Parkinson's Foundation Impact Awards

Parkinson's Foundation Impact Awards is sponsored by Parkinson's Foundation. Impact Awards fund researchers who require foundational support to advance innovative studies across various aspects of Parkinson's disease. The number of these awards doubled in the most recent cycle.

Awards for Independent Investigators | Parkinson's Foundation The Parkinson’s Foundation offers competitive awards for independent investigators, including the Stanley Fahn Junior Faculty Award and Impact Awards. These programs fund early-career faculty, support high-potential research ideas that need initial resources and bring experts together to solve key clinical and scientific challenges.

Investigators can review program details, eligibility and deadlines online and explore all previously funded projects through the Foundation’s award database . The Parkinson's Foundation offers competitive awards for independent investigators: Stanley Fahn Junior Faculty Award : a three-year award for early-career faculty members providing a total of $300,000.

Impact Awards : funding for innovative projects that are in need of support to see their maximum impact on the Parkinson's community. Conference Awards : supporting the gathering of experts in the field working to address unsolved clinical or basic science problems relevant to Parkinson's.

Stanley Fahn Junior Faculty Award The Stanley Fahn Junior Faculty Award honors longtime Parkinson’s Foundation Scientific Director Stanley Fahn, MD, renowned for his clinical abilities and commitment to training the next generation of Parkinson's scientists.

The Stanley Fahn Junior Faculty Award provides funding for promising early-career faculty members, averting research talent loss and ensuring young scientists stay committed to Parkinson’s disease research.

In conjunction with their institution’s commitment, the award gives junior investigators the bridge support needed to secure their independent funding source (such as an NIH R01) in the PD field, with the overarching goal of fostering a career-long independent research leader in PD.

The Parkinson’s Foundation seeks clinical, pre-clinical, or basic research proposals from promising early-career faculty members that will directly impact the understanding or treatment of PD. Successful projects should include novel PD research hypotheses and be inventive in methodology or approach. Each award provides $300,000 in total costs, including up to 10% of indirect costs.

Funds are awarded over three years, subject to annual progress reviews. The award permits salary support up to 40% of the applicant’s total salary. Submission of an NIH R01 or equivalent on a PD-related project is a required award milestone at the end of year two, and the third year of funding is contingent upon this.

Eligibility and Restrictions Junior faculty possessing a PhD, MD, or equivalent are eligible to apply. Applicants must meet the National Institutes of Health (NIH) definition of a "new investigator." The typical applicant will hold an Assistant Professor level position, though exceptions will be considered provided the above eligibility criteria are met.

A letter of support from the applicant’s department chair is required to demonstrate institutional commitment to the applicant. This program is restricted to applicants who are residents and faculty members at institutions in the U.S. and Canada, regardless of citizenship.

Applicants must be in a tenure-track position or equivalent; if the applicant is an instructor, they must have the intent to begin a tenure-track position by the award start date, as confirmed by a support letter from their department chair. While collaborations are encouraged, co-Investigators are not permitted. Only one award will be granted per institution each year, though special exceptions may be considered.

Awardees may not concurrently hold an award from another source with overlapping specific aims . Applications from groups that have been historically underrepresented or excluded in the scientific workforce, including but not limited to racial and ethnic groups, sexual orientation and gender identities, individuals with mental/physical disabilities, and those from economically disadvantaged backgrounds, are especially encouraged.

All application components must be submitted through the Foundation’s online grants portal, ProposalCentral (see “ProposalCentral Instructions” below for more details). The application process is highly competitive and consists of two stages: 1. Letter of Intent (LOI) Applicants must first submit a LOI describing the proposed project, including its specific aims.

LOIs should be approximately one page in length. Only applicants who submit complete LOIs by the specified deadline will be considered; deadline extensions will not be permitted . Following LOI peer review, a subset of applicants will be invited to submit a full proposal.

Detailed application instructions for the full proposal stage will be provided at this time. An applicant may apply to only one program per funding cycle. In addition, an applicant may not submit multiple LOIs (with different projects) to the same program during the same funding cycle.

Applications from multiple individuals within the same institution are permitted, but only one per institution may be awarded. All submitted LOIs are subject to internal review by the Foundation’s administrative and scientific staff. LOIs that are most strongly focused on PD research and best aligned with both the goals of the funding program and the Foundation’s mission will be selected for external peer review.

External peer review results will inform decisions about which LOIs will be invited to submit a full proposal. Full proposals undergo external peer review and are competitively evaluated based on the potential impact of the proposed research on Parkinson's disease, scientific merit, the qualifications of the applicant, and alignment with the Foundation's mission.

