Funding from Foundations/Private Sources

JHU's Corporate and Foundation Relations maintains a Web site listing upcoming grant competitions that are sponsored by foundations and other private sources: http://jhuresearch.jhu.edu/OCFR.htm. They are in addition to the limited-submission RFPs periodically announced by the Research Projects Administration office. The opportunities are listed in order of deadline and links to each funder's application information are provided. Contact Joan Wisner-Carlson (jwisner2@jhu.edu) with any questions.


NFL Charities Medical Research Grants 2010
INTERNAL SUBMISSION DEADLINE: May 21, 2010

NFL Charities, the charitable foundation of the National Football League, is seeking applicants for grants to support sports-related medical research. Awards of up to $100,000 will target sports injury prevention, treatment, and other related research that is relevant to the NFL and affects the overall health and performance abilities of athletes. In 2010, concussion and traumatic brain injury research, cardiovascular research, and MRSA infection research will be given special consideration.

Applications will be evaluated by a medical panel on the basis of their scientific merit and clinical relevance, as well as relevance to the NFL. All grant support and potential overlap must be submitted. Post-doctoral fellows serving as Principal Investigator or Co-PI must include assurances that they will remain at Johns Hopkins University for the duration of the grant period. Salary support for the PI and Co-PI must follow NIH guidelines. Additional information can be found on NFL Charities Web site.

Johns Hopkins is permitted to submit two nominations for this program. The deadline to submit preliminary applications for internal review is 5 p.m. on Friday, May 21, 2010. Interested applicants should submit their internal application materials to kjustice@jhmi.edu. Please submit the documents as one PDF in the following sequence:

1. JHU Limited submission cover sheet (contact kjustice@jhmi.edu for a copy);
   
2. Curriculum vitae, including current external research support and publications;
   
3. Lay summary of the relevance of research to the public or patient (2-3 sentences);
   
4. Description of what makes this project important in terms of scientific merit (2-3 sentences);
   
5. Description of the project's relevance to the NFL (short paragraph);
   
6. Proposal with scientific methods, research aims and timelines (no longer than 10 pages in 11-point font, including references);
   
7. Budget outlining how the awarded funds will be used (one-page maximum -- NOTE: This Foundation does not provide overhead); and.
   
8. Letter from the department chair that describes the candidate's qualifications.
   

Each applicant should expect to receive a confirmation of receipt of their materials within 48 hours. If you do not receive such an acknowledgement, please contact Karen Falter directly at: (410) 502-2132 or by e-mail. Selected candidates will be notified as soon as possible. Completed applications must be received by NFL Charities via the online application process no later than Friday, June 11, 2010.


Damon Runyon-Rachleff Innovation Award

The Damon Runyon-Rachleff Innovation Award provides support for the next generation of exceptionally creative thinkers with "high risk/high reward" ideas that have the potential to significantly impact our understanding of and/or approaches to the prevention, diagnosis and treatment of cancer. This award is specifically designed to provide funding for extraordinary early career researchers who have an innovative, new idea but lack sufficient preliminary data to obtain traditional funding. The research supported by the award must be novel, exceptionally creative and, if successful, have the strong potential for high impact in the cancer field.

Eligible applicants (including non-U.S. citizens) must be conducting independent research at a U.S. institution. Institutional nominations are not required and there is no limit to the number of applications that can be received from a particular institution. Basic and translational/clinical projects will be considered and individuals with a background in multiple disciplines are especially encouraged to apply. The awards will provide $450,000 in direct costs during a three year award term. A complete award program description and application guidelines are available on our website. Pre-proposals are due June 1, 2010.

Please contact the Foundation at 212.455.0520 or awards@damonrunyon.org with any questions.


Maryland Biotechnology Center Grants

Development Program Awards are available in the following categories:

Translational Research Awards — for principal investigators from either private bioscience companies or from research universities located in Maryland. Click here for application instructions and forms.

Biotechnology Shared Resources Awards — for universities or non-profit research institutes for development of shared facilities that assist in the development of products or services by Maryland bioscience companies. Click here for application instructions and forms.

