Overview For the past 33 years, the Michigan Diabetes Research and Training Center (MDRTC) Pilot/Feasibility Study (P/FS) Grants Program has attracted young investigators to diabetes-related research and has stimulated new biomedical, behavioral, clinical, epidemiologic, translational, and health services research. On rare occasions, P/FS grants have also encouraged established investigators in other disease areas to focus their expertise on problems related to diabetes, and established investigators in diabetes to explore new, high-risk directions. Major benefits of the P/FS Grants Program are that it has attracted new investigators into research careers in diabetes and related disorders, has attracted investigators from Schools and Institutes across the University of Michigan (UM) to participate in the MDRTC, and has made the MDRTC a catalyst for new interdisciplinary collaborations. With establishment of the Michigan Center for Diabetes Translational Research (MCDTR), we propose to expand the P/FS Grants Program to type 2 translational researchers who are center members across the region and nation, to further stimulate new investigators to enter the field and to foster productive collaborations. The ultimate goal of the P/FS grants program is to enable awardees to generate sufficient bodies of preliminary data to successfully apply for major research funding from the NIH or other national granting agencies and to accelerate the pace of translation of proven-effective interventions into real world health care settings, communities, and populations at risk. Each year, $50,000 in NIH funds awarded to the MCDTR will be devoted to funding at least two P/FS grants. NIH funds may be supplemented with institutional funds (see below). Management The Administration Core of the MCDTR will oversee the P/FS Grants Program. In order to optimize the use of NIH funds, the MCDTR and the MDRTC will share responsibility for the administration of the P/FS Grants Program. William H. Herman, M.D., M.P.H. and Martin G. Myers, Jr., M.D., Ph.D. will co-direct the program. Together they will solicit applications and requests for extramural peer review, assign internal reviewers, convene the meeting of the P/FS Grants Program Advisory Council, notify awardees, and track outcomes including subsequent extramural grant awards and publications. After the award, the Administration Core will also ensure distribution of funds to awardees, monitor expenditures, and obtain annual status reports on funded projects. Dr. Herman provides scientific oversight for the identification of external reviewers for T1 and T2 translational research applications and Dr. Myers provides oversight for the biomedical research applications. Currently, the Grants Program Advisory Council includes 7 translational researchers and 7 biomedical researchers (Table 1). In the future, a minimum of one-third of Council members will be experts in type 2 translational research in diabetes.
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