Research Funding

IDeA-CTR Announces Pilot Grant Program

LOI Deadline:  October 17, 2017

The Great Plains IDeA-CTR Network is pleased to announce an upcoming call for pilot funding through an NIH/NIGMS grant.  We are requesting a Letter of Intent (maximum of two pages) using the template provided.

Up to 25 applicants will be invited to submit a full application. Those invited to submit full applications will be notified by November 17, 2017. Solicited applications will be due December 22, 2017. The RFA and requirements for invitees are detailed below. Please email your LOI and NIH biosketch as a single PDF document to the Great Plains IDeA-CTR Office at gpctr@unmc.edu.

The goal of the pilot program is to provide support to the most promising and novel clinical-translational research (CTR) projects and help investigators obtain preliminary data necessary for successful investigator-initiated extramural grants. Successful applicants will receive up to $50,000 annually, for up to two years, as well as access to resources of the GP IDeA-CTR to support their research efforts.

Applicable Research: Proposed projects must be clinical-translational research. While there are many definitions of CTR, the GP IDeA-CTR uses the following definitions:

Clinical Research is conducted with human subjects (or on material of human origin such as tissues, specimens, and cognitive phenomena) for which an investigator (or colleague) directly interacts with human subjects. Excluded from this definition are in vitro studies that utilize human tissues that cannot be linked to a living individual. Clinical research that will be supported by this granting mechanism includes clinical trials, the development of new technologies, epidemiological and behavioral studies, and outcomes and health services research.

Translational research is about moving applications for treatments, diagnostics and prevention from pre-clinical work to population level impact. Applicants are required to identify the level of translational research proposed using the T1 to T4 descriptions below.

T1   Translation to humans: Seeks to move fundamental discovery into health application.

T2   Translation to patients: Develops health applications with implications for evidence-based practice.

T3   Translation to practice: Investigates the movement of evidence-based guidelines to health practices.

T4   Translation to communities: Investigates the impact of evidence-practice and policies to population health impact/investigators providing communities with the optimal intervention.

For additional questions regarding whether your research satisfies this definition, please contact your local institutional program coordinator (see ‘Eligible Institutions and Contacts’ on page 2). Alternatively, if you have questions about whether your research applies, you may also contact Dr. Howard Fox at hfox@unmc.edu or Dr. Paul Estabrooks at paul.estabrooks@unmc.edu. Basic science projects (e.g. those using only animal models or cell lines in the absence of patient level data) will not be considered.

Research Priorities: Priorities include a combination of scientific and regional priorities developed by the GP IDeA-CTR Scientific Team and Community Advisory Board. Priority areas are:

  • Behavioral health including, mental health, substance abuse (e.g., opioids and alcohol), and violence as a public health issue
  • Obesity treatment and prevention
  • Aging and Age-related cognitive impairment
  • Injury prevention
  • Technologies and models to improve health access including the evaluation of new or existing tools (e.g., telehealth) with a focus on rural populations.
  • Connecting clinical care and community services (e.g., schools, food banks, YMCAs, etc.)
  • Addressing health disparities based on social determinants, race, ethnicity, and geography

Highest priority will be given to the strongest science and those projects most likely to lead to successful extramural funding. In addition, projects that make an impact on medically disadvantaged, underrepresented minority, and/or geographically or clinically isolated populations—and can introduce or evaluate new tools or technologies useful in these populations—are of high interest.

Leave a Reply

This site is protected by reCAPTCHA and the Google Privacy Policy and Terms of Service apply.