the autonomous vehicle innovation network (avin)’s wintertech development program will support ontario smes in the mobility space and their partners to validate, test, prototype and demonstrate new products and technologies designed to meet the unique demands of winter weather conditions. wintertech will leverage the strengths and innovative capabilities of ontario smes in the mobility space and our unique winter weather conditions to establish the province as a testbed for mobility products and services in severe winter weather conditions. through avin’s wintertech development program, ontario is a global leader in the commercialization of new winter-ready mobility technologies and solutions.

the av r&d partnership fund (stream 2) contributes up to one-third of eligible project costs for approved projects up to a maximum of $1,000,000, with the remainder contributed by applicants and/or partners. project funding can be used towards the development and demonstration of technologies in the connected and autonomous vehicle (cav) sector, in the following priority areas:

• mass light vehicles (e.g., cars, trucks and vans)

• heavy duty vehicles (including commercial vehicles, trucks, buses, rvs and others used for goods movement)

• transportation infrastructure

• intelligent transportation systems (its)

• transit-supportive systems and vehicles

he fy21 defense appropriations act is anticipated to provide funding to the department of defense prarp to support research that addresses the long-term implications of military service as they pertain to alzheimer’s disease (ad) and related dementias (adrd) for service members, veterans, and the general public.  as directed by the office of the assistant secretary of defense for health affairs, the defense health agency j9, research and development directorate manages the defense health program (dhp) research, development, test, and evaluation (rdt&e) appropriation.  the managing agent for the anticipated program announcements/funding opportunities is the congressionally directed medical research programs (cdmrp) at the u.s. army medical research and development command (usamrdc).

fy21 prarp program announcements and general application instructions for the following award mechanisms are posted on the grants.gov website. 

applications submitted to the fy21 prarp program announcements must address one of the following fy21 overarching challenges, which may be award mechanism-specific:

in addition to addressing one of the specified fy21 overarching challenges, applications must also address one or more of the following fy21 military risk factors in support of the fy21 overarching challenges. 

the prarp fy21 military risk factors are listed below.

the following is a summary of the fy21 prarp program announcements.  five award mechanisms will be offered for fy21. 

https://cdmrp.army.mil/funding/prarp

convergence science research award (csra) – letter of intent due june 14, 2021

level i: investigators at the postdoctoral level (e.g., research associates, fellows, medical residents, or equivalent) but below the level of assistant professor (or equivalent) at the time of the application submission deadline.

 mentor required.

level ii: the principal investigator (pi) must be an independent investigator at or above the level of assistant professor (or equivalent) at the time of the application submission deadline.

intent: to support innovative and impactful efforts to generate research resources, tools, and new avenues of investigation for researchers and practitioners in the health sciences.

 level i: applicant can be from any field or discipline and must write the project narrative and other application components, with appropriate guidance from the mentor(s). the mentor(s) must possess qualifications, background, and experience in both the identified military risk factor and alzheimer’s disease (ad)/ad-related dementias (adrd) research.

 level ii: intended to support applicants from any field or discipline at or above the level of assistant professor (or equivalent) from any field or discipline. study teams are expected to demonstrate relevant experience in both the identified military risk factor and ad/adrd.

applications must address one of the following fy21 prarp overarching challenges:

 foundational research

 paucity of clinical studies

 diagnostics and prognostics

 epidemiology

applications should address one of the following fy21 prarp military risk factors:

 traumatic brain injury

 neurophysiological/neurobehavioral

 vascular

 inflammation

 genetic

metabolic

 sleep

pharmacological interventions are specifically discouraged.

while not required, applications to either funding level i or ii are encouraged to provide relevant preliminary data.

research that focuses exclusively on chronic traumatic encephalopathy (cte) research is prohibited.

pharmacological interventions are specifically discouraged.

chronic traumatic encephalopathy (cte) research is prohibited.

preliminary data, while not required, are encouraged.

