OVERVIEW: The American Federation for Aging Research runs a wide range of research grant and fellowship programs.
IP TAKE: Many of AFAR’s grants are made in collaboration with other geriatric-focused organizations and specify a research area and career level for recipients. While there is no citizenship requirement to apply, some programs are limited to the U.S., while others accept applications from individuals or organizations anywhere in the world. This is an accessible and supportive funder, but grants are competitive. Make sure your proposal is clearly written and researched, ask questions of the staff as needed. This is a major aging research funder. Specific areas of priority may also change from year to year, so it may be worthwhile to check the organization’s funding opportunities page periodically.
PROFILE: The American Federation for Aging Research was established in 1981 by Dr. Irving S. Wright, professor emeritus of Cornell University Medical College and former president of the American Heart Association, and awarded its first grants in 1982. The foundation’s mission is to “support and advance healthy aging through biomedical research.” Its main strategy involves funding cutting-edge aging research while encouraging more doctors and researchers to specialize in geriatric medicine. The goal of AFAR is to discover and understand the biomedical mechanisms of aging to help people lead healthier and more productive lives as they grow older. AFAR generally works with other organizations to support individual researchers with Research Grants and in a wide variety of fields related to aging.
Grants for Public Health, Neuroscience and Science Research
AFAR awards grants to researchers associated with universities, hospitals, and non-profit research institutions in the United States. These grants vary in size, duration, and eligibility requirements.
- Afar Grants for Junior Faculty and Glenn Foundation for Medical Research Grants for Junior Faculty support about ten early stage researchers working in a “broad range of biomedical and clinical topics related to aging for one to two years.
- The Paul B. Beeson Emerging Leaders Career Development Award in Aging provides funding to early-career researchers and aims to “develop […] a cadre of talented scientists” to lead the field. Awards are for up to five years.
- The Glenn Foundation for Medical Research Postdoctoral Fellowships in Aging Research support fellows conducting basic and translational research that “builds on early discoveries.” This is a one-year opportunity and 12 grants are typically awarded in a year.
- The Glen Foundation for Medical Research Discovery Award supports full-time faculty studying the biology of aging with funding for research with strong potential for impact on the field This program prioritizes “principal investigators who may not have previously worked in the area of aging” but whose expertise are relevant to the field.
- The McKnight Brain Research Foundation Innovator Awards in Cognitive Aging and Memory Loss consist of two separate awards distributed over a three-year period to support the research of assistant- and associate-level professors. One of the two awards supports clinical translation research, while the second supports research on “basic biological mechanisms underlying cognitive aging and age-related memory loss.”
The Small Research Grant Program for the Next Generation of Researchers in Alzheimer’s Disease are awarded in collaboration with the National Institute on Aging and support “innovative research in areas in which more scientific investigation is needed to improve the prevention, diagnosis, treatment and care for Alzheimer’s disease and related dementias. Two-year grants have been awarded in past years, but the amount and duration of future awards may vary.
Sagol Network GerOmic Award for Junior Faculty aims to support “the development of the careers of junior investigators committed to pursuing careers in the field of aging research and ger-omics research focused on aging and/or age-related disease research in particular.” The awards consist of one- or two-year grants with priority given to studies in the fields of genomics, epigenomics, proteomics, metabolomics, methylomics and comparative or interdisciplinary studies in these areas.
Grants for Higher Education
In addition to grants for faculty-level researchers, AFAR also offers scholarship and fellowship opportunities for” medical students and graduate students, including:
- The Medical Student Training in Aging Research (MSTAR) Program is Administered by AFAR and the National Institute on Aging, this program provides medical students with several months of structured research and clinical training in geriatrics and related fields, at either an AFAR National Training Center or an MSTAR-participating medical school in New York. A stipend is also provided.
- The Diana Jacobs Kalman/AFAR Scholarships for Research in the Biology of Aging is a joint effort between AFAR and the Glenn Foundation. This program gives students enrolled in Ph.D, MD or DO programs the opportunity to carry out a three-to-six month research project on a biomedical aspect of aging.
Important Grant Details:
AFAR’s grants and fellowships are awarded in amounts specific to each program, but generally fall between the range of $5,000 to $750,000.
- While there are no citizenship requirements, applicants must be affiliated with a U.S.-based institution.
- Programs vary significantly in eligibility requirements, guidelines, due dates and award amounts. Specific information about each opportunity is linked to the funding opportunities page.
- To get a broad sense of the projects AFAR supports, grantseekers may review its grantees list.
Address questions about funding opportunities to AFAR via email at grants@afar.org. AFAR can also be reached by phone at (212) 703-9977.
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