Good Afternoon,

The American Diabetes Association has invited proposals for the Pathway to Stop Diabetes Award. This is a limited submission opportunity and the Office of the Vice Provost for Research is facilitating the internal selection process for potential applicants who hold a primary appointment at a school on the Cambridge campus. A synopsis and link to the internal competitions can be found below:

American Diabetes Association Pathway to Stop Diabetes Award

Harvard Pre-Proposal Deadline: May 16, 2023

FAS/SEAS/OSP Deadline (if nominated): July 25, 2023

Sponsor Deadline (if nominated): August 1, 2023

Award Amount:  Accelerator Awards provide up to $325,000/year for five years; Postdoctoral Initiator Awards provide two distinct phases of research support: Phase 1 provides up to two years of support for mentored training at a maximum of $100,000 per year, Phase 2 provides up to five years of support for independent research at a maximum of $325,000 per year. 

Pathway to Stop Diabetes provides crucial support to individuals focusing on innovative ideas and transformational approaches that will lead to ground-breaking discoveries in diabetes prevention, management and cures for diabetes. This call for nominations will prioritize translational applications that move knowledge and discovery gained from basic research to its eventual translation into patient and population benefit. There are two types of awards granted through this program: 

• Early Career Faculty Accelerator Award: This award is designed to support exceptional, independent early-career researchers who have distinguished themselves as promising investigators and are in the beginning stages of establishing successful, sustainable diabetes research programs. Awards are available to early-career diabetes investigators proposing innovative and ambitious diabetes-related research programs. Applicants must hold faculty positions and have demonstrated independent productivity in diabetes research. Applicants may currently hold independent NIH funding but must not have applied for or received an R01/U01 renewal or a second R01/U01 award. Applicants must devote at least 75% of total time and effort towards research during the period of funding, with a commitment of 25% to 50% effort towards their Accelerator Award. 
• Postdoctoral Initiator Pathway Award: This two-phased award is designed to support the transition of scientists from mentored training to independent research faculty. Eligible applicants must currently be in research training positions (post-doctoral fellow, research fellowship) and have no more than seven years of research training following terminal doctoral degree. Applicants must devote 75% to 100% effort towards research during Phase 1, and 50% to 75% effort during Phase 2. 

The Harvard University Cambridge campus may submit only one proposal to either the Accelerator or Initiator opportunities. In order to be considered for the nomination, interested applicants must first submit an internal pre-proposal to the Office of the Vice Provost for Research. The internal application for the Accelerator Award can be found at https://bit.ly/3Zsi0oq and the internal application for the Initiator Award can be found at https://bit.ly/3FVTHYX. HSPH, HMS, and affiliated hospitals may each submit separate nominations for this opportunity and therefore are not included in this call for pre-proposals. 

Questions from FAS or SEAS faculty about this opportunity may be directed to Erin Hale (erin_hale@fas.harvard.edu) or Jennifer Corby (jcorby@fas.harvard.edu).

Requests for support related to the application portal may be directed to vpr@harvard.edu.