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2023 Young Investigator Draft

Request for application to open August 1, 2022

Learn more below and check back to access RFA

Presented by:CSL Behring

Event Photos

2023 Young Investigator Draft

  • About
  • 2022 Draft Class
  • Sponsors
  • Past Draft Classes

About Young Investigator Draft

Watch the full 2022 Young Investigator Draft

The Young Investigator Draft is the result of Uplifting Athletes’ ongoing commitment to cultivate resources that accelerate scientific advancements for rare disease treatments and potential cures while facilitating the next generation of rare disease researchers.

Young Investigator Draft grants fund collaborative basic bench research in order to positively impact treatments and potential cures for the entire Rare Disease Community.

Uplifting Athletes has provided more than $620,000 in funding to 34 rare disease researchers through its first five Young Investigator Drafts.

Uplifting Athletes

What to Expect for the 2023 Young Investigator Grants

The 2023 Young Investigator Grants Request for Application (RFA) will be released August 1, 2022. Changes have been made to the RFA from previous years and you can find what to expect below.

 

Researchers, you can expect:

  • The RFA will be open August 1 - October 14, 2022.
  • Description of why you came into the Rare Disease research field, and what your future plans are in the field.
  • Detail your level of engagement, with rare disease patients and families.
  • Explanation of how the funding from this grant will be utilized. If this project costs more than the $20,000 grant, you will be asked to explain where additional funding is being secured.
  • You may be asked to submit a mentor statement.

 

Patient Advocacy Organizations, you can expect:

  • The RFA will be open August 1 - October, 14, 2022.
  • The $10,000 match will not need to be sent to Uplifting Athletes until February 2023.
  • Although the match is not expected to UA until February 2023, you will be asked to acknowledge that you will be able to fund the $10,000 match at time of selection.
  • Organizations can nominate more than one researcher, but it is likely that only one researcher from each organization would be selected.

Underrepresented Researchers in Medicine Initiative

In May of 2020, conversations began with industry partners about ways that life sciences can promote diversity, equity, and inclusion in medicine and medical research. The vision and purpose of the URM initiative is to engage with rare disease researchers from underrepresented backgrounds and leverage the mechanism of the Young Investigator Draft to fund and celebrate underrepresented researchers.

2022 Young Investigator Draft Class

  • Dr. Gaurav Goyal University of Alabama at Birmingham
    ECD Global Alliance
    Rare Blood disorders View Story
    Dr. Gaurav Goyal University of Alabama at Birmingham
    ECD Global Alliance

    Dr. Goyal was born and raised in a small town in India. He obtained his medical school diploma from Smt. N.H.L. Municipal Medical College in Ahmedabad, India in 2011. He then moved to the United States to complete a residency in Internal Medicine from Creighton University Medical Center in Omaha, Nebraska in 2016. During his residency, Dr. Goyal developed a special interest in hematology-oncology and went on to pursue a fellowship in the same from Mayo Clinic, Rochester, Minnesota from 2016-2019. It was during this fellowship that he developed a unique focus in a rare group of blood diseases called histiocytic disorders, including Erdheim-Chester disease. When he is not working on curing histiocytosis, Dr. Goyal likes to play guitar, read non-fiction books, and meditate.

  • Dr. Ji Zha The Children’s Hospital of Philadelphia
    Team Telomere
    Rare Blood disordersRare cancersRare genetic disorders View Story
    Dr. Ji Zha The Children’s Hospital of Philadelphia
    Team Telomere

    Dr. Zha earned her Ph.D. in neuroscience at the University of Miami Miller School of Medicine in 2014 and completed her first postdoctoral training at Drexel University afterwards. She then joined Dr. Timothy Olson’s lab at Children’s Hospital of Philadelphia (CHOP) in 2016 as a postdoctoral fellow initially and is now a senior research associate at the same lab. Her research in Dr. Olson’s lab has led to two first-author articles and one second-author article published in high-impact peer reviewed journals. Dr. Zha also earned the American Society of Hematology (ASH) Abstract Achievement Awards twice in 2017 and 2019.

