(CLOSED) RFA 67-84 - PA Dept. of Health Collaborative Research on Alzheimer's Disease (AD) In Response to Request For Applications

Sponsor Name: 
PA Dept. of Heath
Amount: 
$11,000.00
Description of the Award: 

The Department has between $11 and $12 million to fund collaborative research projects that are consistent with the research priority of understanding mechanisms of, or the discovery of agents to prevent, stop or cure Alzheimer’s Disease. The Department expects to award three Grants and expects awards not to exceed $4 million.

At least 50 percent of the funds must be spent on clinical research or health services research or both clinical research and health services research; biomedical research may also contribute to the focus.

Clinical research - patient-oriented research which involves direct interaction and study of the mechanisms of human disease, including therapeutic interventions, clinical trials, epidemiological and behavioral studies and the development of new technology.

Health services research- includes any of the following: (1) research on the promotion and maintenance of health including biobehavioral research, (2) research on the prevention and reduction of disease, (3) research on the delivery of health care services to reduce health risks and transfer research advances to community use.

The collaborative research project funded by this RFA will bring together established research scientists with proven records of scientific excellence to work with clinicians, non-traditional partners and other researchers, including junior faculty as members of the research team. Collaboration among and between universities or academic medical centers, in association with businesses, health care providers, public agencies, smaller colleges and universities and other institutions or organizations that are not academic medical centers within the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania is encouraged.

The specific objectives are:

  1. To assist in the elimination or reduction of disparities in health status, outcome, prevention or treatment.
  2. To promote competitive research development and technology transfer in health sciences that are important to Pennsylvania.
  3. To foster interdisciplinary research by teams of scientists and others.
  4. To promote collaborative efforts among academic, business, advocacy and public health institutions.
  5. To provide a catalyst for funding from philanthropic, Federal and other non-state government sources.
  6. To provide flexibility in order to foster atypical teams who may not usually seek to affiliate for research.

 

All research applications submitted in response to this RFA must identify and address disparities in health status, outcome, prevention or treatment, and should relate to a national health objective (that is, Healthy People 2020).

 

Research may include, but is not limited to, the following areas:

• Studies focused on neurosensory systems as biomarkers of AD genesis and progression (for example, vision, olfactory, auditory) or as models of neurodegeneration (for example, macular degeneration, glaucoma, olfactory regeneration) or combinations thereof.

• Work to enable precision medicine for AD through deep sequencing, immunological profiling, and multi- omics molecular profiling.

• Development of early biomarkers of AD risk or onset or both.

• Research into mechanisms for how genetic variants (for example Apolipoprotein (APOE)) influence AD risk.

• Integrative models of cellular communication and interaction in the central nervous system (CNS) that underlie aging and neurodegeneration.

• Development of standardized induced pluripotent stem cell (iPSC)-based in vitro models of AD neurodegenerative processes.

• Research on the propagation of abnormal proteins (for example, tau) from neuron to neuron.

• Mechanistic studies using data or biospecimens from cohorts known to be at risk for AD or both (for example, traumatic brain injury, Down Syndrome, familial disease.)

• Work to understand the interaction between peripheral systems (for example, immune system, microbiome, vasculature) and the CNS in the context of aging, neurodegeneration, and AD.

• Development of novel animal models capable of recapitulating the natural course of clinical AD.

• Use of computational modeling or artificial intelligence or both to develop in silico models of AD genesis and progression.

• Development of a vaccine or other agent to prevent disease onset.

• Integration of molecular and clinical data to enhance drug discovery through machine learning techniques.

 

Research in the following areas will not be considered:

• Genome-wide association studies or epidemiologic studies focused on identifying population-level risk.

• Design and development of registries or tissue banks.

• Studies focused on cognitive testing or therapy or caregiving modalities or devices or a combination thereof.

• Projects focused on health care delivery to current patients with AD.

Although one applicant must be designated on the application as the lead agency, the collaborative research project must consist of at least two organizations that have joined together for the purpose of this RFA. The research project must have one common goal, with the collaborating organizations working together on all phases of the project instead of each collaborating organization working independently on separate phases of the research project.

Collaboration with a minority-serving academic institution or minority-serving community-based organization in Pennsylvania is strongly encouraged, and should include the mentoring and training of students, fellows and junior faculty. Pennsylvania's minority-serving academic institutions are Cheyney University of Pennsylvania and Lincoln University. A minority-serving community-based organization is an organization whose mission is to provide service to minority groups. The application should describe the mission of the minority-serving community-based organization and the racial and ethnic composition of the persons that it serves.

 

Train minority students -- All research applications must include the involvement of minority college students in research through the development of a minority research training program for racial and ethnic student populations that are underrepresented in biomedical, health services and clinical research, such as African Americans and Hispanics. The minority research training program must include, at a minimum undergraduate summer internships or academic semester internships or both. A graduate student training program for underrepresented minority students is encouraged, but not required.

Limit (Number of applicants permitted per institution): 
1
Sponsor LOI Deadline: 
Dec 20, 2019
Sponsor Final Deadline: 
Jan 23, 2020
OSVPR Application or NOI Instructions: 

To be considered as a Penn State institutional nominee, please submit a notice of intent by the date provided directly below.
This limited submission is in downselect: 
Penn State may only submit a specific number of proposals to this funding opportunity. The number of NOIs received require that an internal competition take place, thus, a downselect process has commenced. No Penn State researchers may apply to this opportunity outside of this downselect process. To apply for this limited submission, please use this link:
OSVPR Downselect Deadline: 
Thursday, December 12, 2019 - 4:00pm
Notes: 
Duffy, Charles (Medicine) 12/12/19