level i:

 maximum funding of $225,000 for direct costs (plus indirect costs).

 maximum period of performance is 3 years.

level ii:

 maximum funding of $500,000 for direct costs (plus indirect costs).

 maximum period of performance is 3 years.

for both levels:

indirect costs may be proposed in accordance with the institution’s rate agreement.

innovation in care and support award (incasa) – letter of intent due june 14, 2021

level i: investigators at the postdoctoral level (e.g., research associates, fellows, medical residents, or equivalent) but below the level of assistant professor (or equivalent) at the time of the application submission deadline.

 mentor required.

level ii: the pi must be an independent investigator at or above the level of assistant professor (or equivalent) at the time of the application submission deadline.

intent: to support innovative and impactful research that improves the quality of life and care for individuals, families, and care providers living with ad/adrd.

 level i: applicant can be from any field or discipline and must write the project narrative and other application components, with appropriate guidance from the mentor(s). the mentor(s) must possess qualifications, background, and experience in both the identified military risk factor and ad/adrd.

 level ii: intended to support applicants from any field or discipline at or above the level of assistant professor (or equivalent) from any field or discipline. study teams are expected to demonstrate relevant experience in both the identified military risk factor and ad/adrd.

applications must address one of the following fy21 prarp overarching challenges:

 paucity of clinical studies

 quality of life

 family and care support

applications should address one of the following fy21 prarp military risk factors:

 traumatic brain injury

 neurophysiological/neurobehavioral

 modifiable risk factors

 vascular

 inflammation

 genetic

 metabolic

 sleep

pharmacological interventions are specifically discouraged.

animal research is prohibited.

while not required, applications to either funding level i or ii are encouraged to provide relevant preliminary data.

research that focuses exclusively on cte research is prohibited.

level i:

 maximum funding of $225,000 for direct costs (plus indirect costs).

 maximum period of performance is 3 years.

level ii:

 maximum funding of $500,000 for direct costs (plus indirect costs).

 maximum period of performance is 3 years.

for both levels:

indirect costs may be proposed in accordance with the institution’s rate agreement.

research partnership award (rpa) – letter of intent due june 14, 2021

the initiating pi must be an independent investigator at or above the level of assistant professor (or equivalent) at the time of the application submission deadline.

each named co-pi must be at or above the level of assistant professor (or equivalent) at the time of the application submission deadline.

intent: to create an avenue for collaborative research partnerships between/among investigators to address a research problem or question in a manner that would be unachievable through separate efforts as related to the prarp’s mission.

applications must include clearly stated plans for interactions between/among the partners. the plans must include communication, decision-making, allocation of resources, coordination of research progress and results, and sharing of data among all investigators and organizations participating in the project.

applications must address one of the following fy21 prarp overarching challenges:

 foundational research

 paucity of clinical studies

 diagnostics and prognostics

 epidemiology

 quality of life

 family and care support

applications should address at least one of the following fy21 prarp military risk factors:

 traumatic brain injury

 neurophysiological/neurobehavioral

 modifiable risk factors

 vascular

 inflammation

 genetic

 metabolic

 sleep

pharmacological interventions are specifically discouraged.

preliminary data to support the feasibility of the research hypothesis (or hypotheses) or objectives are required.

research that focuses exclusively on cte research is prohibited.

funding limit is $1.3 million (m) in total costs.

 maximum period of performance is 3 years.

 indirect costs may be proposed in accordance with the institution’s rate agreement.

accelerating diagnostics research award (adra) – letter of intent due june 14, 2021

the pi must be an independent investigator at or above the level of assistant professor (or equivalent) at the time of the application submission deadline.

intent: to support high-impact, human-based development of robust diagnostic and/or prognostic biomarkers for military risk factors that pertain to ad/adrd.

applications must address the following fy21 prarp overarching challenge.

