Drug Discovery Predoctoral Fellowship
Supports advanced PhD students conducting innovative, translational drug discovery research integrating multiple scientific disciplines with clear relevance to human health.
Funder: PhRMA Foundation
Due Dates: April 15, 2026 (Letter of Intent) | August 26, 2026 (Full Application)
Funding Amounts: $30,000/year for up to 2 years (stipend only; up to $1,000/year for research incidentals or conference travel)
Summary: Supports advanced graduate students conducting innovative, translational research in drug discovery across multiple scientific disciplines.
Key Information: Applicants must be full-time, in-residence PhD candidates at accredited U.S. universities; only one applicant per lab per cycle.
Description
This fellowship supports advanced PhD candidates pursuing innovative research in drug discovery that integrates multiple scientific disciplines and demonstrates clear translational potential to human health. Eligible research areas include target identification and validation, disease mechanism mapping using omics technologies, hit and lead identification, protein biochemistry, structural biology, cellular and molecular biology, pharmacological profiling, advanced biomedical imaging, and application of AI or computational approaches to therapeutic hypotheses. Projects must articulate a therapeutically relevant hypothesis and, for computational projects, include a plan for translational validation in human-relevant systems. Proposals focused solely on assay development, chemistry without therapeutic evaluation, or biomarker/diagnostic identification lacking clinical context are not eligible.