Please also view the general forms that must be completed when applying to either program.

The current funding capability for this award program runs through June 30, 2010. We will be processing all applications in a timely manner. Top ranking applications will be invited to the Maryland Biotechnology Center for a presentation and discussion of their proposal. These presentations will be scheduled for May-June, with awards announced shortly thereafter.

If there are any questions about these programs or the application process, please contact Chuck Montague at cmontague@choosemaryland.org, or at (410) 982-8052.


DoD Fiscal Year 2010 Amyotrophic Lateral Sclerosis Research Program

The FY2010 Amyotrophic Lateral Sclerosis Research Program (ALSRP) promotes the introduction of improved therapies for ALS by encouraging ALS investigators to undertake preclinical studies of novel and existing agents.

The ALSRP Therapeutic Development Award mechanism is designed to support preclinical testing and development of therapeutics for ALS. Proposals must include preliminary data relevant to the phase(s) of the preclinical development process covered by the proposed research. The proposal should include a clear statistical plan of analysis, if appropriate. Applicants must clearly and explicitly articulate what impact the project may have on therapeutic development for ALS. Clinical trials will not be supported with this Program Announcement/Funding Opportunity. In contrast, investigators interested in more basic research focused on ALS therapeutics should consider the FY10 ALSRP Therapeutic Idea Award, which does not require preliminary data.

Additional interesting aspects of the Therapeutic Development Award include:

a. Proposals are limited to specific areas of programmatic interest, please refer to the full Program Announcement for these areas on page 2-3.
b. Full applications will be invited based on pre-application screening.
c. The preclinical drug development process may require resources beyond those available at a single organization. Therefore, Therapeutic Development Awards are open to investigators
participating in synergistic collaborations focused on identifying and/or testing lead agents for the treatment of ALS. Collaborations should be dedicated to a single, synergistic preclinical development project or study.
d. Maximum period of performance is 3 years. Maximum allowable funding for entire period of performance is $1,500,000 in direct costs plus allowable indirect costs.

The ALSRP Therapeutic Idea Award is designed to promote new ideas that are still in the early stages of development with the potential to yield highly impactful data and new avenues of investigation for novel therapeutics for ALS treatment. This mechanism supports conceptually innovative, high-risk/high-reward research that could ultimately lead to critical discoveries or major advancement in ALS therapeutics. Research projects should include a well-formulated, testable hypothesis based on strong scientific rationale.

Presentation of preliminary data is not consistent with the intent of the Therapeutic Idea Award mechanism. While the inclusion of preliminary data is not prohibited, the strength of the application should not rely on preliminary data. Innovation and Impact are the most important aspects of the Therapeutic Idea Award.

Additional interesting aspects of the Therapeutic Idea Award include:

a. Full applications will be invited based on pre-application screening.
b. Investigators at all academic levels (or equivalent) are eligible to submit applications.
c. Maximum period of performance is 2 years. Maximum allowable funding for entire period of performance is $400,000 in direct costs plus allowable indirect costs.

Award Mechanism Deadlines:

• Required Pre-Applications (including three-page limit for Pre-Proposal Narratives for Therapeutic Development Awards, and two-page limit for Therapeutic Idea Awards) are submitted through http://cdmrp.org and are due by 5:00 p.m. Eastern Time on May 14, 2010.
• Invitation to Submit an Application: June 2010
  
• Applications are submitted through http://www.grants.gov and are due by 11:59 p.m. Eastern Time on August 4, 2010.
  

PhRMA Foundation Awards
The PhRMA Foundation offers Pre-doctoral Fellowships, Post-doctoral Fellowships, Sabbatical Fellowships, and Research Starter Grants in the following areas:

• Informatics (deadline September 1, 2010)
  
• Pharmacology (deadline September 1, 2010)
  
• Pharmaceutics (deadline October 1, 2010)
  
• Health Outcomes (deadline October 1, 2010)

For complete details including eligibility requirements and application instructions, please visit the PhRMA Foundation website at www.phrmafoundation.org.

Return to top of Funding Opportunities