Pilot and Feasibility Program

Summary The Pilot/Feasibility (P/F) Program of the San Diego Digestive Diseases Research Center (SDDRC) promotes the development of early-stage investigators into productive and funded researchers. At a time of increasing NIH budget pressures, it is challenging for promising early-stage faculty to obtain their first independent research grants in a timely manner to prevent stalling of their careers. Furthermore, it is more important than ever to provide strategic early support for starting the common cycle of substantial initial data generation, first grant submission, more data generation, and second revised grant submission. Without a steady inflow of new investigators and fresh perspectives, research in digestive diseases is liable to slow down and not be able to fulfill its promises in improving the digestive health and well-being of the public. The P/F Program also helps to advance digestive diseases research by encouraging seasoned investigators in other fields to take on challenges in digestive diseases, to facilitate work in new areas by established digestive diseases investigators with innovative high-risk projects, and to promote collaborative work for advancing new approaches in digestive diseases research. The SDDRC P/F Program has been highly successful. Over the past 10-year reporting period (the initial years were in preparation of the original P30 application), the P/F Program has awarded $891,000 in P/F grants to 24 investigators. The great majority of awards (75%) have been given to new investigators to support their career development. Current funding rates are ~30%. Past awardees have had outstanding success in obtaining new grants, having received grants totaling $23.7 million in direct costs for a nominal return-on-investment of 26.6, and an ultimate funding success rate of ~80%. P/F awardees had excellent scholarly productivity, with 24 awardees so far having generated 52 publications related to their P/F projects, and have overwhelmingly (92%) remained in digestive diseases research in academia, underscoring that our P/F awardees have been highly committed and successful in their research endeavors and career trajectories in digestive disease research. Building on these accomplishments, the P/F Program will continue to support 4-5 annual $40,000 P/F grants through a combination of P30 resources and successful engagement of the home institution and other centers and programs with overlapping interests. The Program has a robust elicitation and review process with extensive input from external investigators, including the members of the External Advisory Committee. Together, the P/F Program will advance the SDDRC mission and benefit SDDRC investigators by providing P/F funds to support innovative projects and promote career development in research related to the digestive tract and liver.