancer. More recently, the laboratory has developed an interest on assessing the role of bacterial products in modulating cancer immune responses. The Foundation is honored to issue the award in the amount of $100,000 to further this ground breaking fundamental science. Further information about the incredible work of Florencia McAllister, MD may be found at: https://faculty.mdanderson.org/profiles/florencia_mcallister.html

Did you know the Toys for Tots program, founded by the United States Marine Corps, is supported by law enforcement agencies across the United States? The Toys for Tots program has distributed 584,000,000 toys to 265,000,000 different children in the United States since its inception. We have made gifts to support this program in Louisiana every year since 2014, with the most recent award being issued in December 2019. To date, we have proudly issued awards totaling $17,500 to the Lake Charles Police Officers Association for its Toys for Tots project.

In December of 2019, the Foundation approved its first ever grant award to the People Program New Orleans. We learned of this organization through our Letter of Interest protocols and they have been formally invited to apply to the Foundation on more than one occasion throughout the years; however, 2019 marked the first year where an application resulted in an award being issued. This non-profit offers a community of health and wellness for New Orleans area seniors and is truly one of the best kept secrets in New Orleans. The People Program New Orleans is a non-profit membership organization for persons 50 years old and over who are looking for creative ways to spend leisure time and connect with others. As a sponsored ministry of the Sisters of St. Joseph, currently there are almost 500 members enrolled of diverse backgrounds, ranging from ages 50 to 90. Over 100 varied courses are offered and include exercise, computer, dance, art, needlework, crafts, games, languages, music, and more. For more information on the hard work of the People Program New Orleans, please visit their website: http://www.peopleprogram.org/

The Brown Foundation is proud to announce the winner of the $100,000 grant designated for Scripps Research, a participant in our 2019 Oncology Program, is The Brunie Felding Lab. Under the direction of Brunie H. Felding, PhD this laboratory is on the cutting edge of science with a goal of defining and targeting molecular mechanisms that control tumor metastasis. Metastasis is the main cause of death in cancer patients and if dissemination of tumor cells from primary to distant sites could be prevented or blocked after it has occurred, the mortality of patients with solid tumors could be drastically reduced, and cancer would be curable disease. Further information about the incredible work of Brunie H. Felding, PhD may be found here: https://www.scripps.edu/faculty/felding-habermann/

The Brown Foundation is proud to announce the winner of the $100,000 grant designated for Memorial Sloan Kettering Cancer Center, an invited participant to our 2019 Oncology Program, is The Adrienne Boire Lab. Under the direction of physician-scientist Adrienne A. Boire, this laboratory is on the cutting edge of science with the study of metastasis to the central nervous system. Her laboratory focuses on metastasis to the central nervous system (CNS), both leptomeningeal and parenchymal metastases and she employs multiple complementary approaches to identify and target cancer cell adaptations to the challenging microenvironmental constraints posed by the CNS. The Foundation is honored to issue this award in the amount of $100,000 to further this ground breaking fundamental science. Further information about the incredible work of Adrienne A. Boire, MD, PhD may be found here: https://www.mskcc.org/research-areas/labs/adrienne-boire

Though the Foundation generally requires more than two years of operational history before we consider program support, rare exceptions have been made for programing that is dealing with an acute emergency or has the potential to be revolutionary. One such case where we proudly supported an organization during their operational commencement is Café Reconcile. Café Reconcile now has a 15-year track record of success, 100 active partnerships, and more than 400 requests to support similar efforts in other communities not just in the United States but around the world. Grant support from the Foundation for Café Reconcile began in 2004 with the most recent grant of $25,000 being vetted and approved by our grant review team in November of 2019. A total of ten (10) grants aggregating to $285,500 have been approved for Café Reconcile’s Workforce Development Program over the last sixteen (16) years. With the financial backing of its supporters, Cafe Reconcile’s Workforce Development Program has successfully graduated more than 1,500 youth between the ages of 16 and 24.