  • Dr. Karine Doiron CHU Sainte-Justine Research Center, Université de Montréal
    TBRS Community
    Rare cancersRare genetic disordersRare muscular and neurological disorders View Story
    Dr. Karine Doiron CHU Sainte-Justine Research Center, Université de Montréal
    TBRS Community

    Dr. Doiron, Ph.D.,  is a postdoctoral research fellow in Dr. Serge McGraw’s lab at the Research Center of the Sainte-Justine University Hospital in Montreal. She joined the McGraw lab in September 2019 and is studying developmental epigenetics. Dr. Doiron has established a patient-derived induced pluripotent stem cells and implemented neural differentiation protocols to study the impact of functional heterozygous DNMT3A mutations during brain cell development. Dr. Doiron’s goal is to lay the groundwork for the development of novel therapeutic interventions in Tatton-Brown-Rahman Syndrome research.

  • Dr. Maurizio Risolino University of California, San Francisco
    T.E.A.M. 4 Travis
    Rare Blood disordersRare genetic disorders View Story
    Dr. Maurizio Risolino University of California, San Francisco
    T.E.A.M. 4 Travis

    Dr. Risolino was born and raised in Lagonegro in the south of Italy. At 18 he moved to Napoli, where he spent almost 12 years earning a Master’s and PhD in Cellular and Molecular Biotechnology from the Second University of Naples, Caserta, Italy. From 2012-2014, Dr. Risolino worked as a Research Fellow in Molecular Oncology at the Institute of Genetics and Biophysics, CNR, Naples, Italy. In February 2014, he moved to New York City and joined Dr. Selleri’s Lab as a Postdoctoral Fellow at the Weill Cornell Medical College of Cornell University. In 2015 the laboratory was relocated to the UCSF Department of Orofacial Sciences and Department of Anatomy where Dr. Risolino is currently the Assistant Researcher in the Selleri Lab. This atmosphere will continue to be critical to the development of Dr. Risolino’s research projects and his career as an investigator.

  • Dr. Michael Gonzalez University of Pennsylvania
    Castleman Disease Collaborative Network
    Rare autoimmune disordersRare Blood disordersRare cancers View Story
    Dr. Michael Gonzalez University of Pennsylvania
    Castleman Disease Collaborative Network

    Dr. Gonzalez is the Associate Director of Basic and Translational Research at the Center for Cytokine Storm Treatment and Laboratory (CSTL). He obtained his PhD in Immunology and Infectious Diseases from Washington State University and was a postdoctoral fellow at the Center for Applied Genomics at the Children’s Hospital of Philadelphia (CHOP). In addition to his research role, Dr. Gonzalez also teaches courses at La Salle University and works with a number of volunteer organizations that are focused on increasing diversity in STEM fields. When he isn’t digging into large datasets at CSTL or teaching, Dr. Gonzalez enjoys lifting weights, spending time with his dog Bailey, and reading horror novels.

  • Dr. Naomi Dirckx John Hopkins University School of Medicine
    TESS Research Foundation
    Rare genetic disordersRare muscular and neurological disorders View Story
    Dr. Naomi Dirckx John Hopkins University School of Medicine
    TESS Research Foundation

    Dr. Dirckx studied Biomedical Sciences and completed her PhD at the Catholic University of Leuven (KU Leuven) in Belgium in the lab of Dr. Christa Maes. After her PhD, she moved to Baltimore in 2018 where she started as a Postdoctoral fellow in the lab of Dr. Thomas Clemens, Department of Orthopaedic Surgery, Johns Hopkins University. Dr. Dirckx was awarded with a Young Investigator Award of the American Society of Bone and Mineral Research (ASBMR). Her work involving citrate transporter SLC13A5 has led to a collaboration with TESS Research foundation.

  • Dr. Shu-Yi Liao National Jewish Health, Denver
    Foundation for Sarcoidosis Research
    Rare autoimmune disordersRare genetic disorders View Story
    Dr. Shu-Yi Liao National Jewish Health, Denver
    Foundation for Sarcoidosis Research

    Dr. Liao is a pulmonologist and an assistant professor at the National Jewish Health in Denver, Colorado. He received his MD from National Taiwan University, and earned his MPH and ScD from Harvard School of Public Health. Dr. Liao completed his Internal Medicine residency at the University of California-Riverside and his Pulmonary and Critical Care Medicine fellowship at the University of California-Davis. Dr. Liao joined Dr. Maier’s lab, focusing on the research of sarcoidosis, in 2019. He was the recipient of the Foundation for Sarcoidosis Research fellowship grant for 2020-2022.

