Seed Grants for Trace Element Analysis Research Projects at the University of Washington
The TraceLab at the University of Washington plans to award approximately nine seed grants to support trace element research. Each award will be approximately $5,000 each. They are designed to encourage the rapid development of new projects and to engage new users. The funds for these seed grants are possible due to the generous support of the MJ Murdock Charitable Trust. They are part of a larger instrumentation award that resulted in a new plasma-source mass spectrometry facility in the College of the Environment. Please visit the TraceLab website to learn more about the capabilities of our new facility: http://depts.washington.edu/tracelab/ or address questions to tracelab@uw.edu
Timeline: This is a short-term award designed to stimulate promising but preliminary work. Proposals are due January 5th and awards will be announced soon after (target date Jan 9th). Expenses supported by the award will have to be submitted by February 20th, 2018 (6 weeks). Analysis of samples can be conducted after this deadline.
Eligibility: This award is open to University of Washington faculty, research staff with PI status, graduate students, and undergraduate students with a faculty sponsor.
Types of Research Expenses Supported by this Award: Examples of some the costs that these grants could support include: supplies, research assistant or student support, and small equipment, but not instrument time, travel, or indirect costs. For example, the award can support some of the costs associated with the collection and preparation of new samples, or support preliminary experiments that need new equipment and that require dedicated technician time. When proposing research keep in mind that costs associated with using our ICP-MS instruments are not allowed under this award, a requirement of our donors. Cost associated with instrument time will have to have to be met by the PI through other means. The rates for analysis have not been finalized yet but they are expected to be approximately $600/day. Please contact our team at tracelab@uw.edu to help with estimating instrument needs or with any other questions.
How to Apply: The short format proposals should be a maximum of two pages of text. Please describe the type of signal you hope to measure and how you will use these data to test your hypothesis. An example figure of how data would look for different scenarios is one straightforward way to convey this information. Supporting material to be included that does not count to the page limit: a cover page with the team’s contact information and UW affiliation(s); one or two figures; CVs for the main investigators; and a simple one-page budget. The simple budget should be formatted with categories similarly to an RRF proposal (https://www.washington.edu/research/or/royalty-research-fund-rrf/rrf-for-applicants/instructions-for-preparing-an-rrf-proposal/#budget-template). Please submit proposals as a single pdf attachment in an email to tracelab@uw.edu.
Proposals will be evaluated based on scientific merit, the potential to introduce new methods or techniques that could enhance the facility’s overall capabilities, broader impacts, the potential to act as preliminary data for future external funding, and whether the proposal involves a new PI that has not previously conducted research at TraceLab. Proposals will be evaluated by TraceLab staff, a group of existing TraceLab users, and as necessary, external experts.
Reporting Requirements: If you are awarded a seed grant, then a maximum 2-page summary of results and how these results supported your research, together with one to two figures will be due before June 1, 2018.