City of Houston and local health care organizations receive $4M to treat mental health in students

Help granted

Through a $4 million grant, the city of Houston will be able to provide mental health treatment to at-risk students. Educational First Steps/Facebook

The city of Houston just received a major opportunity to help grow access to mental health treatment in children.

Thanks to a four-year $4 million grant from the United States Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration, the city and its partner, Baylor College of Medicine, are launching the Be-Well Be-Connected program that provides at-risk students age six to 17 years old with mental health treatment.

The program will be led by Dr. Laurel Williams, associate professor of psychiatry at Baylor, division head for child and adolescent psychiatry and chief of psychiatry at Texas Children's Hospital. The treatment will include cognitive behavioral intervention for students with bipolar disorder and first episode psychosis, according to the release. The services will be provided in the child's home, which will ensure compliance.

"We do not have many places in Houston that have this capability to provide this level of intensity of services," Williams says in the release. "Having in-home therapy can allow the young person to stay engaged in their community and in their schools, which can promote wellness and reduction in symptoms burden more quickly."

Other Houston health centers, including Texas Children's Hospital, Harris Health System, Menninger Clinic, Harris Center, Veteran's Mental Health Care Line, Legacy Community Health Services, and DePelchin's Children's Center, will be involved with the program and the Mayor's Office of Education is the program manager of the grant.

"I created the Office of Education to support school districts in Houston because they are doing the essential work of guaranteeing that our next generation of adults is educated and ready for the future," says Mayor Sylvester Turner in the release. "The grant validates our efforts and more importantly will provide care on the frontlines of a key health issue involving young people."

Five independent school districts will also receive first level screening services and telemedical care. Families of the students receiving care will also receive support from the newly developed Texas State Child Mental Health Consortium.

"Houston and our surrounding area is primed to really take children's mental health care to the next needed level," says Williams in the release. "This SAMHSA grant opportunity coupled with the State Consortium will allow better coordination amongst services and an overall increase in available services — services that are desperately needed."

Texas doctors and researchers received millions for their transformational work in cancer prevention and treatment. Getty Images

A Texas organization has doled out millions to Houston cancer-fighting professionals

granted

Researchers at medical institutions across the state have something to celebrate. The Cancer Prevention and Research Institute of Texas has made 71 grants this week to cancer-fighting organizations that total a near $136 million.

"CPRIT's priorities of pediatric cancer research and cancers of significance to Texans highlight this large slate of awards," says Wayne Roberts, CPRIT CEO, in a release. "Investments are made across the cancer research and prevention continuum in Texas unlike any other state in the country."

New to the awards this time around is the Collaborative Action Program for Liver Cancer, which has been claimed by Baylor College of Medicine's Hashem B. El-Serag.

"Texas has the highest incidence rates of hepatocellular cancer in the nation," El-Serag says in a release from BCM. "Our CPRIT funded Center will house infrastructure to support and enhance research collaborations among liver cancer researchers; to educate providers, researchers and the general public on best practices and opportunities to reduce the burden of liver cancer; and to engage private and public entities in policy initiatives."

Houston organizations also received recruitment awards, which reward Texas organizations for bringing in great minds from across the world. According to the release, CPRIT has brought in a total of 181 scholars and 13 companies to the Lone Star State.

Of the 71 grants, 58 represent academic research, 10 prevention, and three product development research. Here are the ones awarded to Houston organizations.