  • Dr. Sushant Kumar University of Pennsylvania
    The Aplastic Anemia and MDS International Foundation
    Rare autoimmune disordersRare Blood disorders View Story
    Dr. Sushant Kumar University of Pennsylvania
    The Aplastic Anemia and MDS International Foundation

    Dr. Kumar received his Ph.D. from the Indian Institute of Technology Bombay in Mumbai, India in 2015. In 2021 he joined the laboratory of Dr. Daria Babushok to conduct his postdoctoral research on rare bone marrow failure disorders. In his role he is able to build on recent studies in his mentor’s laboratory to evaluate immune representation of Paroxysmal Nocturnal Hemoglobinuria (PNH), and to understand the mechanisms of PNH emergence. Dr. Kumar’s long-term goal is to become an independent investigator and to apply his research training to solve the challenging scientific problems in rare immune diseases.

  • Dr. Wu Chen Baylor College of Medicine
    STXBP1 Foundation
    Rare genetic disordersRare muscular and neurological disorders View Story
    Dr. Wu Chen Baylor College of Medicine
    STXBP1 Foundation

    Dr. Chen was born and raised in China. From 2008 to 2012 he pursued his research interest under the guidance of Dr. Alan Chiu at Louisiana Tech University. After Dr. Chen received his PhD, he worked with Dr. William Stacey at the University of Michigan in the Department of Neurology. It was during this time that Dr. Chen grew a strong desire to study epilepsy in transgenic mouse models. This propelled him to join Dr. Mingshan Xue’s group at the Baylor College of Medicine for his second postdoc training. 

Young Investigator Draft Sponsors

Presenting

Logo: CLS Behring

All Pro

Logo: Sanofi Genzyme

All-American

Logo: Astrazeneca

All Conference

Logo: Horizon
Logo: Travere
Trace Link logo

MVP

Logo: Amicus
Takeda logo
parexel logo

Varsity

Ultragenyx logo

Underrepresented Researchers in Medicine Sponsors

Platinum

Logo: Travere

Gold

Logo: Astrazeneca

Bronze

Logo: Agios
Logo: Horizon
TraceLink Logo
Spark Therapeutics Logo

Honorary

Logo: Ultragenyx
Logo: Amicus

Past Draft Classes

2019

  • Headshot: Dr. Alberto Japp
    Dr. Alberto Japp University of Pennsylvania | Rare Autoimmune Disorders
    Castleman Disease Collaborative Network

    Dr. Japp is a native of Brazil and was fascinated by chemistry and biology at a young age. That love of science led him to chase his dream by leaving his home country after graduating from Universidade Federal do Rio de Janeiro (UFRJ). He moved to Berlin, Germany and received his Master’s degree in Molecular Medicine from Charite and acquired his PhD from Humboldt University of Berlin. His current research is focused on autoimmune disorders and how the body fights infections. This research is also powerful in the fight against cancer.

    Rare autoimmune disordersRare Blood disordersRare cancers
  • Headshot: Dr. Brian Sworder
    Dr. Brian Sworder Stanford University | Rare Blood Disorders
    Lukemia Lymphoma Society
    A huge fan of the Los Angeles Dodgers and Los Angeles Lakers, Dr. Sworder is a graduate of UCLA and the Boston University School of Medicine. He is driven by the patients he works with as a clinician on a daily basis and the puzzle of figuring out the science based on what he learns from those patients. It’s why he’s a researcher and a clinician. The same year Dr. Sworder received his grant to focus on research rooted in Lymphoma, he was also part of the team that treated Stanford linebacker and rare disease patient Ryan Beecher - a finalist for the Uplifting Athletes Rare Disease Champion Award. Rare Blood disordersRare cancers
  • Headshot: Dr. Elizabeth Harrington
    Dr. Elizabeth Harrington Columbia University | Rare Genetics Disorders
    Project ALS

    Dr. Harrington was always interested in science and medicine and as a student-athlete who played soccer at the University of Redlands, she figured sports medicine would be her calling. But after cutting her teeth at the National Institute of Health (NIH) as a researcher, Dr. Harrington knew she wanted research to be part of her professional portfolio.

    Rare genetic disordersRare muscular and neurological disorders
  • Headshot: Dr. Eugene Hwang
    Dr. Eugene Hwang Children’s National Medical Center Washington D.C. | Rare Cancers
    ABC2

    During his third year of medical school at Duke, Dr. Hwang was drawn to children and he knew his future would include pediatric medicine. He had discovered his passion and purpose. As a clinician/researcher in pediatric neuro-oncology, his research focuses on coming up with ways to create translational findings that the FDA will allow when it comes to pediatric brain cancers.

