"inspired an interest" is a correct and usable phrase in written English.
You can use it when you want to describe something that caused someone to be intrigued or to be filled with curiosity. For example, "The professor's lecture inspired an interest in astronomy in many of the students."
The stunning cinematography of The Motorcycle Diaries, a film about the young Che Guevara's life-changing road trip through Argentina, Chile and Peru in 1952, has inspired an increased interest in South America as a holiday destination.
The Face of the Moon (1949) by Ralph Baldwin, which presented scientific evidence that lunar craters were formed by asteroid and comet impacts and that the lunar mares were formed by lava flows, inspired an intense interest in the origin of the solar system that lasted for the rest of Urey's life.
"We've seen how London 2012 successfully inspired an increased interest in sport, and we need to harness the same energy in Scotland to ensure future generations are inspired and have access to sporting facilities to help them meet their potential".
Her life as a preman's daughter inspired an early interest in how the human mind works so she studied psychology at Universitas Gadjah Mada, and she is currently looking for employment.
Monica Justice was born in western Kansas and spent her early years on the family farm, which inspired an enduring interest in biology and animal genetics.
His graduate work and the mentors he encountered early in his research career inspired an enduring interest in fruit flies as a simple and effective model to study aspects of development.
A connoisseur of sculpture, he had saved the most beautiful medieval and contemporary sculptures from the Revolutionaries, which inspired a lasting interest in Daumier.
The same impulses inspired a renewed interest in energy-efficient buildings; largely because of the Obama stimulus, tax incentives for efficiency jumped to $2 billion in 2010.
But when the book's success inspired a parallel interest in Némirovsky's life, the story that emerged was rather more complex.
Jessica Ennis, Laura Trott, Victoria Pendleton, Christine Ohuruogu and Beth Tweddle were just some of the names that inspired a new interest in sport in readers who might not normally turn to the back pages of the papers.