The University of Texas MD Anderson Cancer Center

  • $900,000 granted for Shao-Cung Sun's research in regulation of CD8 T cell responses in antitumor immunity (Individual Investigator Research Award)
  • $897,483 granted for Alemayehu A. Gorfe's research in characterization and optimization of novel allosteric KRAS inhibitors (Individual Investigator Research Award)
  • $3 million granted for Hashem B. El-Serag's research at The Texas Collaborative Center for Hepatocellular Cancer (Collaborative Action Program to Reduce Liver Cancer Mortality in Texas: Collaborative Action Center Award)
  • $2.46 million to Jessica Hwang for patient-centered liver cancer prevention in the Houston community (Collaborative Action Program to Reduce Liver Cancer Mortality in Texas: Investigator-Initiated Research Awards)
  • $3.51 million for Kevin McBride's Recombinant Antibody Production Core at Science Park
  • $199,804 granted for Andrea Viale's epithelial memory of resolved inflammation as a driver of pancreatic cancer progression (High Impact High Risk Award)
  • $6 million for the recruitment of Christopher Flowers, M.D. (Recruitment of Established Investigator Awards)
  • $2 million for the recruitment of Kevin Nead, MD, MPhil (Recruitment of First-Time, Tenure-Track Faculty Members Awards)
  • $2 million for the recruitment of Alison Taylor, PhD (Recruitment of First-Time, Tenure-Track Faculty Members Awards)
  • $2 million for the recruitment of Mackenzie Wehner, MD, MPhil (Recruitment of First-Time, Tenure-Track Faculty Members Awards)

Baylor College of Medicine

  • $5.38 million granted for Steven J. Ludtke's new capabilities for cancer research in the TMC CryoEM Cores (Core Facility Support Awards)
  • $1.35 million granted for Bryan M. Burt's novel endoscope-cleaning port for minimally invasive cancer surgery (Early Translational Research Awards)
  • $199,500 granted for Yohannes T. Ghebre's Topical Esomeprazole for Radiation-induced Dermatitis (High Impact High Risk Award)
  • $199,920 granted for Robin Parihar's targeting of cancer associated fibroblasts with anti-IL-11-secreting CAR T cells (High Impact High Risk Award)
  • $2 million for the recruitment of Umesh Jadhav, PhD (Recruitment of First-Time, Tenure-Track Faculty Members Awards)
  • $2 million for the recruitment of Stanley Lee, PhD (Recruitment of First-Time, Tenure-Track Faculty Members Awards)
  • $2 million for the recruitment of Ang Li, MD (Recruitment of First-Time, Tenure-Track Faculty Members Awards)
  • $1.29 million for Jane R. Montealegre's expansion of "a Community Network for Cancer Prevention to Increase HPV Vaccine Uptake and Tobacco Prevention in a Medically Underserved Pediatric Population"

Texas Medical Center

  • $5.44 million granted for William McKeon's Business-Driven Accelerator for Cancer Therapeutics (Core Facility Support Awards)

The University of Texas Health Science Center at Houston

  • $5.95 million granted for Zhiqiang An's Advanced Cancer Antibody Drug Modalities Core Facility (Core Facility Support Awards)
  • $2 million granted for Qingyun Liu's discovery and development of novel peptibody-drug conjugate for treating cancers of the digestive system (Early Translational Research Awards)
  • $199,998 granted for Leng Han's expression landscape and biomedical significance of transfer RNAs in cancer (High Impact High Risk Award)
  • $2 million for Lara S. Savas' Salud en Mis Manos that delivers "Evidence-Based Breast & Cervical Cancer Prevention Services to Latinas in Underserved Texas South and Gulf Coast Communities"

The University of Texas Medical Branch at Galveston

  • $3.55 million granted for William K. Russell's A Targeted Proteomics and Metabolomics Mass Spectrometry Core Facility at the University of Texas Medical Branch at Galveston (Core Facility Support Awards)
  • $199,996 granted for Brendan Prideaux's novel cellular-level imaging approach to assess payload drug distribution in tumors following administration of targeted drug delivery systems (High Impact High Risk Award)
  • $200,000 granted for Casey W. Wright's targeting ARNT and RBFOX2 alternative splicing as a novel treatment modality in lymphoid malignancies (High Impact High Risk Award)

The Methodist Hospital Research Institute

  • $200,000 granted for Robert Rostomily's development of a mini-pig glioma model and validation of human clinical relevance (High Impact High Risk Award)

Texas Southern University

  • $200,000 for Song Gao's alleviating SN-38-induced late-onset diarrhea by preserving local UGTs in the colon (High Impact High Risk Award)

University of Houston

  • $200,000 granted for Sergey S. Shevkoplyas' Novel High-Throughput Microfluidic Device for Isolating T-cells Directly from Whole Blood to Simplify Manufacturing of Cellular Therapies (High Impact High Risk Award)