    Rare cancers
  • Headshot: Dr. Shana McCormack
    Dr. Shana McCormack Children’s Hospital of Philadelphia | Rare Genetics Disorders
    Friedrich's Ataxia Research Alliance

    Dr. McCormack was an NCAA rowing Champion during her undergraduate years at Harvard who went on to obtain degrees from Harvard Medical School, Massachusetts Institute of Technology and the University of Pennsylvania. Her translational research program has two main areas of focus involving individuals with metabolic disorders and brain disorders associated with excessive weight gain. Dr. McCormack has always been fascinated by the research side of her job, but in the end, helping patients and their families is what drives her.

    Rare genetic disordersRare muscular and neurological disorders
  • Headshot: Dr. Brenda Gallie
    Dr. Brenda Gallie Hospital For Sick Children (Toronto) | Collaborative Leadership Award
    Out of Sight Faith Foundation
    For nearly five decades Dr. Gallie has been a pioneer and research ambassador for children with retinoblastoma. For her work, she was appointed to the Order of Ontario 2006 and Order of Canada 2014 in recognition of her more than 40 years or research in retinoblastoma. Her tireless pursuit of finding solutions for children diagnosed with retinoblastoma is inspiring. Dr. Gallie’s impact on the rare disease is global and with the help of new technology and continued advances through research she continues to raise the bar and break new ground in the search to find a cure. Rare cancersRare genetic disorders

2018

  • Headshot: Dr. Aimee Layton
    Dr. Aimee Layton Columbia University | Rare Genetics Disorders
    Boomer Esiason Foundation

    Dr. Layton’s research focuses on using exercise to improve patient outcomes and to predict how a patient will respond to certain interventions. Driven to work in a lab by her intrigue for science, Dr. Layton learned early in her career she needed interaction with patients to intertwine her passion and purpose professionally. And, provided the opportunity by her mentor Dr. Bob Garofano, the University of Massachusetts and Columbia University graduate is filling a dual role in the lab as a researcher and using that science to impact patients directly.

    Rare genetic disorders
  • Headshot: Dr. Angela Waanders
    Dr. Angela Waanders Children’s Hospital of Philadelphia | Rare Cancers
    ABC2

    Dr. Waanders is a physician-scientist involved in clinical care and research on childhood brain and spinal cord tumors. She serves as the Executive Board Chair for CBTTC, and as the Director of Clinical Research for the Center for Data Driven Discovery in Biomedicine (D3b) at the Children’s Hospital of Philadelphia. Her most recent work launched a national initiative to routinely collect post-mortem brain-tumor tissue, including whole brain and spinal cord.

    Rare cancers
  • Headshot: Dr. David Fajgenbaum
    Dr. David Fajgenbaum University of Pennsylvania | Rare Autoimmune Disorders
    Castleman Disease Collaborative Network

    Dr. Fajgenbaum is a rare disease patient who nearly died during medical school. He suffers from Castleman Disease. The former college quarterback is a graduate of Georgetown, Oxford University and the University of Pennsylvania. He discovered a drug in his lab and began testing it on himself and is enjoying a more than five-year remission. The recently published author is at the center of the effort to cure his disease through a research network he founded - Castleman Disease Collaborative Network.

    Rare autoimmune disordersRare Blood disorders
  • Headshot: Dr. Emily Lowry
    Dr. Emily Lowry Columbia University | Rare Muscular and Neurological Disorders
    Project ALS

    Fascinated with neuroscience since the eighth grade when her parents strongly encouraged her to attend summer school for accelerated students and she picked a neuroscience class. Dr. Lowry is a graduate of Barnard College and Rockefeller University and is a researcher at Columbia University with a focus on ALS. The combination of studying the drugs used on patients and how the patients respond to those treatments scientifically drives the native of Northern California. Her love of science, a passion for creativity and compassion for people suffering drives Dr. Lowry.

    Rare genetic disordersRare muscular and neurological disorders
  • Headshot: Dr. Alessia Stornetta
    Dr. Alessia Stornetta University of Minnesota | Rare Blood Disorders
    Kidz1stFund

    Dr. Stornetta grew up in Ticino, the Italian-speaking region of Southern Switzerland, and she obtained all her degrees from the Swiss Federal Institute of Technology (ETH) in Zurich. Drawn to the lab by her love of science and the reality that cancer is the largest killer worldwide, Dr. Stornetta’s research is focused on the impact outside agents have on the oral cavity and what natural molecules produced by the body also have on the oral cavity of patients with rare blood disorders.

