Internal Funding administered by the CTSI

Home / Internal Funding administered by the CTSI

REQUEST FOR APPLICATIONS (RFA): SEED GRANTS FOR CLINICAL AND/OR TRANSLATIONAL RESEARCH ADMINISTERED BY THE CTSI 
(click here for a list of awardees)
download this RFA (pdf format 22KB)  or download letter of intent (doc format 35KB)

1. NATURE AND PURPOSE OF THIS RFA
 
The Clinical and Translational Sciences Institute (CTSI) with funding from the Office of the Vice President for Research and Graduate Studies will provide funds for seed/pilot research projects conceived and designed by clinicians and translational researchers around the state of Michigan through its Pilot and Collaborative Translational and Clinical Studies (PCTCS) program. Success of this program will be the judged by the rate at which seed grants produce new extramural funding for clinical and translational research or create new intellectual property at MSU-CTSI partner institutions.
 
2. CRITERIA FOR FUNDING
 
Projects will be selected based on the following criteria. In order to be considered for funding, it is mandatory that a proposed project meet at least two of these criteria.
 
·     The research is clinical and/or translational (translational defined as either bench-to-bedside or research center-to-communities).
·     The research actively engages investigators and/or subjects in multiple community sites around Michigan.
·     The project has already been submitted for extramural funding, and tangible evidence is provided to link the proposed research to a future award approval.
 
3.  GRANT APPLICATION SUBMISSION AND DECISIONS 

 

To provide both flexibility and agility to funding decisions, online grant applications will be accepted at any time during the year. 
 
However, an initial letter of intent (preapplication) must be submitted prior to acceptance of a full application. The letter of intent – two page limit, template provided (link above- should describe the goals of the proposed project, with an emphasis on its potential to produce external funding or intellectual property.  It is also imperative that the letter describe how the proposed project will meet the funding criteria described above.  A decision to encourage or disallow submission of a full application will be provided within two weeks of submission of the letter of intent.
 

To ensure that funding decisions occur in as short a time as possible, full applications will be reviewed on a monthly basis. To ensure that the best applications are funded – regardless of the calendar month in which they are submitted, the PTCTS Executive Committee will strive to award funds in as close to an even distribution across the fiscal year as is reasonably possible. A decision to approve or disapprove funding will be provided within three weeks of submission of a complete application.

The online submission site is at http://ctsi.msu.edu/grants
 
4. ELIGIBILITY
 
All faculty members employed by Michigan State University, in any department, at any level are eligible to submit applications for this RFA. Community-based investigators are encouraged to apply in collaboration with MSU employed faculty.
 
5. REQUIREMENTS
 
The principal investigator must agree to provide 5-10% effort to the project for the period of funding and to prepare an application for external funding to be submitted during or after project completion. 
 
6. FUNDING
 
Up to $25,000 may be requested for a period not to exceed one year. Priority will be given to research projects with budgets in the $15,000 and under range. At this level of funding, the proposals should be focused on near-term deliverable experiments that fit into an overall strategy, rather than the funding of long-term projects. Funds may be used for any legitimate research purpose, such as research assistants, equipment, supplies, laboratory testing, or data management and analysis.  Use of MSU core facilities for laboratory work is encouraged. Travel costs to scientific meetings, and indirect costs, will not be supported. The MSU-CTSI will assist in securing data management and statistical analysis of data collected in the funded research, if so requested by the PI.
 
7. FORMAT AND ELEMENTS OF THE PROJECT GRANT APPLICATION
 

Online submissions only. The letter of intent or the full application can only be uploaded as one file in an Adobe Acrobat (pdf) format via the CTSI online transmittal at http://ctsi.msu.edu/grants

Required elements of the full application are listed below. The body of the application (sections a-g) is limited to 7 pages in length. Figures, tables, and references are not included in this limit.
 
a)  Summary (limited to 250 words);
b)  Background 
c)  Translational significance
d)  Specific aims
e)  Research plan
f)   Specific plans for obtaining future external funding
g)  Intellectual property potential
h)   Budget and justification – Budgets should be broken down into three categories:
1) Salary for key personnel: segregate regular employees, student & temp labor 
2) Supplies and services:
3) Equipment (individual items costing over $5000).
Note: Awards will be made in General Fund dollars, thus fringe benefit costs need not be included in the budget, with the exception of support for Graduate Assistants. If you include GA’s, you must cover fringe benefit & tuition cost in your budget.
i)    Append biosketches for principal investigator(s) and all key personnel using the NIH-format
 
8.  REVIEW
 
·     The PCTCS Executive Committee will perform an initial review of all submitted grant applications to ensure their close alignment with the overall strategic goals of the MSU-CTSI, with the aim of funding those projects judged to provide maximal balance and impact to the overall PTCTS research portfolio. Executive Committee members involved in the project or those who have academic appointments in the same unit as an applicant will not participate in the review to avoid potential conflicts of interest. For selected applications, the Executive committee will then recruit 2-3 appropriate individuals from inside and/or outside the MSU system to evaluate the scientific merit of the proposals (via written critique). Reviewers will score the proposal (via e-mail communications) on a 1–5 scale employing the same criteria used in NIH peer review. The written critiques serve as feedback for the applicants, with reviewers’ names removed. The PTCTS Executive Committee will make a final decision on funding according to the criteria and principles discussed above. Rejected applicants may resubmit after a 3-month waiting period.