 diagnostics and prognostics

applications must address one of the following fy21 prarp military risk factors:

 traumatic brain injury

 neurophysiological/neurobehavioral

 vascular

 inflammation

 genetic

 metabolic

the proposed biomarker for investigation must correlate with clinical endpoints to include cognition and/or behavior relevant to the proposed military risk factor and ad/adrd. the applicant must choose one biomarker category for the overall application:

 imaging-related

 fluid-based (e.g., cerebrospinal fluid, blood, or saliva)

 retinal

 wearable devices

 other

studies focused on biomarker discovery are discouraged.

pharmacological interventions are specifically discouraged.

animal research is prohibited.

preliminary data regarding the suitability of the biomarker(s) for further testing toward biomarker qualification is required.

research that focuses exclusively on cte research is prohibited.

funding limit is $2.8m in total costs.

 maximum period of performance is 4 years.

 indirect costs may be proposed in accordance with the institution’s rate agreement.

leveraging approaches for innovation in care and support award (leap-incasa) – letter of intent due june 14, 2021

the pi must be an independent investigator at or above the level of assistant professor (or equivalent) at the time of the application submission deadline.

intent: to support high-impact, human-based development of robust diagnostic and/or prognostic biomarkers for military risk factors that pertain to ad/adrd.

applications must address the following fy21 prarp overarching challenge.

 diagnostics and prognostics

applications must address one of the following fy21 prarp military risk factors:

 traumatic brain injury

 neurophysiological/neurobehavioral

 vascular

 inflammation

 genetic

 metabolic

the proposed biomarker for investigation must correlate with clinical endpoints to include cognition and/or behavior relevant to the proposed military risk factor and ad/adrd. the applicant must choose one biomarker category for the overall application:

 imaging-related

 fluid-based (e.g., cerebrospinal fluid, blood, or saliva)

 retinal

 wearable devices

 other

studies focused on biomarker discovery are discouraged.

pharmacological interventions are specifically discouraged.

animal research is prohibited.

preliminary data regarding the suitability of the biomarker(s) for further testing toward biomarker qualification is required.

research that focuses exclusively on cte research is prohibited.

funding limit is $2.8m in total costs.

 maximum period of performance is 4 years.

 indirect costs may be proposed in accordance with the institution’s rate agreement.

a pre-application is required and must be submitted through the electronic biomedical research application portal (ebrap) at https://ebrap.org prior to the pre-application deadline.  all applications must conform to the final program announcements and general application instructions available for electronic downloading from the grants.gov website.  the application package containing the required forms for each award mechanism will also be found on grants.gov.  a listing of all cdmrp and other usamrdc extramural funding opportunities can be obtained on the grants.gov website by performing a basic search using cfda number 12.420. 

for email notification when program announcements are released, subscribe to program-specific news and updates under “email subscriptions” on the ebrap homepage at https://ebrap.org.  for more information about the prarp or other cdmrp-administered programs, please visit the cdmrp website (https://cdmrp.army.mil).

point of contact:

cdmrp help desk
301-682-5507
help@ebrap.org

on april 9, 2021 sharcnet issued a call for proposals for dedicated programming support round xviii. applications are encouraged that satisfy the programme objectives and priority will be given to proposals that meet one or more of the following conditions:

• propose an innovative project that will leverage the capabilities of the national systems, such as “graham” and the cloud.
• propose a programme of work that deals with the efficient processing of large, heterogeneous datasets using a variety of data mining, machine learning or other analytics software.

applications are submitted via sharcnet’s webportal and are due by may 21, 2021 at 11:59 pm est. please note that consultation with a sharcnet hptc prior to submission is a programme requirement.

due to the current workload of sharcnet programming staff, only a limited number of proposals are expected to be awarded in this round. for additional information, please refer to the application guidelines. questions should be addressed to research-support@sharcnet.ca.

the objective of the idea to innovation (i2i) grants is to accelerate the pre-competitive development of promising technology originating from the university and college sector and promote its transfer to a new or established canadian company. the i2i grants provide funding to college and university faculty members to support research and development projects with recognized technology transfer potential. this is achieved through defined phases by providing crucial assistance in the early stages of technology validation and market connection.

