Lundquist Institute For Biomedical Innovation At Harbor-Ucla Medical Center

Lundquist Institute For Biomedical Innovation At Harbor-UCLA Medical Center, doing business as Los Angeles Biomedical Research Institute, is a non-profit biomedical research organization headquartered in Torrance, California that conducts investigator-initiated research across infectious disease, immunology, cardiovascular science, metabolic disease, and related basic and translational biology, funded primarily through federal research grants and research service contracts as a prime recipient and prime contractor as well as a subcontractor on collaborative research initiatives.

The institute operates as a hybrid research vehicle, splitting its recent award footprint nearly evenly between prime awards (52%) and sub-awards (48%). The overwhelming majority of its federal funding flows through NIH grant programs: the National Heart, Lung, and Blood Institute accounts for 78 awards worth $71.2 million in combined potential value, the National Institute of Child Health and Human Development for 33 awards carrying $69.4 million, and the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases for 53 awards. These three NIH institutes represent the top three customer agencies by both count and dollar value, with the National Institute of Diabetes and Digestive and Kidney Diseases, the National Institute of Neurological Disorders and Stroke, the National Institute of Mental Health, the National Institute of Dental and Craniofacial Research, the Defense Health Agency, and the Department of Veterans Affairs rounding out the active federal customer set. The top five customers by award count account for 62% of all awards; the top five by combined potential value account for 84% of total dollars, a concentration pattern indicating substantial reliance on a narrowly held NIH funding base.

Recent capability work spans investigator-initiated research in cardiovascular disease mechanisms, including longitudinal studies of coronary inflammation using computed tomography and coronary artery calcium biomarkers in diverse cohorts; fungal infection immunobiology and antifungal drug development targeting Candida albicans and Aspergillus fumigatus biofilms and drug-resistant invasive infections; asthma and allergic disease pathogenesis involving sensory neuron and B cell interactions; perinatal nicotine vaping exposure and allergic asthma development; diabetes and insulin resistance mechanisms in sleep restriction and circadian misalignment; immunometabolic dysregulation in diabetes-associated candidiasis; and spinal cord injury surgical decompression timing in prospective clinical trials. Representative prime grant awards include a $827,439 National Heart, Lung, and Blood Institute Project Grant on mechanisms of perinatal nicotine vaping-induced pulmonary innate lymphoid cell dysregulation and allergic asthma (September 2026), a $2.966 million Defense Health Agency Project Grant supporting a prospective trial of timing of surgical decompression for acute spinal cord injury through September 2028, and a $2.623 million Army Medical Command award for development of a wearable multiplex biosensor system to monitor COPD exacerbation risk (with California Institute of Technology as sub-grantee), running through March 2028. On the contract side, the institute holds a $500 thousand single-award indefinite-delivery contract with Veterans Integrated Service Network 12 for DNA research on genetic factors influencing blood pressure and arterial stiffness, with a $77 thousand firm fixed-price delivery order issued September 2026 for work in Madison, Wisconsin and other VA study sites.

Activity has grown substantially across the past five years—from 16 awards in 2022 to 81 awards in 2025—with 77 awards in 2024 and 49 year-to-date in 2026. The recompete window over the next twenty-four months presents exposure of $12.4 million in combined potential value across 22 awards nearing ultimate completion. SCI-reported invoicing of federal service contracts above the $150 thousand threshold declined from $2.7 million in FY2022 to $587 thousand in FY2025, with workforce scale on those SCI-captured contracts falling from 12.9 FTEs in FY2022 to 1.5 FTEs in FY2025; this reflects the institute's funding model shift toward grant-based research rather than service contract delivery. Government-paid hourly rates on SCI-reportable prime service contracts ran from a 10th percentile of $90.83/hr through a median of $145.26/hr to a 90th percentile of $375.92/hr, reflecting the diversity of research and administrative labor categories. Across SCI-reportable prime contracts, an average 22% of contractor hours were performed by subcontractors, with 24 named subs engaged across the contract footprint.

The institute subcontracts frequently to other prime grantees across NIH portfolio work. Named sub-grantee relationships include the University of Texas Health Science Center at San Antonio (DNA isolation and genotyping on ~4,600 samples for genetic analyses), Duke University (mobile examination unit provision for multisite cohort studies), the University of Iowa (in vivo virulence screening of Candida mutants in mouse models of oropharyngeal candidiasis and invasive aspergillosis), Wayne State University (mechanotyping and phage-plus-antibiotic efficacy studies), the California Institute of Technology (wearable biosensor optimization and data analytics), and numerous other academic and research institutions. On the federal contract side, the institute subcontracts to Paragon Micro Inc. on therapeutic testing in murine models of fungal infections, to Capitol Carbonic Corp on mobile examination unit operations for the Risk Underlying Rural Areas Longitudinal cohort study, and to Weems Design Studio on rural heart and lung study operations. The institute also operates as a subcontractor to numerous other NIH-funded prime recipients through collaborative roles in multi-site studies, cohort studies, and data-analysis projects across the MESA (Multi-Ethnic Study of Atherosclerosis) ecosystem, the Atherosclerosis Risk in Communities study, and related longitudinal cohorts.

The institute holds a position on the NICHD Contraceptive Clinical Trials Network indefinite-delivery vehicle, with 7 task orders carrying $20.1 million in combined potential value, and maintains delivery order activity under the Indefinite Delivery Contract HHSN275200403369I, with 7 task orders valued at $4.5 million. These vehicles anchor the institute's access to standing federal research and service delivery mechanisms. Facilities include the C.W. Steers Biological Resources Center with capacity for 6,000 mouse cages (as of a November 2020 expansion), supporting infectious disease and immunosuppressed-rodent research. The institute operates a centrally managed core facility with confocal microscopy capabilities (Leica Stellaris system, $750 thousand NIH Office of the Director grant award, May 2026) and houses a Flow Cytometry Core Facility, supporting cross-disciplinary imaging and immunological phenotyping across the research portfolio.