AFAR funds eight junior faculty projects on mechanisms of aging

The American Federation for Aging Research has named eight recipients of its 2026 Grants for Junior Faculty, committing nearly $1.3 million to early career investigators studying the biology of aging. Each award provides up to $160,000 for a one- to two-year project intended to establish the foundation for longer-term research. The grant announcement identifies eight assistant professors at institutions in California, New York, Alabama, Virginia, Massachusetts, Arizona and Minnesota.

Their funded projects address RNA damage and transport, mitochondrial dysfunction, brain clearance, temperature regulation, translation, sex-specific aging across animals, and microbiome-associated inflammation in barrier tissues. The awards support planned research and do not represent findings or demonstrated clinical benefits. Alex Chaim, PhD, an assistant professor at the University of California San Diego, will investigate mechanisms of RNA damage in aging human neurons.

Jingyue “Ellie” Duan, PhD, an assistant professor at Cornell University, will pursue an integration of evolutionary and genomic approaches to sex-specific aging across the animal kingdom. Davis Englund, PhD, an assistant professor at the University of Alabama at Birmingham, will study cytoplasmic p21 as a possible mechanistic driver of mitochondrial dysfunction during aging. Each project is explicitly framed as an investigation rather than as a test of an already established intervention or clinical application.

Four other recipients are examining questions involving the brain, nervous system or tissue environments. Jenna Leclerc, MD, PhD, assistant professor of anesthesiology and neuroscience at the University of Virginia, is studying dependent brain clearance as a fundamental mechanism of aging. Natalia Machado, PhD, an assistant professor at Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center and Harvard Medical School, is working to identify neural mechanisms underlying thermoregulatory dysfunctions associated with aging.

Kevin Rhine, PhD, an assistant professor at the University of Arizona, is investigating dysfunctional RNA transport in aged neurons under the title “Shipping Delays: Dysfunctional RNA transport in aged neurons.” Drake Williams, DDS, PhD, an assistant professor at the University of Minnesota, will examine the spatial dynamics of microbiome-induced inflammaging in barrier tissue. At Stony Brook University, assistant professor Jae Ho Lee, PhD, will investigate the molecular nature of aberrant translation pausing during aging. The eight selections were made through a rigorous review process with support from funding partners.

Other funders include the AFAR Board of Directors, an anonymous donor, the James A. and Dorothy R. Brunn Foundation, the Charina Foundation, the Irene Diamond Fund, David W. Gore, Diana Jacobs Kalman, the Lowell F.

Johnson Foundation, the Irving Kahn Fund, the Diane Nixon Fund, Sami Sagol and the Irving S. Wright Endowment. The scope of the program is early career biomedical research on aging; the announcement does not report experimental results from the newly funded projects or establish that the proposed mechanisms will produce human health benefits.

AFAR says the Grants for Junior Faculty program is intended to support investigators committed to aging research and to help develop their careers. Stephanie Lederman, EdM, AFAR’s executive director, said the program provides flexible support at a critical stage in an early career investigator’s work, when research funding can be especially difficult to secure. AFAR also reported that it expects to provide approximately $6.522 million to 56 investigators through a range of programs in 2026.

The organization said it has provided nearly $232 million to close to 4,600 investigators to date, describing that history as support for the development of aging-research careers. The 2026 grants provide research opportunities and funding; whether any project advances knowledge, leads to larger awards or results in clinically useful findings remains to be determined.

Subject of Research: 2026 grants for junior faculty conducting planned research on the biology of aging

Article Title: Eight early career scientists receive afar grants for junior faculty

Article References: Eight early career scientists receive afar grants for junior faculty. Original publication (Bibliographic details unavailable.)

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Keywords: AFAR grants, aging research, junior faculty, RNA damage, mitochondrial dysfunction, brain clearance, thermoregulation, sex-specific aging, inflammaging, translation pausing, Eight, early