These students leave the 8-week program with basic independent living skills, interpersonal skills and work skills, enabling and empowering them to successfully enter the workforce. Café Reconcile has established a sustainable model for helping disadvantaged youth achieve career success. Currently, Cafe Reconcile strives to provide: 1) youth with an opportunity to learn the life, job, and educational skills necessary for successful entry into the food service and construction industries, 2) a cornerstone for the economic recovery of the Central City neighborhood, and 3) a gathering place where people of goodwill can work together to solve difficult problems.

We at the Brown Foundation developed our 2019 Oncology Program through a pilot program we ran at Tulane in 2018 at the laboratory of Victoria P. Belancio, PhD. In December of 2019 we issued another award in the amount of $100,000 to support the revolutionary science occurring at the Tulane Center for Aging in Dr. Belancio’s laboratory, bringing our total support for her efforts to alleviate human suffering to $337,900. Dr. Belancio’s primary research interests are focused on genetic instability and cellular responses associated with the activity of mammalian retroelements. She is studying molecular mechanisms controlling the expression of and the damage from these elements in normal and cancer cells. She is broadly recognized for her original contributions to understanding the impact of retrotransposons on genome stability and disease and her first major discovery involved identification of novel mechanisms attenuating expression and damage caused by LINE-1 retrotransposon. Further information about the groundbreaking work of Victoria P. Belancio, PhD. may be found here: https://medicine.tulane.edu/departments/structural-cellular-biology-tulane-center-aging-center-circadian-biology-tulane-cancer

The Brown Foundation is proud to announce the winner of the $100,000 grant designated for the Dana-Farber Cancer Institute - an invited participant to our 2019 Oncology Program - is the laboratory of Irene Ghobrial, MD for her groundbreaking work in the study of Multiple Myeloma (MM). MM is a plasma cell cancer that is almost always preceded by the precursor states of monoclonal gammopathy of undetermined significance (MGUS) and smoldering multiple myeloma (SMM). Improvements to non-invasive detection technologies are needed to monitor MM disease progression in order to provide early therapeutic interventions for these patients. Dr. Ghobrial proposes an integrative and powerful blood biopsy approach for early-stage/minimal tumor detection to monitor disease progression in patients with precursor MGUS and SMM. Further information about the incredible work of Irene Ghobrial, MD can be found here: https://www.dana-farber.org/find-a-doctor/irene-ghobrial/

The Brown Foundation is proud to announce the winner of the $100,000 grant designated for the University of Florida Health Cancer Center - an invited participant to our 2019 Oncology Program - is the laboratory of Catherine T. Flores, PhD. Dr. Flores joined the University of Florida faculty to become part of the Preston A. Wells Jr. Center for Brain Tumor Therapy in order to focus on developing novel approaches to target brain tumors. She has developed a pre-clinical platform that utilizes tumor-specific autologous immune cells to efficiently target intracranial tumors. Her research interests are primarily in determining biological interactions between various cellular compartments involved in adoptive immunotherapy. Her studies also focus on leveraging systemic toxicity of frequently practiced clinical treatments in order to further enhance anti-tumor efficacy of immunotherapy. Further information about the incredible work of Catherine Flores, PhD can be found here: https://neurosurgery.ufl.edu/faculty-staff/research-faculty/c-flores/

The Brown Foundation is proud to announce the winner of the $100,000 grant designated for the University of Mississippi - an invited participant to our 2019 Oncology Program - is the laboratory of Dr. Pier Paolo Claudio. His laboratory’s main utilization of the $100,000 grant from the Foundation will be to further his work in assessing the therapeutic efficiency of the tumor suppressor gene p53 expressed by a human replication-deficient-adenoviruses or a conditionally replicative human oncolytic-adenovirus, delivered by ultrasound-targeted microbubble destruction (UTMD), in conjunction with radiation therapy (RT). Dr. Claudio hypothesizes that MBs will target the delivery of RDAds and OVs expressing p53 to human PC cells grafted in immune-deficient NOD Rag gamma mice (NRG), and that MBs/hOVs will induce a greater tumor reduction in conjunction with radiation therapy in comparison to the MB/hRADs. To learn more about the sophisticated research of Dr. Claudio please visit: https://pharmacy.olemiss.edu/bms/team/dr-pier-paolo-claudio/