Rice University

  • $2 million for the recruitment of Jiaozhi (George) Lu, PhD (Recruitment of First-Time, Tenure-Track Faculty Members Awards)
  • $1.67 million for the recruitment of Vicky Yao, PhD (Recruitment of First-Time, Tenure-Track Faculty Members Awards)

The Rose

  • $2 million for Bernice Joseph's Empower Her To Care Expansion

Legacy Community Health Services

  • $999,276 for Charlene Flash's "Increasing Breast and Colorectal Cancer Screening Rates for the Medically Underserved using Population Health Strategies at a Multi-County FQHC"
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Rice Alliance and the Ion leader Brad Burke to retire this summer

lasting legacy

Brad Burke—a Rice University associate vice president who leads the Ion District’s Rice Alliance for Technology and Entrepreneurship and is a prominent figure in Houston’s startup community—is retiring this summer after a 25-year career at the university.

Burke will remain at the Rice Alliance as an adviser until his retirement on June 30.

“Brad’s impact on Rice extends far beyond any single program or initiative. He grew the Rice Alliance from a promising campus initiative into one of the most respected university-based entrepreneurship platforms,” Rice President Reginald DesRoches said in a news release.

During Burke’s tenure, the Rice Business School went from unranked in entrepreneurship to The Princeton Review’s No. 1 graduate entrepreneurship program for the past seven years and a top 20 entrepreneurship program in U.S. News & World Report’s rankings for the past 14 years.

“Brad didn’t just build programs — he built an ecosystem, a culture, and a reputation for Rice that now resonates around the world,” said Peter Rodriguez, dean of the business school. “Through his vision and steady leadership, Rice became a place where founders are taken seriously, ideas are rigorously supported, and entrepreneurship is embedded in the fabric of the university.”

One of Burke’s notable achievements at Rice is the creation of the Rice Business Plan Competition. During his tenure, the competition has grown from nine student teams competing for $10,000 into the world’s largest intercollegiate competition for student-led startups. Today, the annual competition welcomes 42 student-led startups that vie for more than $1 million in prizes.

Away from Rice, Burke has played a key role in cultivating entrepreneurship in the energy sector: He helped establish the Energy Tech Venture Forum along with Houston Energy and Climate Startup Week.

Furthermore, Burke co-founded the Texas University Network for Innovation and Entrepreneurship in 2008 to bolster the entrepreneurship programs at every university in Texas. In 2016, the Rice Alliance assumed leadership of the Global Consortium of Entrepreneurship Centers.

In 2023, Burke received the Trailblazer Award at the 2023 Houston Innovation Awards and was recognized by the Deshpande Foundation for his contributions to innovation and entrepreneurship in higher education.

“Working with an amazing team to build the entrepreneurial ecosystem at Rice, in Houston, and beyond has been the privilege of my career,” Burke said in the release. “It has been extremely gratifying to hear entrepreneurs say our efforts changed their lives, while bringing new innovations to market. The organization is well-positioned to help drive exponential growth across startups, investors, and the entrepreneurial ecosystem.”

Starting April 15, John “JR” Reale Jr. will serve as interim associate vice president at Rice and executive director of the Rice Alliance. He is managing director of the alliance and co-founder of Station Houston, beginning April 15. Reale is co-founder of the Station Houston startup hub and a startup investor and was also recently named director for startups and investor engagement for the Ion.

“The Rice Alliance has always been about helping founders gain advantages to realize their visions,” Reale said. “Under Brad’s leadership, the Rice Alliance has become a globally recognized platform that is grounded in trust and drives transformational founder outcomes. My commitment is to honor what Brad has built and led while continuing to serve our team and community, deepen relationships and deliver impact.”

Burke joined the Houston Innovators Podcast back in 2022. Listen to the full interview here.

