Pilot Project Program (PPP)

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ABSTRACT Our Phase 1 (P-I)/Phase 2 (P-II) effort has enabled us to define the study of neuropsychiatric illness through the lens of systematic multimodal imaging as the thematic area of focus. We feel that we can be competitive at the national level for a center grant beyond the P-III given our current trajectory. During P-I/P-II we developed a strong state-of-the-art infrastructure and a strong research base composed of established faculty and successfully graduated junior PIs, some of whom now serve as core directors and mentors as part of our P-II and Phase 3 (P-III) COBRE programs (detailed in the various cores). Although the number of R01 grants won by local investigators meets the minimum requirement for consideration for a center grant, we still need to increase the number of R01s from MRN/UNM and other research institutions in NM in order to be competitive nationally. The proposed Pilot Project Program (PPP) is designed to maximize our ability to achieve this goal. The PPP will fund three categories of faculty members: (1) current P-II junior PIs and pilot project PIs who have existing pilot projects and need further support beyond their P-II projects; (2) junior faculty members with strong proposals who will be supported as new investigators during P-III; and (3) senior faculty members who wish to include neuroimaging as a new component of their pre-clinical or clinical research program to expand the scope of research. We will allocate a total of up to $250,000/year for our PPP, consisting of $125,000/year requested from the NIGMS and $125,000/year in institutional match funds. This funding will be used to support up to 5 projects at $50,000/project/year. To encourage productivity, each project will be funded for 1 year at a time, with the possibility for competitive renewal if meeting documented criteria and after evaluation by the steering committee (SC). The PPP will establish a training program for each successful PPP investigator on the use of the cores and will implement a mentoring program reminiscent of our P-II mentoring program, to provide mentorship to all 3 categories of funded faculty members. The selection of PPP-supported investigators and the oversight of our PPP will be carried out by the SC consisting of members of our P-II internal faculty development committee along with an administrative member and three core users. 2