Award Intent
The IOCDF is grateful for the opportunity to once again offer the Michael Jenike Young Investigator Awards to junior researchers investigating OCD and related disorders. The intent of these awards is to support promising young investigators who are developing their careers while pursuing creative and impactful research projects on OCD and related disorders across a range of disciplines.
Funding for the Jenike Awards has been generously provided to the IOCDF by the thousands of donors who have contributed to our Research Grant Fund.
Eligibility
Eligible principal investigators must be current graduate students, or must have completed their residency or PhD (or equivalent) on or after September 1, 2018 (note: exceptions to this restriction will be considered on a case by case basis ‒ please contact research@iocdf.org with any questions). Applicants who are still in training must submit a letter from their mentor with their application. You may include study personnel, consultants, etc. in your application who do not meet these requirements, but they cannot occupy a PI or co-PI role.
One area of particular interest, linked to this year’s Research Appeal, is the relationship between neuroinflammation and OCD, such as that found in PANDAS/PANS. Recent research has found a clear connection between neuroinflammation—an inflammatory response within the brain or spinal cord—and the sudden onset of OCD. Exploring this relationship further is of interest, but please keep in mind that other suitable research proposals will be also be considered.
Only research projects that investigate topics in the field of OCD and related disorders (OCD, including pediatric OCD; PANS/PANDAS; hoarding disorder; body dysmorphic disorder) will be considered for funding.
Preparing Your Application
Your application must include the following documents uploaded via the application portal:
- Main proposal document (includes cover sheet, proposal, and references)
- Administrative section (attached to the end of the main proposal)
- Budget Worksheet (uploaded separately using this Excel template, download from Google Sheet to start working on your budget)
- Individual biosketches for the PI, co-PI, co-investigators/collaborators, and all other significant contributors (OSCs) uploaded via the application form
- Mentor Letter (if applicable – see eligibility section above; uploaded via the application form)
Main Proposal Instructions
Formatting
Your proposal is limited to 5 pages, not including cover sheet, references, and narrative budget. Please use Arial font, size 11, single-spaced, with 0.7 inch margins.
Double-spacing is required between paragraphs. Each paragraph can be single-spaced, as long as there is a double-space between paragraphs. The cover sheet and references are not counted toward the five-page limit.
Please upload your proposal as one PDF that includes the following:
Cover Sheet
Include the name, address, phone, fax and email of the Principal Investigator and any co-PIs, as well as the name and address of the sponsoring institution.
Proposal and References
Your proposal should address each of the following points (unless the point is not relevant to the work proposed):
- Background (prior work making this proposal reasonable and worthwhile). Limit to one paragraph
- Hypotheses that will be tested
- Methods
- Intended use of the results
- Describe how the results will improve our understanding of:
- The relationship between neuroinflammation and OCD onset (e.g., PANDAS/PANS);
- The etiology of OCD or a related disorder;
- The epidemiology or clinical picture of OCD or a related disorder;
- The pathophysiology of OCD or a related disorder; or
- The treatment of OCD or a related disorder
- Duration of the proposed study (12 months recommended)
- Describe the funding that has already been obtained for this proposal, and the sources of that funding
- Describe the publication plan
- If the study involves pre-clinical/clinical research, describe how you intend to comply with the IOCDF inclusion policy (see below)
- If the proposed study involves humans, include copies of the Informed Consent and the Institutional Review Board approvals as attachments at the very end of your proposal document. If approvals are pending, please note that fact in your proposal and be prepared to submit approvals for each study site prior to receiving payment
- If the proposed study involves human gene therapy, you must submit a copy of the NIH Recombinant DNA Advisory Committee (RAC) review or waiver of review
- Bibliographic references (not counted toward page limit)
Pre-clinical and Clinical Research (Inclusion Policy)
It is the policy of the IOCDF that women and members of racial and ethnic minority groups shall be included in clinical research funded by the IOCDF, unless there is a clear and compelling reason on the basis of either the health of research participants or the purpose of the research, to exclude women and/or members of minority groups from a proposed study. The IOCDF will not fund clinical research that excludes women and/or members of minority groups without an appropriate justification (cost is not considered to be appropriate). Principal investigators are also expected to conduct analyses for the effects of sex/gender and race/ethnicity when appropriate.
If complying with this policy would risk the health and safety of research participants or conflict with the purpose of the study, please indicate this in your proposal application and provide a detailed justification. All other applicants proposing clinical studies must include the following in their proposal:
- A description of the composition of the proposed study population that includes sex/gender and race/ethnic group data about the population;
- A description of proposed outreach plans for recruiting women and members of minority groups as participants; and
- A description of how effects of sex/gender and race/ethnicity will be addressed in the analytic plan. If there is prior literature either supporting the presence of such effects or suggesting their absence, this should be summarized and addressed. It is not expected that all studies will be adequately powered for analyses of sex/gender and race/ethnicity will be fully powered and it is thus understood that such analyses may be secondary/exploratory.
For preclinical studies, the applicant must address how sex as a biological variable will be considered in experimental design and analysis.
Administrative Section
At the end of your main proposal, please include a separate administrative section with the following:
- Narrative Budget Justification
This section will not count towards the application page limit.
Allowable Costs / Narrative Budget Justification Outline
Using the outline and instructions below, please prepare a narrative budget justification and include it in the administrative section at the end of your main proposal. Please note that in addition to the narrative budget justification, you will also need to complete and upload a separate budget worksheet using the supplied Excel template.