The Brown Foundation support for the National WWII Museum commenced in the late 1990s. We were one of the first groups to fund this museum to help ensure it would be located in New Orleans. The Museum opened on the 56th anniversary of D Day, June 6, 2000. To date we have contributed a total of $3,331,511 to support this essential organization. Following the disbanding of our Arts and Culture Program in 2015, the bulk of our recent support for this organization has been through our educational initiatives, but historically we have proudly been lead sponsor on numerous exhibits such as the Special Exhibit Gallery in Discovery Hall, the Oral History project, the Into the German Heartland and the End of War exhibit in the Campaigns Pavilion, the Loyal Forces: The Animals of WWII that was featured in the Special Exhibits Gallery in 2010, and the Searching for International Justice and Order and Services Exhibit in the U.S. Freedom Pavilion. This is one of our most proud partnerships over the last several decades.

Families Helping Families of Greater New Orleans is a family directed resource center serving the entire state of Louisiana since 1991. They provide peer to peer support, information, resources, and training on disability/special health care need and special education topics. We first issued a small exploratory grant to this prestigious organization in 2000, and then developed a program with them eighteen years later. In October of 2019 our board proudly approved a second $25,000 grant to support FHF’s pilot program to work with children diagnosed with autism, teaching said children the science of computer coding and securing employment in the high technology industry. For more information about Families Helping Families and their incredible dedication to improving lives in the state of Louisiana please visit their website: https://fhfofgno.org/

The Brown Foundation is proud to announce the winner of the $100,000 grant designated for Louisiana State University (LSU) - an invited participant to our 2019 Oncology Program - is the sophisticated work of Harry J. Gould III, M.D., Ph.D. (photo’d) and Dennis Paul, Ph.D. Dr. Gould & Dr. Paul’s work is to activate sodium channels while pharmacologically blocking sodium pumps. Thus, they believe they can selectively kill cancer cells, bacteria and inflamed neurons. In the presence of disease or injury, basic cellular mechanisms that are usually beneficial for cell function can become detrimental to an organism’s survival. Current approaches for treating cancer and disease focus on eliminating the offending agent in the hope that normal functioning will return. This approach is effective when the components of cellular function have not been changed by the disease; but in many disease states such as cancer, basic cellular functioning is altered. In such instances, the standard approach to treatment is to correct or eliminate the altered cells, e.g. chemotherapy or radiation treatments in cancer, thereby effecting a treatment. Dr. Gould & Dr. Paul propose a different approach to treating the altered cells: to use the way in which they differ from normal cells (the very features that make them so successful) against them to cause their destruction without damaging the normal cells. This is a paradigm shift from conventional methods for treating cancer that the Brown Foundation is truly honored to have the opportunity to support.

The Brown Foundation is proud to announce the winner of the $100,000 grant designated for the Salk Institute - an invited participant to our 2019 Oncology Program - is the Regulatory Biology Laboratory with Dannielle Engle, PhD. as the principal investigator. Dr. Engle’s proposal to epigenetically intercept CA19-9 for the treatment of pancreatic cancer is potentially nothing short of revolutionary. She has already demonstrated that CA19-9 is a therapeutic target in pancreatic inflammation and cancer. Instead of drugging CA19-9 itself and waiting for this high abundance target to reach elevated levels, Dr. Engle proposes to go after the elevation process itself. She will do this by identifying the key epigenetic regulators controlling CA19-9 levels in human pancreatic organoid cultures using drugs that are rapidly translatable to the clinic. In layman’s terms, Dr. Engle’s work builds upon the finding that pancreatic cancer cells use different sugars than normal pancreatic cells. She will test whether interference with metabolic pathways governing the production of these sugars will weaken the cancer cells without impacting the healthy cells. This work also considers the financial burden of a cancer diagnosis by pursuing drugs that are already FDA-approved and are also now available as generics, reducing their cost by 5- to 10-fold. Dr. Engle’s hypothesis is that preventing the elevation of CA19-9 will shut down the malignant cascade and trigger cell death in the cancer cells. For more information on the work of Dr. Engle, please visit here: https://www.salk.edu/scientist/dannielle-engle/