    Rare Blood disordersRare cancers
  • Headshot: Dr. Phillip “Jay” Storm
    Dr. Phillip “Jay” Storm Children’s Hospital of Philadelphia | Collaborative Leadership Award
    ABC2

    Dr. Storm is the chief of The Division of Neurosurgery at CHOP, specializing in pediatric brain tumors. The graduate of Wake Forest and Johns Hopkins University has specialized in using his skills as a clinician and a researcher to seek out bold and collaborative new treatments for brain tumors in children. Dr. Storm partners with the Children’s Hospital Research Institute as a leader in pediatric genetic research. Together they are working to develop new treatments that one day will help thousands of children with brain tumors.

    Rare cancers

2020

  • YID 2020 Draftee: Dr Joshua Brandstadter
    Dr. Joshua Brandstadter University of Pennsylvania
    Castleman Disease Collaborative Network
    Dr. Brandstadter is a physician-scientist and third-year hematology/oncology fellow at the University of Pennsylvania.  He completed a combined MD/Ph.D. at Duke University, MSc at the University of Oxford, and an internal medicine residency at the University of Pennsylvania.  His research is focused on uncovering the role of cells that form the walls of the lymph node and spleen (“stroma”) in causing Castleman Disease, a rare disease with no known cause. Rare autoimmune disordersRare Blood disordersRare cancers
  • YID 2020 Draftee: Dr. Cheng Cheng
    Dr. Cheng Cheng University of California, Irvine
    Cure VCP
    Dr. Cheng’s goal is to become an independent research investigator running a laboratory applying basic science to therapeutic discoveries in the field of neurodevelopmental and neuromuscular disorders. Dr. Cheng received her BA from Knox College where she double majored in Biology and Chemistry and obtained her PhD from Washington University. The current project Dr. Cheng is conducting at the Kimonis laboratory at the University of California-Irvine has significance in gaining insights for therapeutic discoveries for neuromuscular diseases. She is gaining experience in translational research in drug discovery by working with not only research scientists, but also clinicians, patients, pharmaceutical companies and patient advocacy groups. Rare genetic disordersRare muscular and neurological disorders
  • YID 2020 Draftee: Dr. Kathryn Hixson
    Dr. Kathryn Hixson University of North Carolina, Chapel Hill
    Malan Syndrome Foundation
    Dr. Hixson received her B.S. in Neuroscience from Brigham Young University. After graduating cum laude, she sought to understand mechanisms important to subsequent disease treatment by joining the Graduate Program in Neuroscience at Boston University School of Medicine. As a Ph.D. student, Kathryn joined the Lab of Translational Epilepsy and received her Ph.D. in Neuroscience with a specialization in Pharmacology. Dr. Hixson joined the University of North Carolina (UNC) Catalyst for Rare Diseases in July 2019 and is accelerating research and drug discovery in rare disease by performing cutting-edge open science, creating research tools to be shared by all, and uniting the vast number of researchers involved in rare disease research. Rare genetic disordersRare muscular and neurological disorders
  • YID 2020 Draftee: Dr. Abhishek Mangaonkar
    Dr. Abhishek Mangaonkar Mayo Clinic, Rochester Minnesota
    Team Telomere
    Dr. Mangaonkar is a Blood and Marrow Transplant Fellow at the Mayo Clinic in Rochester, Minnesota. He did his undergraduate and graduate work at Grant Medical College and did his residency at the Medical College of Georgia at Augusta University. Early in his fellowship, Dr. Mangaonkar developed an interest to study clinical characteristics, natural history and biology of myeloid neoplasms. In the last two years, he has been involved with the bone marrow failure precision genomics clinic, which is a unique collaboration between clinicians, geneticists, molecular biologists, and bioinformaticians. Dr. Mangaonkar intends to prospectively assess clonal hematopoiesis in patients with short telomere syndromes and provide evidenced-based follow-up and testing guidelines. Rare Blood disordersRare genetic disorders
  • YID 2020 Draftee: Dr. Jonathan Whittamore
    Dr. Jonathan Whittamore University of Florida
    Oxalosis & Hyperoxaluria Foundation
    Dr. Whittamore began his scientific training with a Bachelor’s degree in zoology, followed by a Master’s in marine biology. Eager to pursue his enthusiasm for research, he was encouraged to embark upon a Ph.D. joining Dr. Rod Wilson’s comparative and integrative physiology laboratory at the University of Exeter. Furthermore, to broaden his knowledge and expertise, aspiring to become an independent investigator and channel his efforts into biomedical research, he was recruited by Dr. Marguerite Hatch at the University of Florida. It is here where Dr. Whittamore was introduced to oxalate transport and the pathophysiology of associated disease states including the rare group of disorders – the Primary Hyperoxalurias.  Rare genetic disorders
  • Dr. Benjamin Chan Yale University
    Emily's Entourage
    Dr. Chan and Dr. Turner were selected for the 2020 Uplifting Athletes’ Young Investigator Draft Collaborative Leadership Award in partnership with Emily’s Entourage. Emily’s Entourage accelerates research and drug development for nonsense mutations of Cystic Fibrosis. By providing critical leadership and coordination, Emily’s Entourage drives high-impact research, cultivates multi-stakeholder collaboration, and facilitates information exchange to speed breakthroughs. Rare genetic disorders

