Pump-priming grants

Round #4 is now open; deadline 4pm 22 Oct 2019

The VALIDATE Network aims to accelerate vaccine research and development for complex intracellular pathogens that cause diseases significant to low and middle-income countries (LMIC), with an initial focus on Mycobacterium tuberculosis, Leishmania spp, Burkholderia pseudomallei and Mycobacterium leprae. The Network’s priorities lie in cross-pathogen, cross-discipline, cross-species and cross-continent research, with the aim of making step-change progress towards efficacious vaccines targeting these pathogens.

Grants are available for pump-priming projects of up to £50,000 (at 100% FEC), via competitive application to the Network Management Board (NMB). Projects should run for a maximum of 12 months and should lead to relevant and useful data for the field, or produce pilot data that will lead to a larger grant application to an external funder. Projects must be scientifically excellent, and fall within the VALIDATE remit.

This is the final planned pump-priming call for VALIDATE, and the VALIDATE NMB strongly encourage collaborative projects led by and/or involving LMIC researchers. In addition, we particularly welcome projects including any of the following: new collaborations between VALIDATE members, projects led by and/or including Early Career Researchers, projects with industry involvement, cross-pathogen research, cross-discipline research, projects promoting the One Health agenda, in vivo research, and translational research.

Awards are open to all VALIDATE Investigators and Associates, but projects must have at least one Investigator involved. Projects must include VALIDATE members (Investigator or Associate) from at least two different Institutes and all collaborators must be VALIDATE members.

All awardees will be required to submit narrative and financial reports at 6 and 12 months. All awardees must agree to sharing unpublished project data via the VALIDATE portal (a secure area only accessible to Network members who have signed the VALIDATE CDA) to accelerate the progression towards development of efficacious vaccines for these pathogens.

The fourth VALIDATE pump-priming grant round is now open and closes at 4pm (UK time) on 22nd October 2019. Please read our application guidance document (below) before drafting your application. Please submit your application form and associated documents as one pdf document by 4pm (UK time) on the closing date to our Network Management Team at validate@ndm.ox.ac.uk. Please also contact Samantha Vermaak at this address with any queries about the grant call (see also FAQ document below).