SYNERGY Funding Opportunities

The SYNERGY Pilot Grant Program facilitates collaborative translational research studies throughout our institutions, health centers, and communities. We anticipate that providing funding for such studies will accelerate the process of translational and clinical research, thereby positively impacting our overall clinical and translational research enterprise.

Pilot Grants

The overall goal of the SYNERGY grant program is to facilitate collaborative translational research studies within all our institutions and affiliated health centers throughout the state, with an overarching goal of accelerating translational and clinical research and enhancing the pipeline of investigators involved in translational research.

With an inaugural RFA issued in May 2008, SYNERGY established a Pilot Grant Program designed to systematically identify, review, and select innovative multi- and interdisciplinary research concepts that have maximal potential for translation into patient care and population health.

Clinical and Translational Pilot Awards (up to $100,000, 1 or 2 years' duration) are designed for junior and senior faculty researchers seeking support to initiate pilot or feasibility studies in clinical and translational research.
Studies eligible for Pilot Grant funding are those that involve animal models of direct translational importance, human tissues, clinical trials, risk assessment, disease prevention, rehabilitation, intervention related to screening, and human information databases (e.g., medical records).
Pilot Grant RFAs are designed to specifically elicit research projects that are innovative and exploratory, address issues in translational or clinical research, and have a high likelihood of leading to extramural funding.
To foster interdisciplinary and inter-institutional research, the pilot grant mechanism requires each application to list two co-principal investigators, each from a different discipline, department, or school.
Applicants are also expected to demonstrate how their research has the potential to move from laboratory discovery to the bedside, or from the bedside to the population, or from population and bedside observations back to the laboratory.
Review criteria applied by the multidisciplinary Pilot Application Review Committee include innovation, approach, significance, translational character, and investigator qualifications.

Funded Awards

Since 2008 the SYNERGY Pilot Program has issued five RFAs. To date, with awards completed for all five RFAs, over $1,263,337 has been awarded to 31 projects, with an overall funding rate of 1 in 5. The RFAs have been designed to promote translational research activity in specific areas, including community partnerships, comparative effectiveness research, and novel methodologies. The novel methodologies RFA was for the Methodology Innovation for Translational Research Award (MITRA), which has been made in two of the five RFA cycles.

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Funding through Norris Cotton Cancer Center

Developmental Funds (Prouty Pilot Projects)

The Prouty Pilot Project peer-review mechanism is designed to advance meritorious cancer research and collaborative interactions. Investigators at all levels may apply for support for preliminary studies that pursue novel approaches to the problems of cancer, build new interdisciplinary collaborations, and emphasize translation.

American Cancer Society/Institutional Research Grant

Seed grants are available through the ACS Institutional Research Grant administered through Norris Cotton Cancer Center. Applications are peer-reviewed for funding priority by the NCCC ACS/IRG Review Committee. The principal purpose of these grants is to support studies undertaken by investigators who are early in their careers and need pilot data before submitting individual research grant applications. The next RFA will be released in Fall 2011.

Norris Cotton Cancer Center Research Awards

The Norris Cotton Cancer Center Research Awards are made from time to time at the discretion of the Cancer Research Committee to fund projects of particular merit, as identified through a peer-review process defined by the Cancer Center Administration.

Hitchcock Foundation Research Grants

The Hitchcock Foundation funds pilot studies and small discrete research programs:

To develop pilot data to be used as the basis for submission of research applications to national funding sources.
To encourage research by young investigators and those new to the Medical Center who have not yet gained outside funding.
To encourage clinical research at the Medical Center.
To provide support for established investigators with a new research emphasis.

The Neukom Institute for Computational Science

The Neukom Institute for Computational Science program seeks to fund both the development of novel computational techniques as well as the application of computational methods to research across the campus and professional schools.

Dartmouth Office of Sponsored Projects

The Dartmouth Office of Sponsored Projects serves as a central resource to support the research enterprise at Dartmouth by providing guidance and stewardship for the research community and the College.