Before he received the fellowship, Lokesh found himself in a difficult position — he wanted to apply for grants to secure funding for his research, but in order for his grants to be successful, he needed to show pilot data.

“To do pilot experiments, you need money,” Lokesh said, “and without that money, you can’t be successful. Now I am capable of doing some pilot experiments and showing data that can support the grants I’m writing, so this fellowship was a must for my research.”

Despite the significant amount of time it takes to write grants (about six months), Lokesh continues to apply because his research is quite expensive. The 3D bioprinter used to print 3D tissue models cost $130,000 and to run his experiment just once costs roughly $7,000. His fellowship funding has covered a significant portion of those costs.

“The challenge here is any research involving living cells is really expensive,” Lokesh said, “so the more money we have, the better quality the research will be.”

The price of his research is one reason he says his faculty fellowship is so vital. But Lokesh also sees it as a growing investment that provides remarkable opportunities for students and the greater NDSU community to improve the quality of human life.

“This fellowship is like a seed — it starts everything,” he said. “The money is going into labs, into equipment, into students, so it’s going to come back to the university. It’s going to increase the reputation of the university, and it’s going to improve the college infrastructure as well. It’s a seed that flourishes into a bigger investment.”