Oncology Co-Clinical Imaging Research Resources to Encourage Consensus on Quantitative Imaging Methods and Precision Medicine (U24 - Clinical Trial Optional) | PAR 18 841

Opportunity Information: Apply for PAR 18 841

This NIH funding opportunity (PAR-18-841) supports U24 cooperative agreements to build shared research resources that help the cancer imaging community reach practical agreement on how to optimize and use quantitative imaging (QI) methods in co-clinical trials. The core idea is that quantitative imaging can only reliably inform precision medicine if the underlying acquisition, processing, and analysis methods are tuned, standardized, and documented well enough to produce consistent, high-quality measurements. The FOA is structured around creating not just new results, but a durable, web-accessible resource that others can examine, reuse, and learn from, with enough transparency to compare approaches and move toward consensus.

The scientific work is organized into three main goals. First, awardees are expected to optimize preclinical quantitative imaging methods, meaning the imaging protocols and analysis pipelines used in animal settings must be systematically improved and characterized so that measurements are accurate, reproducible, and fit for purpose. Second, those optimized methods must be implemented in an actual co-clinical trial setting, rather than remaining as purely technical demonstrations. Third, the program requires that the resulting data, methods, workflow documentation, and study outputs be placed into an openly accessible, web-based research resource. In practice, this implies that the deliverable is not only a set of publications, but also curated datasets, protocol details, computational methods, and end-to-end workflow descriptions that make it possible for others to understand what was done and replicate or benchmark it.

The FOA defines co-clinical trials as coordinated investigations that involve patients and, in parallel or sequentially, mouse models or human-in-mouse models of cancer that mirror the genetics and biology of the patients malignancies or pre-cancerous lesions. The intent is to connect preclinical and clinical imaging in a way that strengthens translational relevance, allowing imaging-derived measurements and biomarkers to be tested and refined across model systems that are aligned to patient biology. The co-clinical component must have a clear clinical aim. It can focus on a therapeutic objective, such as predicting outcomes, staging disease, or measuring tumor response to treatment, or it can focus on screening, early detection, or risk stratification, particularly distinguishing lethal cancers from non-lethal disease.

Because the emphasis is on developing broadly useful resources and converging on best practices, the FOA encourages multi-disciplinary teams. Competitive applications are expected to bring together expertise across mouse model research, human clinical investigations, imaging platforms, quantitative imaging methods, decision support software, and informatics. This team composition reflects the reality that consensus-ready quantitative imaging depends on hardware and acquisition parameters, image reconstruction and processing, biomarker definition, statistical validation, data standards, and the practical deployment of methods in both preclinical and clinical environments.

Administratively, this is a discretionary NIH opportunity in the education and health activity category, using a cooperative agreement mechanism (U24). A cooperative agreement typically signals substantial programmatic involvement from the NIH compared to a standard grant, aligning with the FOA goal of building community-facing resources and encouraging harmonization. The opportunity is listed as clinical trial optional. The agency is the National Institutes of Health, with CFDA number 93.394. The original closing date shown is 2021-06-14, and an award ceiling of $500,000 is listed in the source information.

Eligibility is broad across U.S.-based organizations, including state, county, and local governments; special districts; independent school districts; public and state-controlled and private institutions of higher education; federally recognized tribal governments; tribal organizations that are not federally recognized governments; public housing authorities/Indian housing authorities; nonprofits with or without 501(c)(3) status (other than institutions of higher education); for-profit organizations other than small businesses; small businesses; and other eligible entities. The FOA also explicitly calls out certain categories of eligible applicants such as Alaska Native and Native Hawaiian Serving Institutions, AANAPISISs, Hispanic-serving Institutions, HBCUs, faith-based or community-based organizations, regional organizations, Tribally Controlled Colleges and Universities, and U.S. territories or possessions. At the same time, it is explicit that non-domestic (non-U.S.) entities and foreign institutions are not eligible to apply, non-domestic components of U.S. organizations are not eligible, and foreign components (as defined in NIH policy) are not allowed.

Overall, the opportunity is best understood as an infrastructure-and-consensus-building program for quantitative cancer imaging in a co-clinical framework. The expected impact is to improve the rigor and comparability of quantitative imaging measurements used to guide treatment decisions or early detection strategies, while leaving behind a publicly accessible body of data and documentation that can accelerate method validation, benchmarking, and adoption across the field.

• The National Institutes of Health in the education, health sector is offering a public funding opportunity titled "Oncology Co-Clinical Imaging Research Resources to Encourage Consensus on Quantitative Imaging Methods and Precision Medicine (U24 - Clinical Trial Optional)" and is now available to receive applicants.
• Interested and eligible applicants and submit their applications by referencing the CFDA number(s): 93.394.
• This funding opportunity was created on 2018-06-28.
• Applicants must submit their applications by 2021-06-14. (Agency may still review applications by suitable applicants for the remaining/unused allocated funding in 2026.)
• Each selected applicant is eligible to receive up to $500,000.00 in funding.
• Eligible applicants include: State governments, County governments, City or township governments, Special district governments, Independent school districts, Public and State controlled institutions of higher education, Native American tribal governments (Federally recognized), Public housing authorities/Indian housing authorities, Native American tribal organizations (other than Federally recognized tribal governments), Nonprofits having a 501 (c) (3) status with the IRS, other than institutions of higher education, Nonprofits that do not have a 501 (c) (3) status with the IRS, other than institutions of higher education, Private institutions of higher education, For-profit organizations other than small businesses, Small businesses, Others.

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