Limited Submission Opportunities

The purpose of the Shurl and Kay Curci Foundation 2026 Research Grants Program is to help prepare and support new investigators at the Assistant Professor level as they begin their careers. The foundation seeks to fund basic life science research (not clinical nor applied) addressing fundamental scientific questions that, when answered, will lead to significant advances in medicine or scientific knowledge.

Managing Unit: SoM

The Pew Scholars Program in the Biomedical Sciences provides funding to young investigators who demonstrate outstanding promise as contributors in science relevant to human health. The program makes grants to selected academic institutions to support the independent research of outstanding individuals who are in their first few years of their appointment at the assistant professor level.
Based on their performance during their education and training, candidates should demonstrate outstanding promise as contributors in science relevant to human health. This program does not fund clinical trials research. Strong proposals will incorporate particularly creative and pioneering approaches to basic, translational, and applied biomedical research. Candidates whose work is based on biomedical principles but who bring in concepts and theories from more diverse fields are encouraged to apply. Ideas with the potential to produce an unusually high impact are encouraged.
Investigator Effort: It is expected that Pew scholars will spend at least 80 percent of their time in work or activities related to the accomplishment of their overall research goals (which are not restricted to the specific aims proposed for this award). However, Pew provides flexible support to the general research aims of the scholar and does not require effort reporting.

Managing Unit: VPDoR

The Mark Foundation Endeavor Awards support collaborative research projects that bring together investigators with diverse areas of expertise to tackle challenges in the prevention, diagnosis, and treatment of cancer. These grants are awarded to teams of three or more investigators to generate and integrate data from diverse lines of research and transform those insights into advances for cancer patients that could not be achieved by individual efforts. Basic, translational, and clinical projects are eligible.

Managing Unit: SoM

$550,000 limited submission funding opportunity for early career biomedical scholars. Stanford Assistant Professors with UTL, UML, NTLR appointments in the early years of their tenure track faculty appointments from any school may be nominated. The Rita Allen Foundation Scholars Program funds biomedical research in the fields of cancer, immunology, and neuroscience. Candidates must have completed their training and provided persuasive evidence of distinguished achievement or extraordinary promise in research in one of the relevant fields.

Managing Unit: SoM

The Rediscovering Our Revolutionary Tradition program supports activities to preserve and improve access to primary source materials—including archival records; documents and rare publications; art and material culture; and photographs and sound recordings that document:
1) The history of American independence and establishment and/or expansion of the nation, including the experiences of states, territories, and communities—in the original colonies and beyond—joining the nation; or
2) The history of American government in federal, state, and local contexts, including the federal Constitution, the Bill of Rights, the Declaration of Independence, state constitutions, governors’ papers, charter documents, court and legislative records, and other foundational documents.

Managing Unit: VPDoR

The NSF Research Traineeship (NRT) program seeks proposals that explore ways for graduate students in research-based master’s and doctoral degree programs to develop the skills, knowledge, and competencies needed to pursue a range of STEM careers. The program is dedicated to effective training of STEM graduate students in high priority interdisciplinary or convergent research areas, through a comprehensive traineeship model that is innovative, evidence-based, and aligned with changing workforce and research needs. Proposals are requested that address any interdisciplinary or convergent research theme of national priority, as described in section II.D below.
The NRT program addresses workforce development, emphasizing broad participation, and institutional capacity building needs in graduate education. The program encourages proposals that involve strategic collaborations with the private sector, non-governmental organizations (NGOs), government agencies, national laboratories, field stations, teaching and learning centers, informal science centers, and academic partners.

Managing Unit: VPDoR

The Greenwall Faculty Scholars Program in Bioethics is a career development award to enable early-career faculty members to carry out innovative bioethics research. It supports research that goes beyond current work in bioethics to help resolve pressing ethical issues in clinical, biomedical, and public health decision-making, policy, and practice, and creates a community that enhances future bioethics research by Scholars and Alums.

Faculty Scholars will be selected on the basis of the strength of their research project, their commitment to the field of bioethics, their achievements, their potential for growth as a bioethics scholar, and support from their home institution, including after the end of this award. While the amount and quality of an applicant’s research in bioethics will count favorably towards their application, outstanding candidates with less direct experience in bioethics will also be considered when their proposed work aims to advance the bioethics field.

Managing Unit: VPDoR

The Foundation primarily supports basic science research with translational potential that can lead to major advances in scientific understanding and human health. Examples of current research areas supported include immunology, microbiome, structural biology, cellular physiology, cancer biology, genetics, genomics, microbiology and infectious diseases, stem cell biology, and neuroscience. Research areas that will not be considered for support include Covid-19 , plant biology, oceanography, space exploration, global warming, agriculture and herbicide research, clinical trials or drug discovery*, vaccine development, ecology, and environment. *The foundation’s guidance on human subjects research suggests using the NIH human subject research decision-making tool to evaluate your project.

Managing Unit: SoM

The overall objective of the forestry program is to improve sustainable forest management that addresses the pressing problems of climate change and biodiversity loss as well as society’s need for forest products.
– The program shall contribute to a change of perspective in sustainable forest management and in the use and value of forests.
– The program shall contribute to the integration of evidence-based science into forestry practice.
– Financial innovation and improved framework conditions should provide leverage for the implementation of sustainable forest management, resulting in forests that can conserve biodiversity, act as a carbon sink and supply forest products.
Thematic focus:
– Innovative and integrative sustainable forest management to develop and provide solutions for adapting to or mitigating climate change, promoting biodiversity, providing resilient ecosystems services and supplying sustainable forest products.
– Incentives or tools for action and behavioural change towards sustainable forest management by transforming theoretical and abstract values of forest products and services.

Managing Unit: VPDoR

The award's objective is to support projects that may be too innovative and speculative for traditional funding sources but still have a high likelihood of producing important findings. Investigations supported by these grants are expected to yield high-impact findings and result in major grant applications and significant publications in high-impact journals.

Managing Unit: Wu Tsai

The Searle Scholars Program supports the career development of early-career scientists who demonstrate exceptional potential and have recently begun tenure-track assistant professor appointments. The program funds high-risk, high-reward independent research across a wide range of scientific disciplines, including biochemistry, cell biology, genetics, immunology, neuroscience, pharmacology, and related fields in chemistry, medicine, and the biological sciences. While it does not typically support purely clinical research, proposals that combine basic and clinical components may be considered.
Applicants for the 2026 competition (with awards beginning July 1, 2026) must submit a research proposal that builds on their previously described research program and will be evaluated for creativity, feasibility, clarity, and the potential for successful outcomes. Searle Scholars Program funding may supplement, but not replace, support from other sources, and overlapping research is allowed.

Managing Unit: VPDoR