Pilot Funding Opportunities

The following pilot funding opportunities are available through the Markey Cancer Center. The list below will be updated when specific due dates for each program become available. Calls for applications and letters of intent are announced two to three months before the application due date. Contact Jennifer Bybee (jennifer.bybee@uky.edu) for more information.

• American Cancer Society Institutional Research Grant (ACS IRG) awards
  The next round of funding for 2024 is detailed below.
  • Announcement: July 17, 2024
  • Amount: $40,000 per award
  • Due Dates
    • Application: August 28, 2024
    • Expected Start Date: December 15, 2024
       
• Center for Cancer and Metabolism (CCM) COBRE Pilot Awards 
  This pilot program funds projects focused on cancer or metabolism, and grants awarded through this program should have the potential to generate competitive extramural applications and peer-reviewed publications. The CCM will offer up to four pilot projects this year. 
  • Announcement: April 17, 2024
  • Amount: $50,000 per award
  • Due Dates:
    • Application: May 28, 2024
    • Presentations, by invitation: September 4, 2024
    • Expected Start Date: January 1, 2025
       
• Cancer Center Support Grant Pilot awards  |  View Funding Announcement (PDF)
  Full applications are invited from approved letters of intent and are limited to Markey Cancer Center members. One round of funding per year.
  • Announcement: December 2023
  • Amount: $50,000
  • Due Dates:
    • Letters of Intent (LOIs), through program leader nominations: February 7, 2024
    • Application, by invitation: April 10, 2024
    • Expected Start Date: July 1, 2024
       

• MCC Community-Engaged  Research Pilot award  |  View Funding Announcement (PDF)
  The purpose of this pilot is to encourage mutually beneficial research collaborations between MCC researchers and community stakeholders that respond to cancer-related, community-driven needs/priorities in Kentucky. Project applications should focus on community-engaged research in basic, clinical and/or population science with a cancer-relevant focus (i.e., a focus on one or more of the following: cancer etiology, cancer risk reduction, early detection, treatment, survival, or quality of life for patients with cancer)

  • Announcement: January 4, 2024
  • Amount: $50,000
  • Due Dates
    • Application: April 3, 2024
    • Expected Start Date: August 1, 2024
       
• MCC Community-Engaged Partnership Planning Project  |  View Funding Announcement (PDF)
  The purpose of this pilot is to encourage mutually beneficial research collaborations between MCC researchers and community stakeholders that respond to cancer-related, community-driven needs/priorities in Kentucky. Project applications should focus on community-engaged research in basic, clinical and/or population science with a cancer-relevant focus (i.e., a focus on one or more of the following: cancer etiology, cancer risk reduction, early detection, treatment, survival, or quality of life for patients with cancer)
  • Announcement: January 4, 2024
  • Amount: $10,000
  • Due Dates
    • Application: May 3, 2024
      Expected Start Date: August 1, 2024

• MCC / Radiation Medicine – Collaborative Bench to Bedside Pilot Grant Award 
  The Collaborative Bench to Bedside Grant Award represents a funding mechanism to stimulate collaborative efforts towards bench to bedside translation between members of the Markey Cancer Center and the faculty in the Department of Radiation Medicine. The goal of this support is to facilitate opportunities to translate bench discoveries into novel investigator initiated clinical trials involving therapeutic radiation medicine. Typically up to two rounds of funding per year.  
  • Announcement(s): February 14, 2024 and June 27, 2024
  • Amount: $50,000
  • Due Dates
    • Application: March 27, 2024 and August 21, 2024, respectively 
    • Expected Start Date: July 1, 2024 and December 1, 2024, respectively
       
• MCC / Substance Use Priority Research Area (SUPRA)
  The purpose of this collaborative pilot funding award is to provide resources to support innovative and collaborative substance use research from a basic science, pre-clinical, clinical, and/or community research perspective, as it relates to cancer.
  • Announcement: TBA
  • Amount: $50,000
  • Due Dates
    • Application: TBA
    • Expected Start Date: TBA
       
• MCC / UNITE Research Priority Area award
  These projects will be supported jointly by the cancer center and the UNITE Research Priority Area and should focus on projects that will help better understand and prevent cancer, detect cancer early, and/or manage cancer treatment more accurately and effectively among racial/ethnic minority populations.
  • Announcement: August 21, 2024
  • Amount: $50,000
  • Due Dates
    • Application: October 9, 2024
    • Expected Start Date: February 1, 2025