DoD Prostate Cancer, Impact Award | W81XWH 18 PCRP IA

Opportunity Information: Apply for W81XWH 18 PCRP IA

The DoD Prostate Cancer Research Program (PCRP) Impact Award is designed to fund prostate cancer research projects that can realistically change the field in a meaningful way in the near term. The central goal is not incremental progress, but work with a clear line of sight to major advances that reduce deaths from prostate cancer and improve quality of life, with explicit relevance to Service members, Veterans, military beneficiaries, and the broader public. This opportunity is positioned for projects that can address important scientific and clinical problems and move results toward real-world use, rather than stopping at proof-of-concept.

A defining feature of the Impact Award is its emphasis on measurable, near-term clinical influence. Proposed research is expected to tackle one or more of the FY18 PCRP Overarching Challenges and to produce outcomes that could transform clinical management of prostate cancer within five years after the award ends. Because of that high bar, the Principal Investigator is expected to make a direct, detailed case for why the work matters clinically, what will change if the project succeeds, and how significant that change would be for patients and care delivery. Along with this impact argument, applicants must include a thorough transition plan that lays out how findings will move into the next stage of development after the project period, and how the team will keep pushing the work forward toward clinical impact even if the immediate endpoint is not a final clinical product or guideline change.

In terms of research scope, the program is intentionally broad but insists on clinical relevance. Projects may be basic, translational, or clinical, including clinical trials, as long as the link to improving prostate cancer management is clear. The announcement encourages applications from many disciplines beyond traditional oncology labs, including engineering, bioinformatics, population science, and psycho-oncology, and it specifically welcomes multidisciplinary efforts. Clinical trial proposals are allowed only if they are small-scale, up to and including Phase II (or equivalent). For investigators proposing trials, the program strongly suggests leveraging the PCRP-funded Prostate Cancer Clinical Trials Consortium (PCCTC) to speed start-up and completion, reflecting the program’s overall push for timely execution and actionable outcomes.

Feasibility is another non-negotiable element. Applications must include preliminary data that support the proposed approach, and any unpublished preliminary data should come from the PI’s lab or from members of the research team. To strengthen rigor and reproducibility, applicants are strongly encouraged, where appropriate, to include standard best practices such as authenticating proposed cell lines, applying statistical rigor in preclinical animal work and epidemiological analyses, and validating findings in patient cohorts. The opportunity also points applicants toward established resources that can accelerate clinically relevant validation, including the PCRP-funded Prostate Cancer Biorepository Network (PCBN) and the North Carolina to Louisiana Prostate Cancer Project (PCaP), especially when the project depends on retrospective human specimens or linked clinical and outcome data. In the same vein, the announcement encourages studies that use large, well-annotated patient datasets with long-term health records and biospecimen repositories, particularly when paired with state-of-the-art genomics or proteomics, advanced bioinformatics, or mathematical modeling.

From a funding and administrative standpoint, the award is issued by the Department of Defense, Department of the Army (USAMRAA) under CFDA 12.420, within the Science and Technology / Research and Development activity category. The funding instrument can be either a grant or a cooperative agreement, and the deciding factor is how much substantial involvement the DoD anticipates during performance. If the agency expects no substantial involvement, the award is typically a grant; if collaboration, participation, or intervention by the DoD is expected, it may be a cooperative agreement, with that involvement spelled out in the award terms. For FY18, the anticipated direct costs for the full period of performance are capped at $750,000. Eligibility is listed as unrestricted, meaning the competition is broadly open to entity types, subject to any additional eligibility clarifications in the full announcement. The Funding Opportunity Number is W81XWH-18-PCRP-IA, the opportunity was posted May 21, 2018, with an original closing date of October 18, 2018, and the program anticipated making about eight awards.

• The Department of Defense, Dept. of the Army -- USAMRAA in the science and technology and other research and development sector is offering a public funding opportunity titled "DoD Prostate Cancer, Impact Award" and is now available to receive applicants.
• Interested and eligible applicants and submit their applications by referencing the CFDA number(s): 12.420.
• This funding opportunity was created on May 21, 2018.
• Applicants must submit their applications by Oct 18, 2018. (Agency may still review applications by suitable applicants for the remaining/unused allocated funding in 2026.)
• The number of recipients for this funding is limited to 8 candidate(s).
• Eligible applicants include: Unrestricted (i.e., open to any type of entity above), subject to any clarification in text field entitled Additional Information on Eligibility.

Apply for W81XWH 18 PCRP IA

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