NALCN Research Funding Opportunities

Our mission is to advance care and develop treatments for individuals affected by NALCN Channel-related disorders - and we want to work with you to support your meaningful and impactful research to do so!

Our goal is to support the scientific community to overcome funding barriers to move promising research forward faster. To this end, we are flexible to funding aspects of research that may not be funded by other sources but are serving as a barrier to moving research forward, including personnel, equipment, and generating pilot data for larger grants. We will award funds raised by the families and friends of those affects by NALCN Channel-related disorders. In this light, the funds should help to facilitate but not replace research funding from other sources and larger grants.

If interested in funding, please send an email to science@channelinghope.org to schedule a short concept call.

To make a final determination, we will ask for:

• Proposal (2 pages max) sharing the rationale, proposal/request, and how it will advance research for NALCN Channel-related diseases
• Budget in US dollars and a projected timeline (indirect costs cannot be included

The proposal would be discussed at the Channeling Hope Foundation Board of Director meeting, which consists of parents of children affected by NALCN Channel-related diseases. There may be requests for more information, including an evaluation strategy/metrics to measure results. A determination will take into consideration these factors:

• Anticipated value - this takes into account the balance of the potential impact and the requested budget.
  • While there is not a specified max budget, the cost relative to the impact will be considered in determining whether your request is feasible to support. Our goal is to fund meaningful research as best as we are able, and we can support fundraising efforts for research that has the potential to be highly impactful.
• Open data and resource sharing - our goal is to advance science for the community. We will favor proposals that will lead to sharing resources or data with the scientific community to accelerate advancements and therapy development. We believe we can go further and faster by working together with our combined expertise, passion, and resources against these complex diseases. 

We look forward to partnering with you against these diseases!

2026 CURE Epilepsy RARE Epilepsy Partnership Award

• This award is co-funded by CURE Epilepsy and rare epilepsy advocacy partners. This year the Channeling Hope Foundation was selected as a partner. This mechanism is specifically designed to stimulate and accelerate discovery in rare epilepsies through the development of research tools, model systems, techniques, and data collection platforms.
• Key Dates:
    • Letter of Intent (LOI) Deadline: June 9, 2026, 9 PM ET
    • Full Proposal Invitations: July 27, 2026
    • Full Proposal Deadline: September 1, 2026, 9 PM ET
    • Anticipated Award Notification: December 2026 – January 2027
    • Anticipated Project Start: Spring 2027
• All applicants must submit a Letter of Intent (no more than two pages) through ProposalCentral at: https://proposalcentral.altum.com. The LOI should outline milestone-based specific aims and include a Future Directions section with a data- and resource-sharing plan.

National Institutes of Health Funding Opportunity:

• Preclinical Proof of Concept Studies for Rare Diseases (R21 Clinical Trial Not Allowed) (RFA-TR-25-002)
  Application due date: Multiple dates, see announcement.

Patient-Centered Outcomes Research Institute (PCORI) Funding Opportunity:

• Broad Pragmatic Studies PCORI Funding Announcement – Cycle 2 2025
• Seeking to fund patient-centered comparative clinical effectiveness research (CER) project
• LOI Due May 13th, 2025
• 2025 Research Project Agenda Topic Themes include:
  • Improving Outcomes for People with Intellectual and Developmental Disabilities
  • Addressing Rare Diseases
  • Promoting Sleep Health