The Gulf Coast Consortia (GCC) is pleased to announce the RFA for the 2020 John S. Dunn Foundation Collaborative Research Award Program. Launched in 2009 with generous support from the John S. Dunn Foundation, this seed grant program continues to build the collaborative environment of the Gulf Coast Consortia (GCC) and fund projects with high potential for impacting human health.

The purpose of this program is to foster new, exemplary inter-disciplinary and inter-institutional engagement in the quantitative biomedical sciences by providing research seed grants of up to $100,000 total to support research/preliminary work for 2 years.

The goal of this program is to fund exploratory projects with high potential for future competitive research funding within 2.5 years of project start and a “best case scenario” plan for transitioning to clinical studies within 5 years. 

UTMB will select three teams from pre-proposald to move to the final proposal stage. Then GCC staff will manage the full proposal process with the expectation of 21 full proposals to be reviewed and three selected for award of funding.

Funds will be awarded to new collaborative teams in which the PI and co-PI are from different GCC member institutions: Baylor College of Medicine, Rice University, University of Houston, UT Health Science Center at Houston, UT Medical Branch at Galveston, UT MD Anderson Cancer Center, and The Institute of Biosciences and Technology of Texas A&M. Scientific disciplines covered by submissions to this program range across a spectrum within the quantitative biomedical sciences.

Each team of faculty wishing to compete for a Dunn Collaborative Research Award must first submit a pre-proposal (as a PDF) of no more than 2 pages. Additional requirements and guidelines are below to Melodi Moore mdmoore@utmb.edu by March 31, 2020.  All complete pre-proposals will be reviewed by the UTMB Research Grants Review & Oversight Committee.  Teams will be notified around April 20 of the selection or not of their proposals. 

***Note that timeline, biosketches and suggested reviewers will not be included in the 2 page limit.

The pre-proposal will include:

1. PI name, title, department, institution, email
2. Co-PI name, title, department, institution, email
3. If applicable: Co-I name, title, department, institution, email
4. Title of project
5. Abstract of up to 450 words
6. Statement attesting to this being a new collaboration among team members (i.e., no joint papers, abstracts, grant funding of any kind) 
7. Statement that the collaborative team leadership (PI and co-PI) is submitting the proposal only once and only to the PI institution
8. Timeline including milestones for the 2-year funding period as well as a best-case scenario plan for transition to clinical studies within 5 years of project start (not included in 2-page limit).
9. Biosketches for the PI and co-PI (2- page limit). ***Note: If a Co-I is included, a 2-page biosketch must also be submitted. 2-page biosketch should only reflect information (e.g. publications) pertinent to the proposal.
10. List of suggested reviewers – name, institution and email; 3 internal to GCC community and 3 external – in the event the team is invited to submit a full proposal. These reviewers will be able to provide an unbiased, knowledgeable review of your team’s inter-disciplinary proposal. Please avoid suggesting reviewers with whom you have conflicts of interest (i.e. joint authorship or grants, frequent interaction, collegial affiliations, etc.). See COI form.

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All pre-proposals will be reviewed internally by a designated research review committee of the PI institution. Based on their review, the committee will select three pre-proposals and notify the GCC of the committee selection. GCC will invite the PI of each to submit a full proposal directly to the GCC. Those not invited to submit full proposals will be notified by the PI institution. 

Questions should be directed to Melodi Moore email: mdmoore@utmb.edu or phone:  406-266-9428