About
At the VCU Office of the Vice President for Research and Innovation, our mission is to foster transformative research, discovery and innovation at Virginia Commonwealth University through excellence in service.
We partner with faculty in all schools and departments as they seek funding, plan studies, establish collaborations, calculate budgets, submit grant applications, negotiate industry contracts and secure patents and licensing agreements.
Our commitment to supporting and elevating the research community at VCU has resulted in record levels of sponsored research and placed us among the nation’s premier public research universities.
Through our passion for discovery and willingness to take on challenges, we continue to advance the work that matters most and position VCU as a national leader in research, innovation, creativity and scholarship.
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Vice president
Meet Dr. Srirama Rao, VCU's Vice President for Research and Innovation.
Leadership
Our leadership team is committed to strengthening VCU’s research infrastructure.
Staff directory
Our skilled staff look forward to helping you in all realms of the research process.
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Key research areas
At VCU, we conduct groundbreaking research that enhances the human experience and creates an impact in the sciences, arts, humanities and professional disciplines.
Our core research strengths include:
- Addiction studies
- Pharmaceutical engineering
- Cardiovascular health
- Neuroscience
- Cancer
- Women's and children's health
Learn more about our accomplishments and see research highlights in our 2018-2019 Annual Report.
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ONE VCU Research
ONE VCU Research, a key presidential priority, is a collaboration between VCU and VCU Health for the purpose of promoting and leveraging the value that clinical research adds to the delivery of enhanced healthcare and quality of life.
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Facts and figures, FY 2019
Research by the numbers
- $310 million in combined awards for sponsored programs for research
- 1 of top 100 NSF-ranked research universities
- 95th among all institutions, public and private, in total R&D expenditures
- 65th in R&D expenditures among public institutions
- $159 million total federal funding
- $25 million from Gates Foundation
- 1 of 20 public institutions that is both a NCI-designated center and has an NIH Clinical and Translational Science Award
- 1 of 54 designated Community Engaged & “Very High Research Activity”
- >120 undergraduate research scholars
Commercialization and economic development
- 114 invention disclosures
- 183 patents fled
- 22 patents issued
- 21 licenses
- 7 copyrights
- 70 industry engagements
- 15 proof of concept grants
Clinical research
- 862 active clinical research studies across 11 units
- 75 clinical trials
- 5,108 clinical research participants
- 301 VCU-designed clinical studies