the specific objectives of this funding opportunity are:

• support research on the current health issues experienced within olmcs;
• strengthen collaboration and partnerships among researchers and health organizations working with or within olmcs (multi-institutional collaboration is encouraged);
• develop and enhance the community-based research approach within olmcs;
• strengthen the knowledge mobilization approach amongst researchers to address the gaps on olmc health;
• build capacity in the area of olmc health.

the goal of the agricultural climate solutions program (acs) is to accelerate co-development, testing, adoption, dissemination and monitoring of technologies and practices, including beneficial management practices (bmps), that sequester carbon and/or mitigate greenhouse gas (ghg) emissions.

through a collaborative approach, projects will focus on the on-farm co-development, testing, adoption and monitoring of new bmps and technologies. projects funded under acs will follow the living lab innovation model. a living lab is an integrated approach to agricultural innovation that brings together farmers, scientists, and other participants to co-develop, test, and monitor new bmps and technologies in a real-life context where they will be used: on canadian farms. more information about the living lab model and its core principles can be found in the living laboratories initiative.

acs will consider projects within the following 2 priority areas:

• carbon sequestration (for example, cover crops, intercropping, conversion of marginal land to permanent cover, shelterbelts, inclusion of pulses in rotations)
• greenhouse gas mitigation (for example, nutrient management, feeding strategies)

please note that during the 2021-22 funding cycle, the emphasis will be on supporting proposals that include the advancement of carbon sequestration as an important part of their project activities.

in addition, projects should indicate if they could support the achievement of other relevant environmental benefits, such as:

• improving soil health and water quality
• water conservation
• increasing biodiversity
• maximizing habitat capacity

the aim of the 2021 grant funding is to facilitate establishing a canada-wide network of living labs. eligible organizations in all provinces are welcome to submit their applications for 2021 grant funding to support the preparation of proposals leading to the development of living labs in their province. please note that while the 2021 granting process is open across the country, the focus will be placed on helping organizations in provinces that currently do not host a living lab established as part of the living laboratories initiative - collaborative program (lli-cp, 2018-23). currently, provinces of prince edward island, quebec, ontario and manitoba each host a living lab under lli-cp.

a second call for grant proposals will be offered in 2022.

brain canada is pleased to be partnering with alzheimer’s association (alz) to jointly launch the advancing research on care and outcome measurement (arcom) funding program, an international and collaborative competition aimed at addressing the significant measurement gaps in care and outcomes across diverse and underrepresented populations and stages of dementia. this program will provide an exceptional opportunity for canadian researchers to join the international research community and contribute to an underfunded area of focus to help ensure care providers are implementing evidence-based practices and achieving desired outcomes. through this partnership, brain canada is committing up to the equivalent of $750,000 cad to canadian-led teams who meet peer review recommendations.

the fy21 defense appropriations act is anticipated to provide funding to the department of defense oporp to support supports research that evaluates orthoses and/or prostheses using patient-centric outcomes relevant to service members and military beneficiaries, veterans, and other individuals with limb loss and/or limb impairment.  as directed by the office of the assistant secretary of defense for health affairs, the defense health agency j9, research and development directorate manages the defense health program (dhp) research, development, test, and evaluation (rdt&e) appropriation.  the managing agent for the anticipated program announcements/funding opportunities is the congressionally directed medical research programs (cdmrp) at the u.s. army medical research and development command (usamrdc).

fy21 oporp program announcements and general application instructions for the following award mechanisms are posted on the grants.gov website. 

the vision of the oporp is to ensure the highest possible quality of life for our injured service members, veterans, and beneficiaries through the advancement of knowledge in orthotics- and prosthetics-related practice.  the oporp supports research on outcomes-based best practices through analysis of prosthetic and/or orthotic device options that are currently available, and not on the development of new devices or the improvement of an existing technology. projects involving spinal orthoses, pediatric populations, or analysis of short-term use devices will not be considered for the fy21 oporp.

applications submitted to the fy21 oporp must address one or more of the following focus areas:

• orthoses or prostheses form:  optimize patient outcomes through the analysis and characterization of variables related to the form of currently available clinical options such as device size, shape, material, and/or configurations.

