Assistant Professor Kayla Wolf, the Nancy and Peter Meinig Family Investigator in the Life Sciences at Duffield Engineering’s Meinig School of Biomedical Engineering, has received a 2025-26 Affinito-Stewart Grant from the President’s Council of Cornell Women (PCCW).
Wolf will use the award for her project, “Modeling How Fibrosis Impacts Function in the Aging Ovary,” to advance research on how age-related fibrosis, or tissue scarring, affects ovarian function. Although fibrosis is a hallmark of ovarian aging that emerges well before menopause, its functional consequences and potential as a therapeutic target remain unclear. By investigating how fibrotic changes influence ovarian function, the work could provide new insights into the biological processes that drive reproductive aging and the menopause transition. This research aligns with Duffield Engineering’s Menopause Health Initiative, which seeks to address critical gaps in understanding the biology of menopause and develop engineering-based approaches to improve women’s health across the lifespan. Better understanding how ovarian aging contributes to menopause-related changes could help identify new opportunities for earlier intervention and improved health outcomes.
The Affinito-Stewart Grant program awards up to $25,000 to support the career advancement of junior faculty members at Cornell. Funding is intended to help recipients strengthen their research programs, pursue major external funding opportunities, publish and present scholarly work, and advance toward promotion and tenure.