Problem: A variety of disorders have particular relevance for pediatric medicine, and do not receive sufficient attention from traditional biomedical funding agencies. This program seeks to identify key targets in the Children's Healthcare of Atlanta patient population, and to stimulate new approaches toward those targets. Emphasis is placed on regenerative medicine because of its unique applicability to pediatric patients, but other treatment methods will be considered.
Proposals: Investigators are asked to identify pediatric diseases and conditions, or therapeutic approaches, with one of the following attributes:
- is neglected in the sense that it receives insufficient national funding or is the subject of many fewer publications than its importance deserves, or
- would benefit from cell and regenerative therapies, and is not currently being widely addressed in this way
The proposing team should provide evidence of both importance and neglect, and describe an experimental approach appropriate to seed-level funding that can begin to address the problem in a novel way or enhance a creative approach already begun. Examples may include, but are not limited to:
- new approaches to the control of respiratory syncytial virus (RSV)
- transdermal drug delivery
- pediatric tissue-focused gene delivery
- cell therapies for pediatric cancers, diabetes, cardiomyopathy, rheumatoid arthritis, inflammatory bowel disease, trauma/sepsis
- identifying and characterizing the efficacy of translatable cell sources for specific pediatric conditions
- patient specific induced pluripotent stem cell models of pediatric disease
- smart biomaterials for functional enhancement, cell delivery, or immune modulation
Issues of direct relevance to Children’s Healthcare of Atlanta patients will be judged to be of highest priority. Funding in this program area would favor new collaborations that would be expected to lead to significant leveraged extramural funding and advancements towards improved treatment options for pediatric patients.
Up to two years of funding may be requested. Please check back to see when this grant is available.
Amount: up to $75,000 per year, up to 2 years