On Tuesday, September 10, 2019 our Education Team hosted our twentieth (20th) annual Joe W. and Dorothy Dorsett Brown Foundation Service Learning Event! A fantastic time was had by all at the Lake Pontchatrain Center, where we have hosted the event every year for more than a decade.

Teachers, students and local non-profits came together to kick-off another school year of service learning projects that span 11 parishes and total over $230,000 in funding for 108 unique Service Learning Plans across 62 different K-12 schools. Our total attendance at our 2019 celebration event topped 1,200 people dedicated to improving the human condition through the utilization of service learning.

Pictured left and right (respectively) are 2019-2020 service learning participants from Arlene Meraux Elementary School in St. Bernard Parish and Destrehan High School in St. Charles Parish! Destrehan High School received $7,404 in support of TWO Service Learning Plans, one being where students of the Industrial Electronics and robotics program will inspire and educate younger students about STEM at seven Greater New Orleans Area elementary schools. The second plan being their Junior Reserve Officer’s Training Corps class teaching middle school students about American Flag etiquette.

Arlene Meraux Elementary School received funding for TWO plans as well: 1) environmental science students will complete services at a local cultural arts center involving weeding in the center’s garden beds, testing the soils and planting starter seedlings while 2) science and math students will partner with LSU Coastal Roots Program to plant, study and nurture cypress trees on school grounds before transporting them to areas in need of coastal restoration. Funding for Arlene Meraux Elementary totals $2,600.00 this school year!

Scripps Research enjoys a rich history of academic and scientific achievement. Its world-class faculty and visionary leadership have partnered to create a top-ranked nonprofit biomedical research institute that translates discoveries into new medicines while training the next generation of scientists. In 2016 program officers for the Foundation conducted a site visit to Scripps Research. Though this site visit did not lead to a grant the visit left a longstanding positive impression on the Foundation and now in 2019 we have determined that Scripps Research is a perfect fit for our Oncology Initiative Program. Three lead in exploratory grants of $10,000 each have issued to Scripps Research for three world class projects.

Come back in December of 2019 to learn which of these three laboratories will receive a full grant of $100,000: 1. The Brunhilde Felding Lab – for research into modulation of tumor cell metabolism to reduce resistance to therapies, under the direction of Brunhilde Felding, Ph.D. 2. The Wendy Havran Lab – for gamma-delta T cell stimulation research, under the direction of Wendy Havran, Ph.D. 3. The Katja Lamia Lab – for research harnessing circadian rhythm pathways to suppress cancers - under the direction of Katja Lamia, Ph.D.

Ms. Dorothy Dorsett Brown spent much of her time in the beautiful state of Mississippi and a meaningful portion of her philanthropic attentions were dedicated to improving the human condition in Mississippi. The Foundation is proud to announce its first ever project with the University of Mississippi Medical Center, Cancer Center, who after careful consideration was invited to participate in our basic science oriented 2019 Oncology Initiative Program. The following three projects received, in the aggregate, $30,000 of exploratory grants in August of 2019 from the Foundation,

and one of them will be selected for a substantially larger research support award in December of 2019: 1. Demonstrate that Lfng marks both cell-of-origin and cancer stem-like cells of PDAC, ultimately leading to the identification of novel biomarkers for early detection and/or targeted therapy for pancreatic cancer, under the direction of Dr Keli Xu. 2. Development of chemotherapeutic agents to be used in the fight against leukemia: PUFAs and enhanced hematopoiesis, under the direction Dr. Yann Gilbert. 3. Gene therapy and improvement of the adenovirus as a delivery system in fight against Prostate Cancer, under the direction of Dr. Pier Paulo Claudio.

