Innovative Project Award

The purpose of the Innovative Project Award is to support highly innovative, high-impact research that could ultimately lead to critical discoveries or major advancements that will accelerate the field of cardiovascular and/or cerebrovascular research. Research deemed innovative may introduce a new paradigm, challenge current paradigms, look at existing problems from new perspectives, or exhibit other uniquely creative qualities.

The Innovative Project Award (IPA) promotes unexplored ideas; therefore, preliminary data is not required and not accepted as part of the proposal. However, a solid rationale for the work must be provided. If you provide preliminary data, the application will be disqualified. Should you include information about preliminary work, then the proposal is not innovative. You may refer to previous projects you have conducted to demonstrate that you possess a competency or technique that equips you to take on this new direction. Proposals may also refer to existing, unanalyzed datasets and the types of data they contain (e.g., geospatial, demographic, billing, molecular) that could be leveraged in conducting the proposed work, but there should be no preliminary descriptive summaries of the data itself. Proposed work should not be the next logical step of previous work, but should have a high probability of revealing new avenues of investigation, if successful.

The principal investigator (PI) is responsible for clearly and explicitly articulating the project's innovation and the potential impact on cardiovascular and cerebrovascular research.

Budget

• Award: $100,000 per year, including 10 percent indirect costs
• The award may be used for salary and fringe benefits of the principal investigator, collaborating investigator(s), and other participants with faculty appointments, and for project-related expenses, such as salaries of technical personnel essential to the conduct of the project, supplies, equipment, computers/electronics, travel (including international travel), volunteer subject costs, data management, and publication costs, etc. The proposed budget must be justified in the application.
• AHA does not require use of the NIH salary cap.
• Award Duration: Two years.
• Total Award Amount: $200,000

Eligibility

_You can learn more about this opportunity by visiting the funder's website._

• At the time of award activation:
  • The candidate must hold a post-baccalaureate Ph.D. degree or equivalent, or a doctoral-level clinical degree, such as MD, DO, DVM, PharmD, or PhD in nursing, public health, or other clinical health science.
  • This program places no limit on eligibility based on career stage, academic rank or discipline. It requires only evidence of employment at a qualified institution, beyond the fellowship/training stage.
  • While no minimum percent effort is specified, the principal investigator must demonstrate that adequate time will be devoted to ensuring successful completion of the proposed project.

_You must be a member of this organization to apply for this award - become a member. Join or begin the membership process well before the deadline. The AHA expects all mentors associated with training/mentored research awards to maintain active AHA membership, as well._

Ineligibility

• AHA does not permit resubmission of a previous Innovative Project Award application.
• Resubmission of a prior application to the AHA Innovative Research Grant program for an Innovative Project Award will not be accepted.
• An applicant may submit more than one Innovative Project Award application; each proposal to an AHA innovative program (Innovative Research Award and Transformational Research Award) must have clearly distinct aims.
• In addition, applicants to this program may submit one Transformational Program Award application, and one investigator-based application (Career Development Award, Established Investigator Award, or Merit Award) per fiscal year.
• The Innovative Project Award may be held concurrently with another Association award.
• Innovative Project Awards are not renewable. The award may be held more than once by a single investigator provided the projects are separate in nature and concept.
• Awards are not intended to supplement or duplicate currently funded work.
• The project submitted may have no scientific or budgetary overlap with other funded work.
• If you provide preliminary data, the proposal will be disqualified.
• Postdoctoral fellows and others in research training positions at time of application must obtain a faculty appointment by the award activation date.