DoD Spinal Cord Injury, Translational Research Award | W81XWH 20 SCIRP TRA

Opportunity Information: Apply for W81XWH 20 SCIRP TRA

The Department of Defense Spinal Cord Injury Research Program (SCIRP) Translational Research Award (TRA) is a discretionary funding opportunity run through the Department of Defense, Department of the Army, U.S. Army Medical Research Acquisition Activity (USAMRAA). It is designed to fund translational spinal cord injury (SCI) research that can move promising scientific and clinical observations toward real-world clinical use. The core emphasis is on accelerating the path from an idea to an application that helps patients, such as a healthcare product, enabling technology, or a practice guideline that could be adopted in clinical care.

This award focuses on work that sits at the intersection of preclinical and clinical research, with a clear intent to bridge gaps that often slow down translation. The program description highlights example project types such as demonstration studies of pharmaceuticals or medical devices in relevant preclinical systems, and clinical research that tests therapeutics, devices, or care practices using human tissues, clinical samples, or other human-derived resources. In other words, the award is aimed at projects that can show concrete progress toward clinical readiness, feasibility, or early clinical utility rather than purely exploratory or basic research with no defined near-term pathway to patient impact.

A key point in the announcement is how the program defines translational research. It is not framed as a simple one-way pipeline from "bench to bedside." Instead, the program encourages a reciprocal, iterative flow of information between basic science and clinical science. That means a strong application would typically show how clinical observations can shape laboratory work and how laboratory findings can, in turn, refine clinical questions, study designs, endpoints, or patient selection. The observations that spark a translational idea can come from multiple sources, including laboratory discoveries, population-based studies, and clinician insight grounded in real patient experiences, including anecdotal patterns that suggest a testable therapeutic or technological opportunity.

From an administrative standpoint, the opportunity is identified as Funding Opportunity Number W81XWH-20-SCIRP-TRA, with funding provided through either a grant or a cooperative agreement mechanism. Cooperative agreements generally imply more substantial involvement from the funding agency during project performance compared with a standard grant, so applicants typically need to be prepared for active coordination, reporting, and milestone-based management consistent with DoD research oversight practices. The activity category is research and development within science and technology, and it is associated with CFDA number 12.420. Eligibility is listed as unrestricted, meaning it is broadly open to many types of applicant organizations, subject to any additional eligibility details that may be included in the full announcement text.

The posting was created on March 19, 2020, and the original closing date was August 25, 2020. The opportunity lists an expected five awards, and the award ceiling is shown as 0, which usually indicates that the specific maximum award amount was not stated in the summary record and would need to be confirmed in the full funding announcement. Overall, the opportunity is best understood as targeted support for SCI projects that can demonstrate a credible, near-term path toward clinical application, supported by a translational plan that intentionally connects preclinical work and clinical realities rather than treating them as separate stages.

• The Department of Defense, Dept. of the Army -- USAMRAA in the science and technology and other research and development sector is offering a public funding opportunity titled "DoD Spinal Cord Injury, Translational Research Award" and is now available to receive applicants.
• Interested and eligible applicants and submit their applications by referencing the CFDA number(s): 12.420.
• This funding opportunity was created on Mar 19, 2020.
• Applicants must submit their applications by Aug 25, 2020. (Agency may still review applications by suitable applicants for the remaining/unused allocated funding in 2026.)
• The number of recipients for this funding is limited to 5 candidate(s).
• Eligible applicants include: Unrestricted (i.e., open to any type of entity above), subject to any clarification in text field entitled Additional Information on Eligibility.

Apply for W81XWH 20 SCIRP TRA

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