Clinical Phenotyping Core Mini-grant RFA

 

Mini-grants of up to $10,000 are available to support the acquisition of critical preliminary data for grant submission or the use of clinical phenotyping to support existing work for a manuscript submission.  Funds must be used for services provided by the Clinical Phenotyping Core (CPC; https://csr-mgh.org/cores/clinical-phenotyping-core-2/).  Awarded funds will cover essential efforts at the CPC including personnel support for conducting the analyses. Please contact Dr. Ata Kiapour (ata.kiapour@childrens.harvard.edu) to discuss opportunities and advantages to using CPC services to support your ongoing and future research programs.

 

Examples of potential services include:

• 2D and 3D phenotyping of bony and soft tissue structures (e.g., bone shape, cartilage thickness) using clinically relevant measurement techniques to mimic clinical evaluations.
• Quantitative image analysis (e.g., T2 mapping) to assess tissue quality (e.g., cartilage and ligament) from imaging data.
• Deep phenotyping (e.g., 3D mapping) to study complex morphologies.
• Imaging biomarker identification to predict the risk of injury or treatment outcomes.
• Genotype-phenotype matching of pre-clinical models (e.g., genetically modified mouse models) to clinical cohorts (e.g., patients with certain musculoskeletal disorders) to help better interpret and validate the preclinical observations.

Submissions that benefit from the use of more than one of the CSR Cores are welcome.

 

Applications must include:

1. NIH style biosketch with other support pages.
2. For applications related to collection of preliminary data for a future grant proposal please include:
   • Title, Specific Aims, funding deadline (must be within a year), agency to which grant is being submitted and type of proposal (R21, R01 etc)
3. For applications related to the use of clinical phenotyping to support existing work for a manuscript submission please include:
   • A description of the study, hypotheses, conducted experiments, collected outcomes, target journal and submission date (should be within 6 months).
4. A brief description (300 words limit) of the study design and why the investigations to be supported by the Core grant are critical for the grant proposal or the publication.
5. For post-docs, a letter from the current mentor must be included indicating:
   • the studies proposed will support funding for the applicant’s independence
   • plans for the applicant’s transition to independence.
6. Budget, based on consultation with relevant Core director(s).