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STTR in practice

Small businesses weighing an STTR partnership with a research institution often ask what one looks like on paper. These are examples of how the programme works, taken from official federal award records.

Public award record. INSTAR Lab was not involved. Every example is an award made to another organisation. INSTAR Lab has not yet held an STTR award and has no confirmed partners. Nothing here suggests otherwise, or that INSTAR Lab would be eligible for or win similar funding.

Earth, a blue and white crescent, rising above the grey horizon of the Moon against black space, photographed by the Apollo 8 crew in December 1968.
Illustrative NASA photograph (Apollo 8, 1968); not an INSTAR Lab image. Credit: NASA (source)

6 public awards

Chosen from NIH and NSF records across Phase I and Phase II. Four name a research institution in the record’s text; two do not, and say so. Facts were checked against the official record on October 23, 2026.

  • Public award record. INSTAR Lab was not involved.

    Matching college students to mental health care

    NIH · Phase II · MiResource, Inc. with Child Mind Institute

    A software company that links university students to local mental health providers worked with a children’s mental health research institute to build an online tool. The tool is meant to assess a student and then suggest suitable care. The record describes a Phase I build followed by a Phase II validation on a university population.

    Award 1R42MH125688-01 · April 1, 2021 to July 31, 2022 · $147,826

  • Public award record. INSTAR Lab was not involved.

    Antibody drug candidates for hearing loss

    NIH · Phase I · Zebra Biologics, Inc. with The Scripps Research Institute

    A biotechnology company used antibody-generation technology developed with a research institute to look for antibodies that switch on a nerve-growth receptor in the inner ear. The aim was to find candidate drugs for hearing loss caused by damage to hearing nerve cells. The Phase I work selects, characterises and tests candidates in mouse nerve cells.

    Award 1R41DC018250-01 · September 10, 2019 to October 1, 2022 · $304,258

  • Public award record. INSTAR Lab was not involved.

    Trackable particles for heart-repair therapy

    NIH · Phase I · 5M Biomed, LLC with Kennedy Krieger Institute (with Johns Hopkins University)

    A small company and a research institute teamed up to build tiny magnetic particles that attach to cell-released vesicles. The particles let the vesicles be purified, steered and followed on an MRI scan after a heart attack. Phase I tests whether the particles keep the vesicles working while making them visible.

    Award 1R41HL169102-01A1 · December 1, 2023 to November 30, 2025 · $306,433

  • Public award record. INSTAR Lab was not involved.

    An early-warning blood profile for dementia risk

    NIH · Phase I · OmegaQuant Analytics, LLC with Fatty Acid Research Institute

    A clinical laboratory that measures fatty acids in blood worked with a research institute to test whether those measurements can predict memory loss or dementia years ahead. The plan is to combine existing long-running study data and apply statistical and machine-learning methods. Phase I also checks whether labs and consumers would pay for the resulting tests.

    Award 1R41AG085816-01 · December 1, 2023 to November 30, 2025 · $506,500

  • Public award record. INSTAR Lab was not involved.

    A small, low-cost camera that sees colour in detail

    NSF · Phase I · Syzygy Optics LLC (research institution not named in the record)

    A small optics company set out to make a compact spectrometer, an instrument that splits light into its colours, for hyperspectral imaging. The key step was a way to manufacture curved gratings that match the design. The abstract says the starting designs came from work with astronomers at a university and an observatory.

    Award 2233096 · July 15, 2023 to June 30, 2025 · $275,000

  • Public award record. INSTAR Lab was not involved.

    Measuring a baby’s oxygen level through the mother’s abdomen

    NSF · Phase II · StorX Technologies, Inc. (research institution not named in the record)

    A medical-device company is refining a sensor that shines near-infrared light on a pregnant woman’s abdomen to estimate the baby’s blood oxygen during labour. Phase II adds device revisions and a pilot patient study with clinical researchers. The record lists the end date as March 2027, so the work is still running.

    Award 2233238 · April 15, 2023 to March 31, 2027 · $1,195,735

About these examples

  • Summaries are in our own words; the official record is linked on every page.
  • An institution is named only when the record’s own text names it. Where it does not, we leave it blank.
  • An outcome appears only if the record states one.
  • For how many STTR awards NIH and NSF make each year, see STTR by the numbers.
  • For the general rules, see how an STTR collaboration works.