Final funding decisions will be made following peer review meeting discussion of the highest-ranked proposals. Funding decisions are expected in June. The Foundation's funding year typically begins August 1 and ends July 31 of the following year.

All great ideas in science begin with a seed that, when nurtured, can profoundly impact the community. However, without adequate funding, these ideas may never get started, grow, or be fully explored. Recognizing this, the Parkinson's Foundation supports innovative projects from their inception, providing the necessary resources to maximize their impact on the Parkinson's community.

The Parkinson's Foundation Impact Awards support high-risk, high-reward research with the potential to transform our understanding of PD, establish new directions in PD research, or accelerate the development of novel interventions. Projects should be based on groundbreaking or unconventional ideas that are unlikely to be funded through more traditional funding mechanisms.

Our goal is to support researchers in testing innovative concepts that have the potential to significantly advance PD research, generate compelling preliminary data, and position projects for continued funding from the Parkinson's Foundation and other funding organizations. Program Details: Subprograms To better support the full continuum of Parkinson’s research, the Impact Awards are offered through two subprograms.

All proposals must demonstrate a significant focus on Parkinson’s disease and align with the goals of the selected subprogram. 1. Impact Award: Foundational Research The Foundational Research subprogram supports innovative basic and mechanistic research that advances our understanding of PD biology.

Projects should seek to uncover fundamental disease mechanisms, identify new biological pathways, develop novel experimental tools or models, or generate transformative insights that could enable future therapeutic development.

Projects may include but is not limited to research that: Elucidates disease mechanisms Defines cellular and molecular pathways involved in PD Investigates genetic contributors to disease Studies disease heterogeneity or resilience Examines the role of co-pathologies Develops innovative experimental tools, models, or technologies Identifies novel biomarkers or therapeutic targets Generates foundational discoveries that enable future therapeutic development 2.

Impact Award - Translational Research The Translational Research subprogram supports research that advances promising discoveries closer to clinical application. Projects should focus on validating therapeutic targets, developing therapeutic candidates, advancing biomarkers toward clinical utility, or generating evidence needed to support future clinical studies.

Projects may include but are not limited to research that: Validates therapeutic targets Develops pharmacological, biologic, gene therapy, cell therapy, or neuromodulation approaches Advances biomarkers toward clinical implementation Conducts proof-of-concept studies in relevant preclinical models Performs IND-enabling or therapeutic de-risking studies Advances discoveries toward clinical testing Uses established, well-characterized human cohorts to advance translational research While the following areas are important, they are outside the scope of both Impact Award subprograms and will not be considered: Research that represents incremental follow-on work to projects previously funded by the Parkinson's Foundation or other funding agencies Projects whose proposed scope cannot reasonably be completed within 24 months Complementary and supportive therapies, including diet, exercise, physical therapy, occupational therapy, speech therapy, psychotherapy, social work, and community support Human subject research that requires recruitment of new participant cohorts Meta-analyses of existing clinical studies that do not generate new primary data Each award provides $200,000 in total costs over a two-year period ($100,000 per year).

Up to 10% ($10,000 per year) of the total award may be used for indirect costs. The combined salary support for the Principal Investigator (PI), Co-Principal Investigator (Co-PI), and Co-Investigator(s) is capped at $35,000 annually . Salary support for postdoctoral fellows, graduate students, research staff, and other key personnel is not capped.

Tuition is not an eligible expense.. Funding is provided over a two-year period, subject to satisfactory annual progress review. Eligibility and Restrictions This award is open to scientists with a PhD or MD, regardless of nationality or geographic location (domestic or international).

The Parkinson's Foundation encourages applications from both established investigators and those new to the field of PD. Investigators who are new to PD are encouraged to identify a collaborator with expertise in Parkinson’s disease. Only independent investigators are eligible to serve as PIs.

Applicants must hold a tenure-track faculty position or equivalent. Non-tenure track faculty may serve as Co-PIs, and postdoctoral fellows may serve as Co-Investigators. Applications from investigators holding Instructor appointments will be considered if they can demonstrate that they will assume a tenure-track position by the award start date, as confirmed by a support letter from their department chair.

The Foundation reserves the sole authority to determine an applicant’s eligibility. Awardees may not concurrently hold an award from another source with overlapping specific aims . If you have questions regarding eligibility or program fit, please contact the Parkinson’s Foundation's Research Grants Team ( Grants@Parkinson.

org ). Applications from groups that have been historically underrepresented or excluded in the scientific workforce, including but not limited to racial and ethnic groups, sexual orientation and gender identities, individuals with mental/physical disabilities, and those from economically disadvantaged backgrounds, are especially encouraged.

