Developmental Funds

Columbia University Health Sciences, New York NY

Investigators

Linked publications, trials & patents

Abstract

Developmental Funds are critical to promote synergistic, collaborative, translational research that is aligned with the Herbert Irving Comprehensive Cancer Center (HICCC) Strategic Plan and fueled by the needs of the Catchment Area. The HICCC continues to utilize Developmental Funds tactically, to facilitate high-priority research with a significant probability of external grant funding, foster the research careers of junior investigators, enhance team science, increasing translational and clinical research, and promote new research areas relevant to the Catchment Area in coordination with the Community Outreach and Engagement Office and the Community Advisory Board. During the project period, the HICCC invested $1.4M of CCSG Development Funds in 19 projects to HICCC Members that resulted in $17.8M in extramural finding, an almost 13-fold return on investment, driven in part by intentional efforts to build research teams to leverage NCI/NIH multi-PI and multi-component grants, and contributed to 32 new cancer-relevant publications. Built on this foundational support, the HICCC leveraged a further $10.7M in non-CCGS funds for an additional 129 projects that include support for: new interdisciplinary collaborations, expanding the collaborative opportunities across Columbia for HICCC Members; early career investigators at critical points in their cancer research career development; bi-directional translational research accelerating movement of discoveries to innovative clinical and population research and back to new hypothesis driven research; and strategic needs of the Research Programs to enhance inter/intra collaborative research, drive translation of Research Program Member discoveries, and augment Member research in areas of unmet need such as cancer health disparities. Non-CCSG investments returned over $34.4M in external funding and contributed to 56 new cancer-relevant publications. In total, the HICCC invested $12.1M in 148 projects during the project period, returning $52.3M in external funding. The HICCC also leveraged a further $1.3M in support from partners at Columbia (e.g., Columbia Technology Ventures, Columbia departments and institutes) to augment HICCC project support of drug discovery projects and early career investigators. In this application, the HICCC requests $320,000 per year in Developmental Funds, equivalent to the current level of support and 8% of the total CCSG budget request (direct costs). These funds will be utilized to continue the robust support pilot programs that align with HICCC’s 2025-2030 Strategic Plan and advance its strategic priorities with a particular emphasis on collaborative research, translation of discovery science to patient benefit, particularly in cancers relevant to the HICCC Catchment Area and early career support.