2021

  • Dr. Ukpong Eyo University of Virginia
    SLC6A1 Connect

    Dr. Eyo was born in Nigeria and grew up in several different countries. He immigrated to the United States in 2003 to pursue undergraduate studies at Northwest Missouri State University. He then went on to graduate school at the University of Iowa. Following his Ph.D studies, Dr.

    Rare genetic disordersRare muscular and neurological disorders
  • Dr. Timothy Hines The Jackson Laboratory
    Charcot-Marie-Tooth Association

    After completing his undergraduate work at Appalachian State University in 2012, Dr. Hines went to the University of South Carolina where in 2018 he completed his PhD in Biological Sciences. While at South Carolina, Dr.

    Rare muscular and neurological disorders
  • Dr. Qinglan Ling University of Texas Southwestern
    Cure SURF 1 Foundation

    Dr. Ling has a keen interest in using cutting-edge genetic tools to develop treatment strategies for human diseases. She earned her Ph.D. in pharmacology from the University of Houston in 2018 where she published three peer-reviewed papers as the first author and received a Future Faculty Fellowship in 2015. Dr.

    Rare muscular and neurological disorders
  • Dr. Adele Mossa Icahn School of Medicine at Mount Sinai
    DDX3X Foundation

    Dr. Mossa, Ph.D. is a postdoctoral research fellow in the De Rubeis lab at the Seaver Autism Center for Research and Treatment at the Icahn School of Medicine at Mount Sinai. She has worked on mouse models for rare neurodevelopmental disorders since her undergraduate studies.

    Rare genetic disorders
  • Dr. Neha Nagpal Boston Children’s Hospital
    Team Telomere

    Dr. Nagpal received her Ph.D. in Biochemical Engineering and Biotechnology from the Indian Institute of Technology Delhi, India.

    Rare Blood disordersRare genetic disorders
  • Dr. Peter M.J. Quinn Columbia University
    Cure Retinal Blindness Foundation

    Dr. Quinn, Ph.D. began his scientific career at The University of Manchester and continued his development in the Novel Therapies Division of Manchester-based biotech Epistem. He subsequently undertook a Masters in Molecular Medicine at Brunel University where he fostered a deep enthusiasm for research.

    Rare genetic disorders
  • Dr. Sarah Sheppard Children’s Hospital of Philadelphia
    LGD Alliance

    Dr. Sheppard is an Attending Physician in the Division of Human Genetics and a postdoctoral fellow in the Center for Applied Genomics under the mentorship of Dr. Hakon Hakonarson at the Children’s Hospital of Philadelphia (CHOP).

    Rare genetic disorders
Uplifting Athletes

Founded in 2007, Uplifting Athletes fulfills its mission to inspire the Rare Disease Community with hope through the power of sport with a powerful network of over 20 college football student-athlete led chapters, Uplifting Ambassadors and Team UA participants.

Since its inception, Uplifting Athletes has raised more than $5 million to support the mission of Uplifting Athletes and its charitable programs: Rare Disease Awareness, Rare Disease Research, Uplifting Experiences and Uplifting Leaders.

To find out more about Uplifting Athletes, visit our website:

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