Funder: Thrasher Research Fund
Due Dates: December 8, 2026 (Fall award notification) | March 16, 2027 (Spring concept) | April 8, 2027 (Spring concept decisions) | Early May 2027 (Spring proposal) | June 22, 2027 (Spring awards) | August 30, 2027 (Fall concept) | September 23, 2027 (Fall concept decisions) | Mid October 2027 (Fall proposal) | December 7, 2027 (Fall awards)
Funding Amounts: Up to $25,000 direct costs plus 7% indirect costs ($26,750 total) for up to two years
Summary: Supports mentored, early-career investigators conducting medical research directly addressing children's health and building independent research careers.
Key Information: Current or previous NIH K award support (including K12) or CTSA support disqualifies applicants.
Description
The Thrasher Research Fund's Early Career Awards help new child-health researchers develop into independent investigators through small, mentored research grants. The program welcomes a wide range of pediatric medical research topics rather than focusing on a particular disease. Projects must offer a novel, scientifically sound, hypothesis-driven approach with a clear pathway toward improving children's health.
Most awards support development research, including therapeutics, interventions, diagnostics, and clinically relevant biomarker validation. Discovery and delivery research are occasionally supported. Priorities include addressing important research gaps, meaningfully advancing the field, and producing widely translatable results. Review considers the incidence and severity of the medical problem, existing resources and treatments, the applicant's research potential and commitment, and the quality of mentorship.
