Dear Researchers,

We hope your summer has been enjoyable and productive. Can you believe the calendar has turned to August already? Soon we will have the excitement of a new academic year, the beautiful colors of Fall, and football Saturdays!

Please take a moment to see how the resources of the Indiana CTSI can be helpful to your research. If you have any questions, don't hesitate to reach out. We're here to help! All the best for a great start to the academic year!

Sincerely,

Melanie DeFord, Deputy Director and Assistant Vice President for Research
Jessica Brookshire, Notre Dame Co-Navigator of the Indiana CTSI
Prakash Nallathamby, Notre Dame Co-Navigator of the Indiana CTSI

Take a moment to explore our past newsletters and summits. At Indiana CTSI, we’re committed to uniting Indiana’s life sciences community to drive research forward and improve health across the state.

Wednesday, October 15, 2025

9:00 a.m. – 12:00 p.m.

via Zoom

On Wednesday, October 15, the Indiana CTSI will host a virtual multi-institutional mock study section where participants will gain first-hand experience of what it’s like to go through an NIH grant review process. The Indiana CTSI is hosting the event in collaboration with the University of Central Florida (UCF).

The Association for Clinical and Translational Science (ACTS) has successfully hosted mock study sections for trainees and early career faculty at their annual conference for the past 10 years. This is the first time the Indiana CTSI will offer this training experience, according to Tammy Sajdyk, PhD.

In addition to UCF, several other institutions who were previously involved in the administration of the mock study section at ACTS will be involved in the event. These institutions include the North Carolina Clinical and Translational Sciences Institute at the University of North Carolina; the Clinical and Translational Sciences Institute at the University of Minnesota; and the Yale Center for Clinical Investigation at Yale University.

This opportunity is geared towards pre-doctoral students, post-doctoral fellows and junior faculty who are eligible to submit NIH or NIH equivalent grants. Previous grant submission is not a requirement.

“This is a great opportunity to learn about how grants are reviewed. It will ensure new investigators are better prepared for their first submission,” said Sajdyk, who is the Indiana CTSI navigator for the IU School of Medicine Indianapolis campus.

Prior to the event, each participant will be assigned a K- or R-level NIH grant to review. During the activity, they will take the role of an NIH study section reviewer and discuss their assigned grant with peers and experienced faculty.

There is no cost to participate in the mock study section. More information is available on the application form. Applications will be accepted until all slots are filled and then names will be placed on a waitlist.

Those with questions should reach out to Sajdyk at tsajdyk@iu.edu.

The Indiana CTSI Commercialization PDT is designed to provide early guidance to academic and clinical investigators interested in advancing their discoveries to the market. The programs are open to investigators from Indiana University (IU), Purdue University, or the University of Notre Dame; and includes a pool of advisors across these universities and industries around the state to provide investigators with a wide range of expertise and perspectives.

Submission Deadline: August 13, 2025

Developmental and Hyperactive Ras Tumor (DHART) SPORE program. The goal of the SPORE program is to improve the diagnosis and management of tumors arising in persons with neurofibromatosis type 1 (NF1) and other inherited “Rasopathy” syndromes through basic, translational, and clinical research.

Two funding opportunities are available via this program: the Developmental Research Program (DRP) and the Career Enhancement Program (CEP).

Contact: kevin.shannon@ucsf.edu and jblakel3@jhmi.edu

Submission Deadline: September 30, 2025

The mission of the Grants Linking University–wide Expertise (GLUE) awards is to support “the planning and team building across campuses to develop of large multi-investigator and/or multi-project, milestone-driven, translational research teams who are planning to eventually submit a multi-year extramural grant applications with annual budgets of $300K or higher in direct costs per year”.   Examples of such grants include (but are not limited to) PPGs, U series, multi PI R01s, STTRs and SPORE grants.

Applications for GLUE grants are accepted for review at any stage of their development.  It is expected that these planning/seed grants will increase multidisciplinary collaborations, institutional competitiveness, opportunities for extramurally funded training grants and overall institutional funding.

The GLUE funding is available to collaborative teams where the lead PI of the research team is from IUB, and the other members of the team are from Indiana CTSI affiliate campuses.

Contact: Jybe@iu.edu

Letter of Intent Deadline: September 17, 2025

Submission Deadline: October 1, 2025

The Indiana CTSI Community Health Partnerships (CHeP) is soliciting proposals for the development of community-university partnerships to improve health, examine social determinants of health (SDoH), or enhance health equity, to result in future collaborative research proposals. The award can be used to establish new partnerships or to strengthen/expand existing community-university partnerships to solve critical health problems affecting Indiana residents. This award will not fund research pilot projects; instead, it will fund activities to help develop partnerships between organizations that have potential to later engage in joint research projects to address health, health equity, or SDoH. The expected outcome of this award is the development of a future research proposal for opportunities such as the Community Health Partnerships Trailblazer Award (Trailblazer Award). Examples of partnership development activities we are interested in funding include meetings, conferences, travel expenses, stakeholder interviews, and quality improvement assessments.

Contact: chep@iu.edu

Submission Deadline: Rolling submission

Research Project Development Teams (PDTs) are groups of experienced senior faculty located on each of the Indiana CTSI campuses who will connect you with resources, collaboration opportunities, and small (typically up to $15,000) awards for preliminary or additional data. Each PDT is designed around a common research theme.

There are biostatisticians and regulatory experts on each team, and other experts are added as needed when you meet with the team to discuss your application. You will have access to the expertise and knowledge you need all in one place.

Contact: tsajdyk@iu.edu

Submission Deadline: August 25, 2025; December 15, 2025; April 1, 2026

Deadline: November 3, 2025

Submission Deadline: Rolling Submission

Letter of Intent Deadline: August 22, 2025 by 5:00 p.m. EST

Submission Deadline: October 17, 2025 by 5:00 p.m. EST

Rolling Submission

Rolling Submission

These virtual sessions are open to anyone affiliated with an Indiana CTSI partner campus. Attendees will hear from an expert on a specific topic, and then there will be time for conversation and questions.

If you have questions, contact Dr. Tammy Sajdyk. 

Wednesday, August 20, 2025

12:00 - 1:00 p.m.

Wednesday, September 3, 2025

7:00 - 8:00 a.m.

Wednesday, September 10, 2025

12:00 - 1:00 p.m.

The Indiana CTSI has experts across a wide variety of fields and research areas of interest. Click the button below to have the latest research discoveries and developments making news and positively impacting health in Indiana delivered right to your inbox. 

The Indiana CTSI includes Indiana University, Purdue University, and the University of Notre Dame as the major academic partners along with a number of other institutions and entities in the state.

It is funded by a Clinical and Translational Sciences Award from the National Institutes of Health amounting to some $38 million for the current seven-year funding period of 2023-2030. This funding is supplemented by additional support from many other institutional and corporate partners.

Funding is provided to researchers by many mechanisms to promote translational and collaborative research among the partner institutions.

For more information, please visit: indianactsi.org

If you have any questions about Indiana CTSI grants, programs, or upcoming events please feel free to reach out to co-navigators Jessica Brookshire or Prakash Nallathamby.