In partnership with Entrepreneurship@Illinois, the Office of Technology Management (OTM) is proud to have introduced two new awards at Founders Week 2026.
One of the two new awards is The Emerging Innovator Award, which recognizes faculty members who submitted an innovation report to OTM for the first time during the preceding year.
The award celebrates an important milestone in the innovation journey, recognizing the broader potential of a research discovery and taking the first formal step toward exploring its translation into societal or commercial impact.
All faculty members reaching this milestone during the year are recognized as Emerging Innovators, creating an annual cohort of researchers beginning their engagement with the University’s innovation and commercialization ecosystem.
"Innovation begins with bold ideas and the courage to pursue them,” says Susan Martinis, Senior Vice Chancellor for Research and Innovation at Illinois. "These faculty members saw the potential of their discoveries to make a difference and took action to bring those ideas forward. We are proud to recognize their creativity, initiative, and commitment to translating research into impact."
For the School of Integrative Biology, the winners this year are Entomology's Associate Professor Esther Ngumbi and Plant Biology's Professor Wendy Yang.