PCR Grant Call Announcements

We are proud to work with the UK’s top scientists with a shared aim of reducing morbidity, increasing survival rates and improving quality of life for men with prostate cancer. We are committed to funding the gaps we see in the research ecosystem and there is an urgent need to develop new effective treatments for men with prostate cancer, particularly advanced prostate cancer, and to carry out the underpinning research to achieve this.

Improvements in therapies have been developed in the past decade, but one man still dies of prostate cancer every 45 minutes in the UK, and 250,000 men die each year from prostate cancer world-wide. Innovative thinking and new approaches are required to solve this problem, and existing treatments need to be applied more effectively.

Our vision is of a world without the impact of prostate cancer.

We are accepting proposals for innovative, ambitious research projects that address key challenges pertaining to addressing prostate cancer.

We will be accepting proposals for social or medical research projects.

This grant call aims to address some of the major challenges faced by men with prostate cancer. A number of significant gaps in our scientific knowledge of prostate cancer are slowing down better outcomes for patients. Better understanding of prostate cancer will lead to new treatments and using current treatments more effectively. While we are interested in the areas of research below, we will consider any research avenue relevant to men with advanced prostate cancer: 

• Drug/ therapy discovery and Treatment
• Side Effects
• Diagnosis
• Classification and Drug Targeting (Personalised Medicine)
• Basic Science and Target Discovery
• Experiences of the healthcare system
• Treatment adherence

Career Stage 

• Applications are accepted from academic or research institutions, or hospitals that are based in the UK or USA. National or international collaborations will be considered as long as the award can be administered through a UK- or USA-based lead host institution.  

• The lead applicant(s) must be based in the UK or USA and at minimum have a PhD (or equivalent higher research degree) and three (3) years of independent research experience. However, if you have less than three (3) years of independent research experience, you may still apply under the mentorship of a senior. We assess eligibility on years of experience, not calendar time since qualification, or on age. 
• We welcome co-PIs on projects and encourage eligible early career researchers to apply in their own name. 
• We encourage involvement from community groups and patients, including as co-investigators and/or collaborators.  
• We are aware that career paths are not necessarily linear. For example, some people may have caring responsibilities, or may have been adversely affected by disruptions caused by the pandemic. If you have an idea that could improve the situation for people affected by prostate cancer, we encourage you to apply to our schemes. We have provided the option for you to provide contextual information on any gaps in your career and/or publishing history, and any impacts of COVID-19 on your research, that you may want us to take into account so that we can assess your application fairly. 
• The project should boost prostate cancer research and build capacity in advanced prostate cancer research. 

Institution 

The lead applicant must be based at a university or research institution or hospital in the UK or US. National or international collaborations will be considered as long as the award can be administered through a lead host institution based in either country. 

Research Strategy 

All proposals must align with our Research Strategy and should be innovative, solution-oriented and seek to develop recommendations. 

The three main criteria used to select successful projects will be: 

• Relevance to people affected by prostate cancer 
• Scientific excellence and innovation 
• Collaboration with other scientists

Applications will need to include a lay summary of the project. This is important to the application process to ensure that anyone, no matter their scientific background can understand the project and understand the importance of it. Our review process includes a patient panel and so the patients must be able to understand the project fully to be able to assess it.

Find our lay summary guide here for more information.

Prostate cancer affects 1 in 4 Black men, compared to 1 in 8 men of other ethnicities. Our analysis has revealed that very little is being done to address this, leading us to take both an awareness-raising and a research initiative in 2021. We funded five research projects in 2022 to address these issues and are currently reviewing proposals in the US to fund a further couple of medical projects to address racial disparities in prostate cancer. We are delighted to announce that we will be back to fund some more projects next year to continue to tackle this problem, that will be open to the UK and US.

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