Parkinson's Foundation Impact Awards
Funds independent Parkinson's disease investigators pursuing bold, high-risk projects with translational clinical relevance.
Eligibility · United States
⚠This may reflect a past cycle — verify the current call on the funder's site.
The Parkinson's Foundation Impact Awards provide USD 200,000 in total direct costs over two years — USD 100,000 per year — to independent tenure-track investigators pursuing novel or high-risk Parkinson's disease research. The Parkinson's Foundation is a US 501(c)(3) formed in 2016 through the merger of the National Parkinson Foundation and the Parkinson's Disease Foundation, and has funded more than 670 scientists globally since 2010. The program explicitly priorities outside-the-box science: new hypotheses, underexplored mechanisms, and biomarker identification rather than incremental extensions of existing work. Both national and international applicants are eligible; there is no restriction on institution country. Applicants must hold a PhD or MD and must hold an independent tenure-track or equivalent faculty appointment at the time of application. For the 2025-2026 cycle, the letter of intent was due October 10, 2025; the full application deadline was February 23, 2026; and the award start date is August 1, 2026. That cycle is now closed, and the next cycle is expected in late 2026 based on annual cadence. Applicants apply as individuals; eligible host institutions include universities, research organizations, and nonprofits. Applications are submitted through ProposalCentral at proposalcentral.com. Competitive Impact Award proposals articulate a genuinely novel scientific question in Parkinson's disease, explain why the approach is distinct from well-funded existing lines of investigation, and demonstrate the principal investigator has the independence and institutional infrastructure to execute a two-year hypothesis-driven program. Reviewer weighting favors originality and conceptual departure; applicants with preliminary data supporting a completely new direction are more competitive than those extending established programs. Contact: Grants@Parkinson.org.
Funds novel or high-risk Parkinson's disease research projects led by independent tenure-track investigators, emphasizing outside-the-box approaches and biomarker discovery over incremental extensions of existing work.
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