What Is an Independent Investigator Grant?

Independent Investigator Grants are awarded to principal investigators. Let’s begin by explaining the role of a principal investigator.

Principal investigators are typically faculty members (e.g., professor, associate professor, assistant professor) who lead a research lab as an expert in their field. As the lab leader, they are responsible for developing the research agenda, designing research projects, securing funding (often through grants like Rally Foundation for Childhood Cancer Research’s (Rally)), and mentoring lab members (e.g., graduate students, fellows).

Once researching independently as a principal investigator, also known as a PI, you are typically considered an early career investigator (i.e., young investigator) or fully independent.

Young investigators are at a critical career stage where they must establish themselves through research, publications and grant funding. It is important to fund young investigators so they can establish themselves independently as the next generation of researchers.

RESEARCH GRANTS

Rally helps fund the most promising research initiatives through research grants including our Independent Investigator Grant.

A Rally research grant is a financial award provided to universities, hospitals and private research institutions to support a specific research project.

Rally grants are awarded based on a competitive dual peer-review process conducted by our Medical Advisory Board, which is made up of leading childhood cancer experts.

The Independent Investigator Grant awards up to $50,000 per year for one or two years depending on how the investigator’s grant scored.

Rally funds all levels of research, from science at the bench to translational, and includes fellows, young investigators and independent investigators.

RALLY RESEARCH FOCUS

Rally research grants must address at least one of the following priority areas:

• Innovative approaches to research that could lead to advanced studies or clinical trials.
• Basic science studies that are likely to lead to a new discovery.
• Under-studied cancer types.
• Quality of life, survivorship and palliative care studies.
• Personalized, targeted, alternative or integrative research proposals.
• Data utilization through data standardization, collection, storage, analysis and sharing.

WHY

Because kids with cancer deserve better.

Some childhood cancer treatments have been the same for more than 40 years. With your support, we are changing that. Rally-funded research has led to new and better treatments, and ultimately cures, with fewer harmful side effects.

Between 2006 and 2024, Rally awarded $35 million in childhood cancer research grants funding 597 projects at institutions around the world.

Rally’s next grants will be announced in early April 2025.