• orthoses or prostheses fit:  optimize patient outcomes related to the human-device interface through the analysis of variables in currently available clinical options that facilitate fit-related metrics such as comfort, limb health, and/or usability.

• orthoses or prostheses control:  optimize patient outcomes through the analysis of variables related to currently available device mechanisms such as device control, sensors, and passive or active response.

• orthoses or prostheses function:  optimize patient outcomes by analyzing device-inclusive care protocols and interventions to inform best practices such as evaluation and prescription, timing of interventions, community functioning, and multidisciplinary approaches to clinical care in order to understand short- and long-term outcomes with respect to activities of daily living and other real-world activities.

https://cdmrp.army.mil/funding/oporp

clinical research award – letter of intent due july 15, 2021

independent investigators at all academic levels (or equivalent)

supports research that evaluates orthoses and/or prostheses using patient-centric outcomes relevant to service members, veterans, and other individuals with limb loss and/or limb impairment.

 supported research is intended to generate clinically useful evidence with potential to enhance and optimize patient outcomes, and inform clinical or policy decisions.

 multidisciplinary collaboration among academia, industry, patient advocacy, the military services, the department of veterans affairs (va), and/or other federal government agencies is highly encouraged.

 applications submitted to the fy21 oporp cra must address at least one of the fy21 oporp focus areas.

 preclinical studies using animals are not allowed.

 clinical trials are not allowed.

the fy21 oporp cra offers two funding levels:

funding level 1:

 maximum funding of $350,000 for total costs (direct costs plus indirect costs)

 maximum period of performance is 2 years

funding level 2:

 maximum funding of $2,000,000 for total costs (direct costs plus indirect costs)

 maximum period of performance is 4 years

clinical trial award – letter of intent due july 15, 2021

independent investigators at all academic levels (or equivalent)

 supports implementation of clinical trials with the potential to have a significant impact on improving the health and well-being of service members and military beneficiaries, veterans, and other individuals with limb loss and/or limb impairment.

 supports clinical trials that evaluate orthoses and/or prostheses using patient-centric outcomes for the purpose of generating clinically useful evidence to enhance and optimize patient outcomes.

 multidisciplinary collaboration among academia, industry, patient advocacy, the military services, va, and/or other federal government agencies is highly encouraged.

 applications submitted to the fy21 oporp cta must address at least one of the fy21 oporp focus areas.

 preclinical studies using animals are not allowed.

the fy21 oporp cta offers two funding levels:

funding level 1:

 maximum funding of $350,000 for total costs (direct costs plus indirect costs)

 maximum period of performance is 3 years

funding level 2:

 maximum funding of $4,000,000 for total costs (direct costs plus indirect costs)

 maximum period of performance is 4 years

a pre-application is required and must be submitted through the electronic biomedical research application portal (ebrap) at https://ebrap.org prior to the pre-application deadline.  all applications must conform to the final program announcements and general application instructions available for electronic downloading from the grants.gov website.  the application package containing the required forms for each award mechanism will also be found on grants.gov.  a listing of all cdmrp and other usamrdc extramural funding opportunities can be obtained on the grants.gov website by performing a basic search using cfda number 12.420. 

for email notification when program announcements are released, subscribe to program-specific news and updates under “email subscriptions” on the ebrap homepage at https://ebrap.org.  for more information about the oporp or other cdmrp-administered programs, please visit the cdmrp website (https://cdmrp.army.mil).

point of contact:

cdmrp help desk
301-682-5507
help@ebrap.org