One of the most exciting activities a foundation gets to undertake is launching new initiatives. Frequently a new initiative exposes us to organizations we may have hitherto never interacted with. When that new organization is a decorated and revered world class leader in their field like the Dana-Farber Cancer Institute is in oncology research, we feel truly blessed and become incredibly captivated by their programming. At the Dana-Farber Cancer Institute basic, translational, clinical, and population sciences research are never far apart — physically or philosophically. It’s a tradition that goes back to the Institute’s founder, Sidney Farber, MD, who conceived of a facility where scientists in upper-floor laboratories would make discoveries that could be used in treating cancer patients in ground-floor clinics.

On August 16, 2019 the Foundation issued three exploratory grants to three laboratories with our new friends to further basic research. In December of 2019 one of these three labs will receive a $100,000 award to further support their research: 1. The Center for the Prevention of Progression of Blood Cancers (CPOP), under direction of Rob Soiffer, M.D. and Irene Ghobrial, M.D. 2. Reprogramming Immune Responses Using Long Non-coding RNAs, under direction of Carl D. Novina MD, PhD. 3. Immunotherapeutic Vaccine Strategy for Lung Cancer, under direction of David Barbie, MD (DF/HCC Lung Cancer Program); Jonathan Duke-Cohan, PhD (biochemistry); Bruce Reinhold, PhD (Mass Spectrometry); and Ellis Reinherz, MD (molecular immunology).

The University of Florida is one of the most prestigious universities along the gulf coast and is the only AAU accredited member university in Florida. The UF Health Cancer Center has a mission to prevent, detect, treat and ultimately cure cancer. The overarching goal of the UF Health Cancer Center is to improve cancer outcomes. This is, in part, accomplished by promoting research in cancer mechanisms, developing and conducting interventional clinical trials addressing the most prevalent cancers that affect patients, and improving their understanding of the determinants of cancer outcomes in rural, underserved and elderly patients.The UF Health Cancer Center is committed to the interdisciplinary basic discovery and translational research, and the pursuit of scientific endeavors that have near-term clinical applications.

It is our honor to have just issued three exploratory grants to this organization to further basic research with the following projects: 1. The development of novel pathways of micro RNA processing in gene regulation and cancer, under the direction of Mingyi Xie, Ph.D., Assistant Professor in the Department of Biochemistry UF College of Medicine. 2. The development of novel approaches to target brain tumors, under direction of Catherine T. Flores, Ph.D., Assistant Professor Department of Neurosurgery UF College of Medicine. 3. Understanding the biochemical activities of carbohydrate processing enzymes involved in cancer progression and metastasis, under the direction of Lina Cui, Ph.D., Assistant Professor in the Department of Medicinal Chemistry UF College of Pharmacy.

“The Price of Freedom Can Be Seen Within These Walls.” — Captain William “Bill” Detweiler. Construction on the New Orleans VA Medical Center (an eight-story, 1.6-million-square-foot hospital that replaced an aging facility destroyed by Hurricane Katrina) was completed in November of 2016. On August 13, 2019 the Foundation was able to develop our first program within this impressive structure. We couldn’t be prouder to be the first private foundation to grant $50,000 of money to the Louisiana Veterans Research and Education Corporation to help them fill their laboratories and launch their veteran focused research operations. Need lab space? Contact Stephanie Kleehammer (the Executive Director of Louisiana Veterans Research and Education Corporation) today and see if this impressive new center could house your research initiatives.

