Research@UIC > Funding Opportunities > Finding Funding > Limited Competitions > Dana Foundation Program in Brain and Immuno-Imaging

Dana Foundation Program in Brain and Immuno-Imaging

Internal Competition Completed

Principal Investigator Selected:

• Orly Lazarov, Assistant Professor, Anatomy and Cell Biology, College of Medicine

Program Summary

The Dana Foundation’s imaging research program focuses on improving human brain and brain-immune functioning in health and disease. Funds support pilot-testing by investigators who are early in their research careers of promising but high-risk innovative ideas that have direct clinical application and that, when successful, are competitive for larger scale support from other funders. Grant amounts may be up to $200,000 total, payable over three years. Applicants will be informed within ten weeks whether they will be invited to prepare full proposals. The first awards will be announced in July 2010, with subsequent award announcements made during the remainder of the year. Below is a description of the program and application process.

Please note that due to financial constraints, selection this year will be extremely competitive with fewer than 10 percent of preliminary proposals likely to receive funding.

Previously funded studies have focused primarily on 1) understanding normal brain functioning, how it is altered by disease or injury, and how it recovers or repairs, 2) assessing and improving diagnostic and therapeutic approaches, and 3) refining and advancing imaging technologies to address specific clinical questions.  In addition to these three general areas of continued interest, it is becoming increasingly apparent that neurodegenerative diseases, such as Alzheimer’s disease and Parkinson’s disease, and mental illnesses such as schizophrenia and depression start long before they are clinically evident. The Foundation, therefore, encourages studies that seek to understand developmental processes of disease, surrogate measures of early disease existence, and measures of disease progression.

The Foundation invites submission of one preliminary application per invited institution (see eligibility), using either:

• Conventional imaging - anatomical imaging of white or gray matter and measures of physiological functioning. These proposed studies should focus on patient-oriented clinical research. Exceptions for considering research in animal models or in human tissues will be made only in cases where the research has direct clinical relevance, but cannot yet be safely and effectively conducted in humans.
• Cellular/molecular imaging - biochemical actions of specific brain cells, or their interactions with immune cells with direct clinical relevance to human health and disease. These studies may involve human tissues or animal models. Applications can involve the study of cells within neural circuits, using a combination of imaging and single cell electrical recording, if the techniques have already been developed.

Eligibility:
Each U.S. medical school dean, and the presidents of the few selected biomedical research institutions that have been invited by letter, may nominate one applicant. The applicant may use either conventional or cellular imaging or both. To be considered under this Program, the application must be countersigned by the medical school dean or invited biomedical institute’s president.

Investigators at institutions that are affiliated with a medical school are eligible to apply only through their affiliated medical school, by submitting an application to the medical school dean. Previous applicants are eligible to reapply through their dean’s office (or through the president’s office, in the case of applicants from a specifically invited biomedical research institute). Projects involving collaborations with NIH intramural researchers or industry scientists are acceptable.

Support is focused on faculty researchers who have demonstrated the potential for independent research careers who are at the assistant professor level, or in the first few years of their associate professor appointments. Post-doctoral fellows are not eligible to apply. Applications from junior investigators that are an extension of the work of a senior mentor, particularly if from the same institution, are discouraged.

For both conventional and cellular imaging proposals, promising career investigators who have not yet been awarded more than one independent research grant (R01 from the NIH or equivalent from another Federal agency) are eligible to apply for funding of up to $200,000 payable over three years.  

The Foundation does not provide support for indirect costs. Also, as much as 10 percent of the total grant award may be used to purchase equipment for the project. The balance is to be used to meet direct research costs. Projects should be feasible to obtain meaningful data within the award limit over a period of up to three years.

All applicants please note:

• All proposals that seek to develop new imaging techniques or assays, or modify existing ones to address clinical questions, whether in systems or cellular and molecular imaging, must provide preliminary evidence of feasibility and evidence of the investigator’s experience in using the technology. Proposals seeking support without such preliminary evidence will not be considered.
• Investigators proposing patient-oriented studies should provide preliminary evidence that the required number of participants—patients and controls—are available at the research institution(s) involved.
• For all proposals that do not propose to undertake studies in humans, the direct relevance to human health and functioning needs to be explicitly stated.
• Certain areas are not appropriate for consideration:
  • Ideas for which you do not have preliminary data.
  • Instrument development without initial evidence of feasibility and clinical
      applicability.
• Descriptions of all previously funded projects are available at: http://www.dana.org/grants/imaging/.

UIC is restricted to one application from the College of Medicine.

Additional Information 

http://www.dana.org/grants/detail.aspx?id=1264

Deadlines

Letter of Intent Instructions

• By submitting this form, applicant attests that s/he has read and meets the sponsor's eligibility criteria for this program. The LOI can be emailed to RDS@uic.edu, Attn: Chang Lee.
• OVCR may reserve submission slots for previously submitted but unfunded proposals that received highly competitive ratings from the external sponsor. These will be evaluated on a case-by-case basis by the Vice Chancellor. For consideration, scanned copies of your complete reviews (not just summary) must be included with LOI.
• Depending upon the number of LOIs submitted, OVCR may be required to facilitate an internal peer review process to select UIC’s submission(s) to this program. Based on the response to this program in previous years, we anticipate that an internal peer review process (Internal Limited Competition) will be required.

LOI form: http://tigger.uic.edu/depts/ovcr/research/funding/forms/0600.doc

Please contact Chang Lee at clee10@uic.edu or 6-1961 with any questions.

If an authorized principal investigator is not listed above, please consider the limited competition still open.  Contact RDS@uic.edu for further information.

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