Discovery Awards: Application Guidelines

The application cycle is currently CLOSED. We hope to announce the 2021 cycle in mid-spring for a potential fall 2021 deadline.

Eligibility:

NEW for 2020:

• Only one application per lead PI will be accepted. There is no limit to the number of proposals you can participate in as a co-PI.
• If you were the lead PI of a funded 2019 Discovery Award, you are not eligible to apply as the lead PI of a 2020 award. You will be eligible again in 2021.
• Approximately three of the 30 awards will be in research related to climate change.
• Approximately five of the 30 awards will be in research related to artificial intelligence.

Applications from all academic and professional disciplines at the university are welcome, and may cover fundamental, applied, or clinical research in any field, as well as the development of applied creative projects in the arts and humanities.

Applications must include at least two faculty members and/or APL staff members representing at least two separate schools/divisions or affiliates of the university.

Schools/divisions and affiliates are as follows: Applied Physics Laboratory (APL); Berman Institute of Bioethics (BI); Bloomberg School of Public Health (BSPH); Carey Business School (CBS); Center for Talented Youth (CTY); Human Language Technology Center of Excellence (HLTCOE); Jhpiego; Krieger School of Arts & Sciences (KSAS); Peabody Institute; School of Advanced International Studies (SAIS); School of Education (SOE); School of Medicine (SOM); School of Nursing (SON); Sheridan Libraries; and Whiting School of Engineering (WSE).

For example, Peabody and SOM co-PIs qualify as an eligible partnership, but two faculty members from different SOM departments would not qualify without a third co-PI from a different school or affiliate.

Funding:

Teams may request up to $100,000, with an award term of one to two years, to explore a new area of collaborative work. Support may be used for salary, graduate students, postdoctoral fellows or technicians, equipment, travel, and/or consumables. Applicants must describe a credible plan that assures they will make substantial progress during their funding period. Include fringe on all salary funding requests.

The aim of this program is to incite novel interactions within JHU; therefore, no more than 10% of the grant should be allocated as a subaward.

For any Discovery Award proposals that include APL, ensure that the APL co-PI(s) coordinates their proposal with Alan Ravitz (Alan.Ravitz@jhuapl.edu) prior to final proposal submission to JHU. APL proposals must be submitted to Alan by September 18 for internal technical and financial review.

2020 applicants will select a start date between 1/1/2021 and 6/30/2021. 

2021 Deadline: TBD

2020 awards were announced in December. It is anticipated that approximately 30 Discovery Awards will be made this cycle. The 2020 RFA is the sixth annual cycle.

Guidelines:

Applications will consist of four elements:

1. A proposal, which should include five sections that succinctly describe the: (A) innovative hypothesis to be tested or goal to be achieved; (B) nature of the collaboration that enables the proposed work; (C) approach to be pursued during the year of funding; (D) expected impact of the proposed studies beyond the initial funded phase, including what future work would be enabled; and (E) potential source of funding to sustain the effort.
   The proposal section can be no more than three pages, not including references. Please use 12 point font and margins no smaller than 1/2 inch.
   1. Since the Discovery Awards are intended for new collaborative projects, no preliminary data are required.
2. A budget breakdown that describes how the funding will be allocated to each investigator on the team, and how it will be apportioned for any personnel, supplies, equipment or other project expenses. Any budget amount up to the cap can be proposed. Faculty salary and equipment costs can be included. No indirect costs should be included in the budget.
3. A current CV or biosketch for all investigators. Please include all current and pending support from sponsored and non-sponsored sources.
4. Up to five key words to aid in reviewer assignment.

Review Criteria:

The review process will evaluate the innovativeness of the project, its potential long-term impact and the synergy expected to result from the proposed crossdivisional collaboration. Collaborators who have worked and published together in the past are not excluded, but the project itself must be both highly innovative and as of yet unfunded. Applications will also be judged on the likelihood of success in attaining future funding. Proposals will be reviewed by a panel of distinguished faculty.

Post–Award Requirements:

Recipients will submit a final progress report, including any completed work, reports of invention, and any external funding applications/awards enabled by this funding. Recipients may also be asked to present their work at a Provost Research Symposium. [/vc_column_text][/vc_column][/vc_row]