The Jenike Award is a maximum $50,000 grant paid in four equal, quarterly installments. Indirect costs are not awarded.
Please use the following outline to form your narrative budget justification.
Personnel
- Please list each member of the project team and their role, regardless of their percent effort or whether a salary will be paid. Please note the percentage of each team member’s time that will be spent on the proposed project (percent effort).
- For members of the project team who will be paid, please list their salary. To calculate salary, multiply the individual’s institutional base salary by their percent effort. This calculation provides the maximum salary that can be requested; a lesser amount may be requested in place of this amount.
- Fringe benefits may also be requested in accordance with your institution’s rate.
- Please list consultants in this section, and justify the use of consultants by describing their role in the project, relationships to investigators, and expertise in the field. Please include an estimated total of hours that each consultant will spend working on the project.
- If your proposed project is supported by funding from other sources, please detail that support, including personnel whose salaries may be shared.
Supplies & Equipment
- Please itemize supplies as separate categories (e.g., lab ware, office supplies, or chemicals) and list the total for each amount. If the total budget for any category is over $500, list examples of items to be purchased and their use. Any single item over $300 should be itemized individually on the budget worksheet. Please list and describe any durable equipment purchases, the project need they would address, and how durable equipment will be utilized upon completion of your project.
- For particularly expensive items (e.g., certain medications), please describe the procurement process that will be used and how cost will be minimized.
Travel Expenses
- Funds may be requested to cover travel costs for study subjects (e.g., parking or bus fare).The IOCDF does not generally fund travel expenses for personnel, with the exception of expenses related to attending the IOCDF Research Symposium and Annual OCD Conference. If you do request funding for travel expenses, please specify the reason for the travel.
Study Participant Recruitment and Advertising
- If requesting funds for study participant recruitment, please describe your recruitment plan and itemize costs by category (e.g., payments to participants, billboard advertising, or radio advertising).
Institutional Review Board
- In the event that you require IRB approval from an independent agency that charges for their services, you may include these costs in your budget. Please describe the reason for accessing an independent agency and provide an estimate of anticipated charges.
Other Application Information:
Biosketches
Applicants must upload a biosketch via the application form for the PI/co-PI and all co-investigators, collaborators, consultants, and other significant contributors (OSCs). Please use the provided template and limit each biosketch to four pages maximum. Refer to NIH guidance on team roles if you are unsure of the definitions of these terms.
Budget Worksheet
Please complete a budget worksheet using the provided template and upload it in the specified section of the application form.
Review Criteria
Reviewers will be asked to consider a range of criteria in evaluating grant applications. These include:
Significance and Impact: Does the project address an important problem? How will scientific knowledge, and/or clinical practice be improved with this project?
Approach: Is the strategy, methods, and analyses appropriate so that the aims of the project can be reached? Is the study feasible? Are the plans for the protection of human subjects reasonable?
Investigator Potential: Are the investigators qualified to complete this project? Are they likely to continue to make an impact on research in the field of OCD and related disorders?
Environment: Where will the work be done? Will the institution support and contribute to the success of the investigators? Are the investigators well-suited to complete the project?
Reviewers will also be asked to consider how well the project conforms to these application guidelines, including the IOCDF’s policy regarding women and minority group inclusion in pre-clinical/clinical research.
Award Conditions
The following conditions are attached to IOCDF Jenike Awards:
- Progress Reporting: Progress reports will be made three times during the term of the grant in a prescribed format. A full project report must be submitted within one month of the end of the project term.
- IOCDF Newsletter Article: Upon completion of their projects, PIs are expected to write and submit a 1,500 word article for a future issue of IOCDF’s OCD Newsletter. The article should explain the PI’s grant-funded research, their findings, and the significance of their work in language that is clear and accessible to a lay audience.
- IOCDF Research Symposium/Conference: Jenike Award winners are strongly encouraged, upon completion of their research, to participate in an IOCDF Research Symposium and/or Annual Conference. They are also encouraged to submit a poster for the Research Symposium and/or Annual Conference poster sessions.
- Acknowledgement: Award recipients are expected to include a credit line acknowledging the International OCD Foundation as a funding source on all published materials arising from IOCDF-funded research.
- Restrictions/Unused Funding: Grant funds from the IOCDF can only be applied to the project for which the Research Award was given. Any unused money available at the end of the project must be returned to the IOCDF.
NO-COST EXTENSIONS
While the IOCDF strongly encourages that all Young Investigator Award projects are completed within one year, it recognizes that there may be circumstances that may impede the progress and completion of the project in this time-frame. In the event that more time is needed to complete the study funded by the Award, the PI can email the IOCDF Research Communications Specialist requesting a one-year no-cost extension.
The request should explain the reasons for why the extension is required, including, but not limited to:
- Need for sufficient participant enrollment
- Need for sufficient data collection and time for analyses
- Scheduling issues for the PI and staff involved with the project
- Obstacles connected to the COVID-19 pandemic and other uncontrollable events
The PI should send the no-cost extension request as a Word document or PDF, using the funded institution’s letterhead. Once the request is received, it will be reviewed and a no-cost extension approval letter will be sent if the justifications are appropriate.
Questions & Additional Information
Please see our FAQs for additional information. If you still have questions, please email Boris Litvin, Research Communications Specialist, at blitvin@iocdf.org.