The Prostate Cancer Foundation (PCF) has issued two requests for applications:
PCF Young Investigator Awards
- Purpose: To develop the careers of young scientists engaged in research addressing unmet medical needs in the diagnosis and treatment of potentially lethal prostate cancer.
- The Foundation invites applications from early-career basic scientists, medical oncologists, pathologists, urologists, radiologists, radiation oncologists, public health experts, bioinformaticians, bioengineers, or professionals from any other field that could contribute to the end of potentially lethal prostate cancer.
- Applicants may be working in basic, translational, computational, or clinical research in an academic or community research organization and need not be trained specifically in prostate cancer research to be highly competitive. However, successful applicants should be working in a research environment capable of supporting transformational prostate cancer research.
- Research proposals submitted in consideration for this award should, if successful, provide high impact to the field. “Small- step” or incremental proposals, and projects that do not address lethal or potentially-lethal prostate cancer such as diagnostics and treatments for low-risk localized disease, are usually non-competitive. Highly innovative basic science programs will be carefully considered, but priority will be given to “bench to bedside” translational research proposals with the potential to deliver near term benefit to patients.
- Eligibility:
- Applicant must have a professional degree (MD, DO, PhD, MD-PhD, DSc, ScD, DDM, DDS, DMD, MBBS, or equivalent) and be within six years of completion of their terminal degree or subsequent mentored academic or clinical training program, including postdoctoral or clinical fellowships.
- Applicant must be under the supervision of a mentor(s). At least one mentor at the applicant’s institution is required.
- Budget and Project Period:
- $75,000 per year for 3 years.
- Award funds may be used innovatively and flexibly to advance the career and research efforts of the awardee. This may include funding ‘protected time’ or direct costs for laboratory science. This award does not support indirect costs for institutional overhead.
- Application Deadline: Monday, February 23, 2026
PCF TACTICAL Award (Therapy ACceleration To Intercept CAncer Lethality)
- Purpose: To support qualified teams of investigators from academic and community institutions that will directly contribute to improved outcomes for patients with prostate cancer with lethal potential.
- PCF seeks applications for currently unfunded, large-scale multi-disciplinary team science research projects that will directly contribute to reducing death and suffering from prostate cancer, and will deliver transformative and tangible outcomes in the 3-5- year funding period. This includes basic, translational, clinical, and community-based research projects focused on strategies to prevent prostate cancer metastasis, morbidity, or mortality, which addresses major unmet needs in a transformative way.
- Research proposals submitted in consideration for this award should, if successful, provide high impact to the field and focus on tangibly overcoming a specific challenging scientific question or major unmet clinical need. “Small-step” or incremental proposals, and projects that do not address lethal or potentially-lethal prostate cancer such as diagnostics and treatments for low-risk localized disease, are usually non-competitive. Highly innovative basic science programs will be carefully considered, but priority will be given to “bench to bedside” translational research proposals with strong potential to deliver near term benefit to patients. Preference will be given to teams able to deliver on major aims within the funding period.
- Clinical trial direct costs are not allowed; however, correlative research to support high impact clinical trials for advanced prostate cancer is encouraged.
- Eligibility:
- Teams must be composed of at least 5 investigators from non-profit academic research centers or community organizations, including two young investigators who are within six years of completion of their terminal degree or subsequent mentored academic or clinical training program including postdoctoral or clinical fellowships.
- Cross-disciplinary teams that are diverse and inclusive will be favored.
- Investigators from for-profit companies and government institutions can be included as collaborative team members, but cannot receive any funds from this Award mechanism.VA investigators are excluded from this exception, and can be included as funded team members, including as Principal Investigator.
- Budget and Project Period:
- $5,000,000 to $10,000,000 over 3 to 5 years.
- Institutional indirect costs are not allowed.
- Deadlines:
- LOI Deadline: Monday, March 16, 2026
- Invited Full Application Deadline: Monday, June 15, 2026
To Apply:
- These are open RFPs (UCSF may submit an unlimited number of applications to each).
- Follow application instructions in RFP, conferring with your Grants Officer as needed. Please notify your Grants Officer as soon as possible of your intention to apply to ensure that they will have enough time to support your application.
For more information and to review complete application instructions and eligibility requirements, please visit https://www.pcf.org/our-work/open-rfas-rfps/.
Due Date