Pilot Projects Program

Pilot Projects Program - Abstract The Pilot Projects Program (PPP) is an integral component of the COBRE in Oxidants, Redox Balance and Stress Signaling and supports our mission to drive innovative redox-related basic and translational studies using the Center’s core resources and technologies. The overall goal of this program is to continue the significant momentum we have gained from the first two Phases of this COBRE by providing and prioritizing short-term funding for pilot studies that are designed to address important scientific questions in redox and signaling disciplines. We have incorporated innovative features of the PPP in this Phase III application, building on informatics tools and web resources developed and maintained by the South Carolina Clinical & Translational Institute (SCTR) that serve as CTSA-supported infrastructure, but provide a platform for electronic submission and review of applications and progress reports. The PPP will continue to provide and prioritize short-term funding through a competitive program which incorporates open solicitation, peer review and funding in three grant categories: Discovery: Attracting junior faculty without prior extramural funding to oxidants, redox balance and stress signaling research; New Direction: Enticing established investigators in other areas of biomedical research; and Feasibility: Enabling established redox investigators to explore an area that represents a significant departure from their currently funded work. The ultimate goal of the program is to provide adequate resources and training for pilot investigators to develop sufficient preliminary data to prepare a competitive extramural grant application that will directly utilize one or more of the COBRE cores. Our ultimate goal will be to use these funds to leverage additional funds and ideas that will expand participation and scientific competitiveness for the Center. Requests for applications will be solicited annually, four months in advance of the anticipated award date. Decisions related to the awarding of funds will be based on a rigorous and independent three-phase peer-review process that is modeled on the NIH system. The initial level of review will involve screening of proposals to verify that applications meet the eligibility criteria. The second will involve a panel of internal experts whose primary function will be to evaluate the scientific and technical merits of applications. A third level of review will be performed by the External Advisory Board. Applications will be scored using the NIH scale and prioritized according to four criteria: 1) Quality of the research (scientific merit, innovation, and impact); 2) Relevance to the mission of the Center and direct involvement of one or more COBRE Cores in the research plan; 3) qualifications of the research team to lead the research effort toward securing extramural funding and 4) stimulation of collaborative efforts with Center members. We plan to fund two new and/or continuation projects per year at $50,000 or $75,000 each for one to two years of support. We also envision that the PPP will enable investigators to form cooperative, interdisciplinary projects where sustainable studies can be turned into programmatic multi-investigator grant applications (e.g. U or P awards – we have been successful in garnering U awards, see Overall section) that will have a long-term impact on redox and cell signaling research at MUSC.