Houston team uses CPRIT funding to develop nanodrug for cancer immunotherapy

cancer research

With a relative five-year survival rate of 50 percent, pancreatic cancer is a diagnosis nobody wants. At 60 percent, the prognosis for lung cancer isn’t much rosier. That’s because both cancers contain regulatory B cells (Bregs), which block the body’s natural immunity, making it harder to fight the enemies within.

Newly popular immunotherapies in a category known as STING agonists may stimulate natural cancer defenses. However, they can also increase Bregs while simultaneously causing significant side effects. But Wei Gao, assistant professor of pharmacology at the University of Houston College of Pharmacy, may have a solution to that conundrum.

Gao and her team have developed Nano-273, a dual-function drug, packaged in an albumin-based particle, that boosts the immune system to help it better fight pancreatic and lung cancers. Gao’s lab recently received a $900,000 grant from the Cancer Prevention and Research Institute of Texas (CPRIT) to aid in fueling her research into the nanodrug.

“Nano-273 both activates STING and blocks PI3Kγ—a pathway that drives Breg expansion, while albumin nanoparticles help deliver the drug directly to immune cells, reducing unwanted side effects,” Gao said in a press release. “This approach reduces harmful Bregs while boosting immune cells that attack cancer, leading to stronger and more targeted anti-tumor responses.”

In studies using models of both pancreatic and lung cancers, Nano-273 has shown great promise with low toxicity. Its best results thus far have involved using the drug in combination with immunotherapy or chemotherapy.

With the CPRIT funds, Gao and her team will be able to charge closer to clinical use with a series of important steps. Those include continuing to test Nano-273 alongside other drugs, including immune checkpoint inhibitors. Safety studies will follow, but with future patients in mind, Gao will also work toward improving her drug’s production, making sure that it’s safe and high-quality every time, so that it is eventually ready for trials.

Gao added: “If successful, this project could lead to a new type of immunotherapy that offers lasting tumor control and improved survival for patients with pancreatic and lung cancers, two diseases that urgently need better treatments."

Houston booms as No. 2 U.S. metro for new home construction

Construction Boom

Driven by population growth, more residential rooftops are popping up across Houston and the rest of Texas than anywhere else in America.

Using data from the U.S. Census Bureau and Zillow, Construction Coverage found 65,747 new residential units were authorized in greater Houston in 2024. That figure landed Houston in second place among major metro areas for the total number of housing permits, including those for single-family homes, apartments, and condos.

Just ahead of Houston was the Dallas-Fort Worth Metroplex, which took first place with 71,788 residential permits approved in 2024. In third place was the country’s largest metro, New York City (57,929 permits).Elsewhere in Texas, the Austin metro ranked sixth (32,294 permits), and the San Antonio metro ranked 20th (14,857 permits).

Construction Coverage also sorted major metro areas based on the number of new housing units authorized per 1,000 existing homes in 2024. Raleigh, North Carolina, held the No. 1 spot (28.8 permits per 1,000 existing homes), followed by Austin at No. 2 (28.6), DFW at No. 3 (22.2), Houston at No. 4 (21.6), and San Antonio at No. 13 (13.6).

A Newsweek analysis of Census Bureau data shows building permits for 225,756 new residential units were approved in 2024 in Texas — a trend fueled largely by activity in DFW, Houston, Austin, and San Antonio. That put Texas atop the list of states building the most residential units for the year.

Through the first eight months of last year, 145,901 permits for new residential units were approved in Texas, according to Census Bureau data. That’s nearly 80,000 permits shy of the 2024 total.

Among the states, Construction Coverage ranks Texas sixth for the number of residential building permits approved in 2024 per 1,000 existing homes (17.9).

Extra housing is being built in Texas to meet demand spurred by population growth. From April 2020 to July 2024, the state’s population increased 7.3 percent, the Census Bureau says.

While builders are busy constructing new housing in Texas, they’re not necessarily profiting a lot from homebuilding activity.

“Market conditions remain challenging, with two-thirds of builders reporting they are offering incentives to move buyers off the fence,” North Carolina homebuilder Buddy Hughes, chairman of the National Association of Home Builders, said in a December news release. “Meanwhile, builders are contending with rising material and labor prices, as tariffs are having serious repercussions on construction costs.”

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