Cancer Center at Illinois Seed Grant Program 2024

Start Date3/27/2024 Deadline Date5/1/2024

DATES AND DEADLINES

  • Proposal Due Date: May 1, 2024
  • Award Notification: June 17, 2024
  • Earliest Start Date: July 8, 2024

PROGRAM GOALS

The Cancer Center at Illinois (CCIL) is soliciting interdisciplinary team research proposals to initiate new collaborations and enhance existing collaborations among faculty. The aims of this seed grant program are to enable faculty teams to:

  1. Develop novel cancer-focused research ideas that require the involvement of multiple cancer investigators from different disciplines.
  2. Formulate either a hypothesis-driven or technology-focused research project that relates to one or ideally both of the CCIL research programs and their accompanying themes. (See descriptions of CCIL Programs in RFP).
  3. Collect preliminary data or other relevant information to support a feasible approach for grant proposals to an NCI recognized funding agency.
  4. Garner external funding for multi-investigator, program project level research projects using CCIL support as a catalyst.

The CCIL anticipates funding up to ten (10) interdisciplinary research proposals during this cycle, based on the merit of the proposed projects, and their applicability to the goals of the CCIL. The initiative will not provide interim or incremental support for existing research programs or projects. Projects should not anticipate additional internal funding after the seed funds are exhausted. We also encourage the use of CCIL Shared Resources as part of the project (See descriptions of CCIL Shared Resources in RFP).

Proposals that span the research themes of both of the CCIL research programs are of particular interest as well as those that advance the work of one of CCIL’s current research Working Groups: Anticancer Discovery from Pets to People; Cancer and Microbes; Center for Genomic Diagnostics: Environmental Effects on Cancer: Cancer Toxicology of PFAS; Extracellular Vesicle Imaging and Therapy; Immunological Systems; Mechanochemical Dynamic Therapy; Optical Imaging (CLIMB Center); Organoid; and Robotics and Interoperative Assessments. Other areas associated with cancer research will be considered.

Mentorship activities and goals should be identified in the proposals, especially those involving existing CCIL educational and training programs.

For more information, please view the Full 2024 Cancer Center at Illinois Seed Grant RFP.

Eligibility

RESEARCH TEAM ELIGIBILITY

Proposals must reflect substantive involvement of multiple investigators from different scientific disciplines and/or academic departments.

Projects should demonstrate substantive collaboration between CCIL members and must specifically address CCIL research program strategic themes (see program descriptions). Proposals should include a description of the innovative nature of the research and the team’s capabilities, where the contribution of each collaborator’s expertise is evident. At least two of the team members must be current CCIL members..

Although not limited to these topics, the CCIL is particularly interested in proposals that:

  • Seek to identify novel biological targets for anticancer therapy.
  • Seek to identify and/or develop new anticancer compounds.
  • Develop and use improved artificial intelligence and machine/deep learning algorithms for identifying patterns in image-based or numerical-based data for diagnostics.
  • Develop multi-modal, multi-scale imaging approaches (including hardware, algorithms, modeling, and simulations) that connect molecular- and cellular-scale processes in carcinogenesis with clinical tumor-, tissue-, and body-scale imaging to be used for cancer screening, diagnosis, and monitoring.
  • Develop robust and reliable collection, isolation, purification, and characterization processes for extracellular vesicles (including bioassays and analysis methods to determine vesicle content).
  • Utilize large genomic or proteomic data sets to derive novel biomarker targets for cancer diagnostics.
  • Involve the conception and development of novel biochemistry approaches for ultra-selective recognition of biomarker molecules, especially approaches that do not require enzymatic amplification.
  • Develop novel engineered models of cancer.
  • Advance the work of one of CCIL’s current Working Groups: Anticancer Discovery from Pets to People; Cancer and Microbes; Center for Genomic Diagnostics; Environmental Effects on Cancer: Cancer Toxicology of PFAS; Extracellular Vesicle Imaging and Therapy; Immunological Systems; Mechanochemical Dynamic Therapy; Optical Imaging (CLIMB Center); Organoid; and Robotics and Interoperative Assessments.
PRINCIPAL INVESTIGATOR ELIGIBILITY

Each project will identify a lead principal investigator (PI) who assumes organizational leadership for the project. A faculty member may only be PI on one submitted project. However, there is no limit to being a co-investigator on other projects. Applicants are strongly encouraged to include faculty at the Assistant Professor rank on their teams. Priority will be given to projects for which PIs are existing CCIL members. Preference will be given to investigators who have not previously received substantial CCIL research support funding.

Principal Investigator Requirements

GENERAL REQUIREMENTS

  • The PI must be a Professor, Associate Professor, or Assistant Professor
  • The PI and his/her unit are fully responsible for any overages if the funding request is calculated incorrectly
  • The PI is responsible for consulting with the relevant offices and meeting all requirements