The FY19 Defense Appropriation provides $3.2 million (M) to the Department of Defense Duchenne Muscular Dystrophy Research Program (DMDRP) to support innovative, high-impact Duchenne muscular dystrophy research.  As directed by the Office of the Assistant Secretary of Defense for Health Affairs, the Defense Health Agency J9, Research and Development Directorate manages the Defense Health Program (DHP) Research, Development, Test, and Evaluation (RDT&E) appropriation. The managing agent for the anticipated Program Announcements/Funding Opportunities is the Congressionally Directed Medical Research Programs (CDMRP) at the U.S. Army Medical Research and Materiel Command (USAMRMC).

FY19 DMDRP Program Announcement and General Application Instructions for the following award mechanism is posted on the Grants.gov.

IMPORTANT:  All applications for the FY19 DMDRP Idea Development Award must address opportunities and challenges in the development of safe and effective macromolecular and cellular therapies that address primary pathology of DMD. Eligible therapeutic strategies include: gene therapy, genome editing, oligonucleotide therapies, exon skipping, protein therapeutics, and cell therapies.

Studies proposed under this award may include:

·        Delivery to skeletal muscle and heart (ligand assisted, nanoparticles, identification of biological barriers to delivery, alternative vectors)

·        Immunosuppression, and other strategies to deal with neutralizing antibodies

·        Re-dosing

·        Targeting muscle stem cells

·        Cell based therapies, including but not limited to: selection of novel cell types, expansion, root of delivery, differentiation, and integration

Studies proposed under this award should not include:

• Therapies addressing secondary pathology of DMD (fibrosis, inflammation, muscle atrophy, oxidative stress, mitochondrial defects, abnormal peripheral circulation)
• Small molecules
• Efficacy testing absence of mechanistic understanding,
• Evaluation of standard vectors or delivery technologies

https://cdmrp.army.mil/funding/dmdrp

Idea Development Award

Principal Independent investigator (PI): Independent investigators at all academic levels (or equivalent) are eligible to be names as a PI.

• Supports the development of innovative, high-risk/high-reward research that could lead to critical discoveries or major advancements that will accerale progress in improving outcomes for individuals with DMDM.
• Applications must address opportunities and challenges in the development of safe and effective macromolecular and cellular therapies that address primary pathology or DMD.
• Preliminary data are required.
• Clinical trials are not allowed.
• Maximum funding of $350,000 in direct costs (plus indirect costs)
• Period of performance not to exceed 2 years

A pre-application is required and must be submitted through the electronic Biomedical Research Application Portal (eBRAP) at https://eBRAP.org prior to the pre-application deadline.  All applications must conform to the final Program Announcements and General Application Instructions available for electronic downloading from the Grants.gov website.  The application package containing the required forms for each award mechanism will also be found on Grants.gov.  A listing of all CDMRP and other USAMRMC extramural funding opportunities can be obtained on the Grants.gov website by performing a basic search using CFDA Number 12.420. 

For email notification when Program Announcements are released, subscribe to program-specific news and updates under “Email Subscriptions” on the eBRAP homepage at https://eBRAP.org.  For more information about the DMDRP or other CDMRP-administered programs, please visit the CDMRP website (https://cdmrp.army.mil).

Point of Contact:

CDMRP Help Desk
301-682-5507
help@eBrap.org