In early July of 2019, Hurricane Barry threatened the Louisiana coastline. Though New Orleans did not catch the worst of the storm, there was still flooding that impacting non-profit organizations throughout our region. The administrative offices of our friends at the School Leadership Center of Greater New Orleans were some of the offices that were damaged and they needed an emergency home base to continue their operations. We at the Foundation were blessed to have a vacant office at the Brown Foundation Center so we took in their three employees and housed the operations of the School Leadership Center of Greater New Orleans through August 19, 2019. It was our pleasure and honor to provide rent and cost free emergency space to our friends. Learn more about the great work of the School Leadership Center of Greater New Orleans through their website: https://www.slc-gno.org/

At MD Anderson, one of the nations top institutions for cancer care, crucial scientific knowledge gained in the laboratory is rapidly translated into clinical care. In FY18, MD Anderson invested almost $863 million in research, a 17% increase in the past five years and a substantial investment in humanity’s future. MD Anderson and the Brown Foundation have partnered with one another to fight cancer several times over the years. It took little deliberation among our program officers to unanimously determine MD Anderson was a perfect invitee to our 2019 Oncology Initiative Program. On August 16, 2019 the Foundation issued three exploratory grants of $10,000 each to three basic science projects with MD Anderson. The Foundation’s three newest initiatives to battle cancer beside our longstanding allies in the fight against cancer at MD Anderson include:

(1) the work of Mark Bedford, Ph.D. in using protein domain microarrays to evolve small-molecule inhibitors of epigenetic pathways; (2) the work of Guillermina “Gigi” Lozano, Ph.D. in identifying vulnerabilities in p53 mutant tumors; and (3) the work of Florencia McAllister, M.D., in understanding the role of the immune system in immunosurveillance and immunoevasion and on dissecting the molecular and cellular mechanisms that regulate the immune responses to tumor progression. At the end of 2019 one of these three laboratories at MD Anderson will receive an additional one hundred thousand dollars in support through our new program.

The Foundation couldn’t be prouder that LSU Health and Sciences was one of the nine basic research institutions to be featured in our 2019 Oncology Initiative Program. In August of 2019 the Foundation issued three exploratory grants of $30,000 to three cancer research programs at LSU.  In December of 2019, one of these three programs will be converted from an exploratory grant to a full foundation grant of $100,000 in additional research support.

The Foundation’s three newest projects to fight cancer along side LSU include: (1) the work of Hamid Boulares, PhD to develop a new and improved approach to treat/prevent inflammatory diseases that involve oxidant stress and PARP-1 activation; (2) the work of Francesca Peruzzi, PhD on molecular mechanisms associated with brain cell dysfunction caused by HIV-1 infection and on the role of microRNAs in controlling tumor growth; and (3) the work of Harry J. Gould, M.D.,Ph.D., and Dennis Paul, Ph.D. in targeted osmotic lysis (activating sodium channels while pharmacologically blocking sodium pumps).

The Memorial Sloan Kettering Cancer Center is one of the world wide leaders in cancer treatment and research. In July of 2019 the Foundation proudly issued three exploratory grants of $30,000 to three laboratories at Sloan Kettering. At the end of 2019 one of these three labs will receive an additional, substantially larger, gift from the Foundation.

The Foundation’s three newest projects to fight cancer with Sloan Kettering include: (1) Genomic landscape underlying response to anti-PD-1 immunotherapy in patients with non-small cell lung cancers, under the direction of Matthew Hellmann, MD; (2) Defining and dissecting immune cell-cancer cell interactions in the spinal fluid, under the direction of Adrienne Boire, MD, PhD; and (3) Understanding the roles of histone 3 lysine 36 methyltransferases in regulating gene expression and in cancer, under the direction of Zhen Sun, PhD and Kristian Helin, PhD.

