Rancho Research Institute

Rancho Research Institute, doing business as LOS Amigos Research & ED Institute, is a tax-exempt nonprofit organization based in Downey, California, that operates as a federal grant recipient and sub-recipient in clinical and translational research focused on spinal cord injury, stroke recovery, and neurorehabilitation. The organization functions primarily as a prime recipient on federal health research grants (58% of recent awards) and as a sub-recipient on collaborative research awards (42%), with no federal contract prime positions and no seats on government-wide contract vehicles.

The organization's research portfolio centers on neurological rehabilitation and functional recovery following traumatic and acquired neurological injury. Representative prime grant work includes a $727,810 Project Grant from the National Institute of Diabetes and Digestive and Kidney Diseases (CFDA 93.847), awarded June 2026 through March 2031, to investigate functional and structural brain connectivity alterations in post-stroke lower urinary tract dysfunction and to identify neurological biomarkers predicting response to transcutaneous spinal cord stimulation therapy. The work combines task-based and resting-state fMRI, diffusion MRI tractography, and a twelve-week clinical trial of TSCS therapy, all conducted at the Downey facility. Earlier work included a Project Grant from the National Institute on Disability Independent Living and Rehabilitation Research (award date September 2021, completion August 2026) supporting the Southern California Spinal Cord Injury Model Systems (SOCAL-SCIMS) program at Rancho Los Amigos National Rehabilitation Center, encompassing comprehensive service delivery, participation in the National SCI Database, site-specific research including randomized clinical trials for pain management and heart rate variability biofeedback training, and collaborative research on bowel-related quality of life in spinal cord injury populations.

Customer concentration sits heavily with National Institutes of Health components. The National Institute of Child Health and Human Development accounts for five awards, the National Heart Lung and Blood Institute for four awards, and the Veterans Administration for four awards across 56% of recent awards. However, potential-value concentration diverges sharply: the Veterans Administration Veterans Integrated Service Network 22 anchors 100% of combined potential value at $1.7 million across two awards, while the dominant-volume customers (NICHD, NHLBI, Administration for Community Living) carry potential values below the measurement floor in the source data, signaling that most NIH awards are sub-awards rather than prime. In its sub-recipient role, Rancho engages with Northwestern University, the Rehabilitation Institute of Chicago, the University of Washington, University of Southern California, UCLA, and Massachusetts General Hospital on research programs spanning peripheral artery disease mobility improvement, spinal stimulation expertise consultation, sleep apnea treatment adherence in stroke rehabilitation, and blood pressure management post-stroke and myocardial infarction. Two awards complete within the next twenty-four months and face recompete. Recent activity has grown from one award in 2021 to seven in 2025, with award volume driven primarily by sub-recipient awards across multiple NIH institutes rather than sole-source prime grants.