Gates Foundation: Grand Challenges Exploration Round #8

The Gates Foundation released the topics for its newest call for applications:
http://www.grandchallenges.org/Explorations/Pages/TopicsOverview.aspx
There are 5 topics, although 2 are particularly interesting for TropMed:


1.)Design New Approaches to Optimize Immunization Systems
This topic aims to generate novel approaches to optimizing the performance of immunization logistics and supply systems in low-resource settings. Applicants are encouraged to re-examine the systems trusted with delivering vaccines and design innovative solutions to optimize the performance of these systems, both today and in the future. We seek proposals that are responsive to the topic that are daring in premise and clearly different from the approaches currently under investigation or employed. The solutions submitted to this topic must be focused on the operational aspects of immunization systems in countries, and must have the potential to be scaled up or reproduced in multiple settings.
http://www.grandchallenges.org/ImproveVaccines/Topics/Pages/OptimizeImmunizationSystemsRound8.aspx


2.) Explore Nutrition for Healthy Growth of Infants and Children
The goal of this topic is to solicit new scientific understanding and new science-based preventative and therapeutic approaches to improve nutrition and promote the healthy growth and development of infants and young children. We strongly encourage investigating the mechanisms of action of nutritional deficiencies and interventions, since this will provide the basis for new strategies to promote healthy growth and will facilitate developing tests to measure nutritional status and to measure treatment outcomes, including discriminating responders from non-responders in population studies.
http://www.grandchallenges.org/ImproveNutrition/Topics/Pages/NutritionforInfantsandChildrenRound8.aspx

The deadline for all responses to the Grand Challenges Exploration Round #8 are 17 November 2011.

NIH Research Project Grant (Parent R01)

The Research Project Grant (R01) is an award made to an institution/organization to support a discrete, specified, circumscribed project to be performed by the named investigator(s) in areas representing the specific interests and competencies of the investigator(s). The R01 research plan proposed by the applicant institution/organization must be related to the stated program interests of one or more of the NIH Institutes and Centers (ICs) based on descriptions of their programs (contact the Faculty of Tropical Medicine Office of Research Services for assistance identifying which IC to apply to).


For more information, see:
http://grants.nih.gov/grants/guide/pa-files/PA-11-260.html


The funding is for 3-5 years and the budget depends on the scope of the project.


The next deadline is 5 October 2011.  There are regular deadlines every February, October, and June

NIH Research to Advance Vaccine Safety (R01 or R21)

The grant supports research that will contribute to the overall understanding of vaccine safety. This research opportunity invites studies that address scientific areas potentially relevant to vaccine safety such as: 
1) physiological and immunological responses to vaccines and vaccine components,
2) how genetic variations affect immune/physiological responses that may impact vaccine safety, 
3) identification of risk factors and biological markers that may be used to assess whether there is a relationship between certain diseases or disorders and licensed vaccines, or 
4) the application of genomic/molecular technologies to improve knowledge of vaccine safety


This grant is available in both the R01 and R21 scheme.  See more information here:
http://grants.nih.gov/grants/guide/pa-files/PA-08-256.html (R01)
http://grants.nih.gov/grants/guide/pa-files/PA-08-257.html (R21)
R01 = more money, but requires extensive preliminary research and expertise
R21 = less money, more exploratory and "risky" research


The deadline for this application is 8 January 2012.  The R01 is for up to 5 years of funding, with no formal budget limit.  The R21 is worth $275,000 over 2 years.

NIH Host-Targeted Interventions as Therapeutics for Infectious Diseases (R21/R33)

Applications focused on discovery and development of a therapeutic that targets a host-encoded function required for infection by one or more NIAID Category A, B, or C priority pathogens are invited.  Eligible pathogens include dengue, Brucella melitensis, Rickettsia spp., Japanese encephalitis, Giardia lamblia, Toxoplasma gondii, Chikungunya virus, and others  (For a complete list of Category A, B, & C pathogens, see http://pathema.jcvi.org/pathema/AbcGenomes.shtml)


Activities may include, but are not limited to:

• Identification and validation of new host targets for drug discovery;
• Development of new and improved target identification technologies;
• Screening for candidate therapeutics;
• Molecular modeling, library screening, and medicinal chemistry/structural activity analysis to optimize candidate compounds for preclinical studies;
• Preclinical characterization of candidate therapeutics, including toxicity and efficacy in in vitro or in vivo models;
• Performing reiterative design, chemical synthesis and in vitro analysis to develop a "mature" lead compound; and
• Synthesis of sufficient quantities of a lead compound(s) for preclinical characterization.

This grant is worth a total of $1,175,000 over 5 years.  The deadline to submit a Letter of Intent is 31 October 2011.  The application deadline is 30 November 2011.

For more information, see http://grants.nih.gov/grants/guide/rfa-files/RFA-AI-11-032.html

NIH Exploratory Developmental Research Grant Program (Parent R21)

The R21 mechanism is intended to encourage new exploratory and developmental research projects. 


For example, such projects could assess the feasibility of a novel area of investigation or a new experimental system that has the potential to enhance health-related research.  Another example could include the unique and innovative use of an existing methodology to explore a new scientific area. These studies may involve considerable risk but may lead to a breakthrough in a particular area, or to the development of novel techniques, agents, methodologies, models, or applications that could have a major impact on a field of biomedical, behavioral, or clinical research.


This grant is worth $275,000 over 2 years.  The nearest deadline is 14 October.


For more information, see: http://grants.nih.gov/grants/guide/pa-files/PA-10-069.html

NIH Biomarkers of Infection-Associated Cancers (Exploratory R21)

This grant seeks applications that propose to identify biomarkers for cancers where the cause of the disease is attributed to infectious agents.


Specifically projects that look at either:
1.) Molecular profiles of normal, precancerous, and cancerous lesions following infection and of body fluids from infected individuals.
-or-
2) Evaluating these molecular profiles for use in gaining a better understanding of the role of infectious agents in cancer development and use in early detection, risk assessment, and prevention of cancer


For more information, see: http://grants.nih.gov/grants/guide/pa-files/PA-11-159.html


This grant opportunity has regular submission deadlines every October, February, and May.  The grant is worth $275,000 over two years.

International Society for Infectious Disease Small Grants

The Small Grants Program is designed to fund pilot research projects by young investigators in developing countries. The goal is to support and foster the professional development of young individuals (less than 40 years of age) in the field of infectious diseases research by helping them to acquire additional skills and data to apply for other grants. Areas of interest include, but are not limited to investigations of the epidemiology, pathophysiology, diagnosis or treatment of infectious diseases, the epidemiology and control of hospital-acquired infections, and modeling of cost effective interventions.
Up to five grants of up to US $6,000 each will be awarded annually.  The nearest deadline is October 1


Click here for more information: http://www.isid.org/grants/grants_small.shtml