Foundation support for Boys Town over the last two decades has totaled $226,250. Boys Town Louisiana opened in 1989, and today meets the needs of youth and families through a variety of Integrated Continuum of Care® services. Boys Town offers Diagnostic and Assessment Services to provide immediate help to youth in dangerous situations and Boys Town has three Family Homes for Adolescents in New Orleans while even providing In-Home Family Services SM to qualified troubled families. These services and programs supported by the Brown Foundation touch the lives of 7,600 children and families in Louisiana each year.

The Ochsner Clinic Foundation recently received $19,900 for STEM programming support for professional development. We’re very pleased to have another program with this group, who last received grant approval from the Brown Foundation in 2007. Our relationship with Ochsner spans nearly 30 years, and total funding has now surpassed $350,000 with this most recent grant.

2019 SupportSTEM grantees were announced and awarded funds at our June 4, 2019 Emmy Noether Awards Event! Twenty-seven applicants were approved for a total of $304,022. Recipients presented the best STEM implementation plans and instructional support for k-12 schools via paid professional development, curriculum implementation programs, equipment and STEM kits.

Pictured left are our partners from the Talaria Antibodies out of Baton Rouge, accepting the award on behalf of Bay Area Bioscience Education Community who are working to create a new STEM curriculum. Pictured right is Electric Girls, one of the few groups to receive a SupportSTEM award from the Foundation in both 2018 and 2019.

Lusher Charter School accepting 2019 SupportSTEM Award at June 4, 2019 event. Project “Environmental Sustainability” received $18,645 in support! Also included in picture (second from the right) is Amaris Lewis, our 2019 Emmy Noether Award Gold Medalist who is a (very!) recent alumni of Lusher Charter School.

GNO Science and Engineering Fair accepting 2019 SupportSTEM Award at June 4, 2019 event. Project “Mentors for Student STEM Research” received $12,390 in support!

Archbishop Shaw High School accepting 2019 SupportSTEM Award at June 4, 2019 event. Project “Forensic Science” received $16,675 in funding support! We loved this plan involving the build of a new class and a motivated teacher working with great partners. This program aims to foster interest in science careers through the emulation of forensic methodology. Could a future crime scene analyst be inspired by this foundation gift?

Woodmere Elementary School accepting 2019 SupportSTEM Award at June 4, 2019 event. Project “Woodmere STEM” received $8,670 in support!

The 2019 Emmy Noether Awards Event was held at the Louisiana Cancer Research Center on Tuesday, June 4, 2019. It was another successful year! Professor E.F. Hunter III and gold medalist Amaris Lewis.

One of our two silver medalists, Shivani Patel, with her family and Foundation board members.

Taylor Collins, one of the Emmy Noether Award Scholars, with Professor Hunter, the Foundation’s Education Program Officer and President. We couldn’t be more proud of these young ladies.

Special thanks to our 2019 Emmy Noether Award judges! First row: Kristi Trail, P.E. Jean Jacob, Ph.D., Cathie Smith, Victoria Belancio, Ph.D., and Tamika Duplessis, Ph.D.

WYES has a mission, in part, “to educate and inform”. We at the Foundation have a long history of partnering with WYES to produce high quality educational programming in Louisiana. On April 30, 2019 we awarded $90,000 to WYES to assist in their Service Learning Opportunities Project. This new project will feature multiplatform programing with streaming, broadcast, an online forum, and other avenues to assist Louisiana and Mississippi educators learn more about service learning initiatives in our region. Stay tuned for the Service Learning Programming on WYES!

