Cancer Research Fund of the Damon Runyon - Walter Winchell Foundation

The Damon Runyon Fellowship Award provides $300,000 of funding paid over 4 years to approximately 36 postdoctoral scientists annually that are completing their training and expanding their scientific expertise under the mentorship of a recognized scientific leader. To encourage physician-scientists to pursue a career in cancer research, awardees may also apply for assistance with medical school loan repayment of up to $100,000 on qualifying loans. At the end of their fellowships, the most exceptional researchers in this award program are eligible to receive the Dale F. Frey Award for Breakthrough Scientists, which includes an additional $100,000 of support to further catalyze their research and careers.

At the end of the Damon Runyon Fellowship, there are often a select few researchers who have greatly exceeded the Foundation’s highest expectations. These spectacular young scientists are the most likely to make paradigm-shifting breakthroughs that transform the way we prevent, diagnose, and treat cancer. To catapult their research careers—and their impact on cancer—the Foundation makes an additional $100,000 investment over a two-year period in these exceptional individuals by selecting them as recipients of the Damon Runyon-Dale F. Frey Award for Breakthrough Scientists (5-6 awardees annually). In doing so, the Foundation provides additional financial support to enable these scientists to continue the pursuit of bold and innovative ideas, accelerates the path to independence, and encourages a continued career in cancer research.

The Damon Runyon Clinical Investigator Award was developed to accelerate the process of moving discoveries from bench-to-bedside by identifying the best early career physician-scientists and supporting their patient-oriented, translational research. In providing outstanding young physicians with the resources and training structure essential to becoming successful clinical investigators, this innovative program aims to increase the number of physicians who can seamlessly move between the laboratory and the clinic in search of breakthrough diagnostics and treatments. The Clinical Investigator Award provides each recipient $600,000 over three years. Recipients are also offered the opportunity to retire up to $100,000 of their medical school debt, recognizing the incredible financial burden physicians incur during their training. Furthermore, each awardee has the opportunity to apply for two additional years of funding ($400,000 over two years).

The Damon Runyon-Rachleff Innovation Award supports the next generation of exceptionally creative thinkers with high-risk, high-reward ideas that have the potential to significantly impact our understanding of and/or approaches to the prevention, diagnosis, or treatment of cancer but lack sufficient preliminary data to obtain traditional funding. The Innovation Award is specifically designed to provide funding to early career independent researchers who have an innovative new idea, not incremental advances. The research supported by the award must be novel, exceptionally creative and, if successful, have the strong potential for high impact in the cancer field. The Stage 1 award is awarded to 4-6 scientists annually, for two years at $200,000 per year ($400,000 total). The Stage 2 award, supporting years three and four (an additional $400,000), is granted to those awardees who demonstrate significant progress on their proposed research during years one and two of the award.

The Damon Runyon Physician-Scientist Training Award supports and encourages outstanding physicians to pursue cancer research careers by providing them with the opportunity for a protected research experience under the training of a highly qualified and gifted mentor. The four-year award provides $460,000 of funding to 3-5 physicians annually. Awardees may also apply for assistance with medical school loan repayment of up to $100,000 on qualifying loans.

The Damon Runyon Quantitative Biology Fellowship Award program is designed to encourage quantitative scientists (trained in fields such as mathematics, computer science, physics, engineering, or related) to pursue research careers in computational biology under the joint mentorship of leaders in both computational science (“dry lab”) and cancer biology (“wet lab”). By investing in this area, Damon Runyon brings additional attention to the importance of these specially trained scientists for making meaningful progress in cancer biology. This three-year award provides $240,000 of funding to 3-5 scientists annually. Awardees may also apply for assistance with medical school loan repayment of up to $100,000 on qualifying loans.

The Damon Runyon-St. Jude Pediatric Cancer Research Fellowship Award provides funding to early career scientists conducting research with the potential to significantly impact the prevention, diagnosis, or treatment of one or more pediatric cancers. We aim to identify and support the future breakthrough scientists working on addressing difficult questions in pediatric cancer research.

Damon Runyon wants to ensure that the best young college students and recent college graduates are encouraged to pursue rigorous scientific education and to commit their talents to tackling longstanding challenges in cancer research. We recognize that these emerging scientists will come from a variety of backgrounds. To provide those with the talent, passion, curiosity, and determination to pursue a career in cancer research with an opportunity to do so, we are introducing the Damon Runyon Scholars Program for Advancing Research and Knowledge (SPARK).