All application components must be submitted through the Foundation's online grants portal, ProposalCentral. Detailed application instructions, LOI guidelines, and the list of other required components, can be found there (Apply now) . The application process is highly competitive and consists of two stages.

Stage 1: Letter of Intent (LOI) Applicants must first submit a Letter of Intent (LOI) describing the proposed project, including its specific aims. The LOI should be approximately one page in length. Applicants must select the subprogram to which they are applying (Foundational Research or Translational Research).

An applicant may apply to only one program or subprogram per funding cycle. In addition, an applicant may not submit multiple LOIs (with different projects) to the same program or subprogram during the same funding cycle. The person submitting the LOI will be considered a lead PI (if awarded, all payments will be made to their institution).

If invited to the next stage, the same person will be automatically transferred as a lead PI. No changes in the lead PI and the title of the application are allowed after the LOI submission. Any Co-PIs, Co-Is and collaborators and their institutions must be listed during the LOI stage.

Only applicants who submit complete LOIs by the specified deadline will be considered. Deadline extensions will not be permitted. Following the LOI peer review, a subset of applicants will be invited to submit a full proposal.

Detailed full proposal application instructions will be provided at the same time. For current application dates visit Award Deadlines . All submitted LOIs are subject to internal review by the Foundation’s administrative and scientific staff.

LOIs that are most strongly focused on PD research and best aligned with both the goals of the funding program/subprogram and the Foundation’s mission will be selected for external peer review. Because the Impact Awards are intended to support innovative, high-risk/high-reward research, reviewers will place significant emphasis on novelty and potential impact.

LOIs submitted to the Foundational Research Program and Translational Research Program will be evaluated according to criteria appropriate for the selected sub-program. The peer review results will inform decisions about which LOIs will be invited to submit a full proposal. Full proposals undergo external peer review.

They will be competitively evaluated based on the novelty and potential impact of the proposed research on Parkinson's disease, scientific merit, the qualifications of the applicant, and alignment with the Foundation's mission. Final funding decisions will be made following peer review meeting discussions of the highest-ranking proposals. Funding decisions are expected in June.

The Foundation's funding year typically begins August 1 and ends July 31 of the following year. Conference Awards support the gathering of experts in the field working to address unsolved clinical or basic science problems relevant to Parkinson's disease. All applications should demonstrate the potential to advance the field of Parkinson's research.

We require publicly available meeting results. Applicants may use this award to: Identify or define emerging research questions Plan or organize a clinical trial Standardize research methods The Parkinson's Foundation commits to including the perspective and experience of people living with PD in the research process. We highly encourage applicants to incorporate a community engagement component into award applications.

The level of support will be determined after reviewing the application, based on the conference's potential impact on Parkinson’s research and its alignment with the Foundation’s mission. We also encourage contributions from multiple funding partners, including the applicant institution.

Eligibility and Restrictions Conference Awards are open to both national and international independent investigators with a PhD, or MD, or equivalent degree. We encourage planned or proposed funding partners but require them to be named in advance. If one or more of the proposed funding partners is a for-profit entity, e.g., a pharmaceutical company, the source must make its support in the form of an unrestricted educational award.

Conference results must be publicly available. Conferences may not be for social or networking purposes. The Parkinson's Foundation expects that each meeting or conference will engage members of the Parkinson's community.

The application period is open year-round. We accept applications anytime, though applicants must submit them at least 90 days prior to the proposed conference start date. Please contact Grants@Parkinson.

org if you are interested in applying. We review all Conference Award proposals, based on scientific merit and PD impact. We make final decisions four to six weeks after application submissions.

Funding may commence immediately upon award notification. Reporting Requirements and Other Terms We require applicants who successfully receive Parkinson's Foundation funding for their conference to identify the foundation as a support source in all conference materials and advertisements, in all presentations and any subsequent publications.

As conference sponsors, we require as-needed, complimentary registration for Parkinson's Foundation designated staff or guests. As part of the Parkinson's Foundation's public-sharing goal, we may post conference-related information, such as the notice or agenda on our website. At a minimum, awardees are required to submit a 200-word lay summary after the conference.

Explore All Our Research Grants Visit our Award Search Database for all currently and previously funded Parkinson’s Foundation research awards. Search by keyword, investigator, institution, and more!

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