We at the Foundation love seeing groups that legitimately cross over into multiple areas where we are focused.  Such was the case with our new friends at unCommon Construction who recently received a grant in the amount of $12,000 in support of their expanded programming.  At unCommon Construction, youth from different high schools apply to join a diverse team to earn hourly pay and school internship credit for building a house in a semester. With the revenue from each project, apprentices also earn a matching "Equity Award Scholarship" for further education, industry certifications or the tools (literally the tools!) needed for long-term employment. Through more than 100 hours each semester, apprentices develop career awareness and exposure, technical, soft skills, and leadership abilities through a work-based learning experience in a real-world classroom. Learn more about our new friends at www.uncommonconstruction.org/

Our program to preserve the Louisiana coastline while simultaneously sequestering carbon to preserve the planet continues to matriculate. In March of 2019 the Salk Institute graciously hosted researchers from the Louisiana coalition (including Tulane ByWater Institute, LUMCON, Lake Pontchartrain Basin Foundation, The Water Institute of the Gulf, and - our Program Officer - Dr. Ronald Spencer) to work on the larger federal support grant applications. During the three days of meetings Dr. Spencer proudly presented an additional $100,000 grant to support the ongoing collaboration of the five research organizations. The Brown Foundation is committed to addressing the carbon build up struggles we face through science and believes the Salk Institute led marsh grass project can salvage the Louisiana coastline.

Our SupportSTEM applications were due on April 5, 2019. This is the second year of our SupportSTEM pilot program and we received 38 applications totaling $620,000 in requested funds! We are honored to play this small part in helping develop STEM programming in the New Orleans MSA.

Did you know the Brown Foundation has a large conference room that is free for exempt organizations to utilize for their training sessions, seminars and board meetings? From January 1, 2018 through March 15, 2019, the Foundation’s conference room has been used 159 times by dozens of different organizations we are proud to call our partners. If you or a charity you work with has need of a conference room in Metairie, Louisiana please contact Beth Buscher at 504-834-3433 and make a reservation. We already have 71 bookings for this totally free space (with free parking!) in 2019 so do not delay.

The Foundation has a long, proud history of supporting first responders and we are proud to call The Professional Fire Fighters Association of Louisiana a partner in our efforts. PFFALA utilize no professional grant writers or outside fundraisers of any kind and they conduct all of their money raising efforts in-house. We were proud to issue our third grant to this organization in December 2018.

Over the last twenty years, the Foundation has gifted $298,375 to Loyola University, but no gifts have been made to Loyola since 2011...that is, until January of 2019!

Our very first grant in 2019 is a $30,000 feasibility/planning grant to Loyola University for the launch of a new post graduate program that we have been working with Loyola to develop since the fall of 2018. This program, assuming development, will be the first of its kind in the United States and will draw sophisticated and already successful students to Loyola from all over the country. Check back in the summer of 2019 to learn what exactly our new and exciting partnership with Loyola may entail.

In late November 2018, the Louisiana Universities Marine Consortium hosted scientists from the Tulane ByWater Institute, The Water Institute of the Gulf, and the Lake Pontchatrain Basin Foundation (among others) along with two program officers from Brown. For their efforts and in order to assist LUMCON secure and participate in a much larger federal program, the Foundation issued a $20,000 planning grant to LUMCON.

Following an extended weekend worth of meetings among five major research institutions, universities and the Foundation around the Houma area, the Foundation proudly issued a $20,000 planning grant to Tulane ByWater Institute to aid Tulane in applying for a larger federal grant in the carbon sequestration space to save our coastline.

The Lake Ponchartrain Basin Foundation shares Brown’s vision for protecting our coastline and sees the importance of marsh grass to the vulnerable gulf coast region and all the animals inhabiting same. On the day before Thanksgiving 2018 we issued our first grant to the Lake Ponchartrain Basin Foundation in more than a decade. We are proud to renew this partnership and look forward to the matriculation of the science.

Biotechnology is key to the economic growth of the entire gulf coast region and the United States. Throughout this country biotech incubators have been forming to help aspiring scientists take their ideas from the laboratory and put them into commerce. Located just outside of the French Quarter, the New Orleans BioInnovation Center has received three grants totaling $90,000 since 2017. Our support of the New Orleans BioInnovation Center does not stop at cash contributions, we have proudly produced guest speakers for their conferences and have provided other critical services to help them fulfill their mission.