Funding Opportunities

The Global Team Science Award ($3 million over 3 years)  supports interdisciplinary, collaborative, and highly synergistic projects that push the boundaries of innovation and bridge research and clinical efforts in lupus. The successful Teams will focus on unraveling human lupus heterogeneity by applying cutting-edge technologies to address critical questions that could bring about breakthroughs in lupus care, research or drug development.

The 2025 deadline for this program has passed.

Inquiries can be directed to: 

Scientific: Mara Lennard Richard, PhD; mrichard@lupusresearch.org
Administrative: Diomaris Gonzalez; dgonzalez@lupusresearch.org

The LRA has established the Mechanistic Clinical Award to advance a precision framework for therapeutic development in lupus with the goal of testing novel biomarkers, therapeutic or lifestyle approaches, or mechanistic hypotheses for proof-of-principle and evaluation of the approach. The award provides up to either $500,000 over two years for mechanistic studies using lupus patient biospecimens or $1,000,000 over three years for small mechanistic clinical trials not exceeding 20 participants and two to three study sites. Clinical trials funded through this mechanism should pursue hypothesis-driven approaches and those not readily undertaken by conventional, industry-sponsored drug development trials.

The 2025 deadline for this program has passed.

Inquiries can be directed to:

Scientific: Kari Fischer, PhD; kfischer@lupusresearch.org
Administrative: Diomaris Gonzalez; dgonzalez@lupusresearch.org

The Translational Bridge Award ($450,000 over 2 years) provides funding to bridge the gap between post-discovery and pre-commercial development and to accelerate the pace at which promising LRA-funded foundational research discoveries are translated into clinical evaluation and transitioned to a viable product that impacts patients directly. All projects should advance potential commercial entities or clinical products with a clear and direct relevance to people with lupus and offer the potential to improve diagnosis or standard of care for the disease or usher in a cure. These can include a range of technologies, therapies, interventions, and diagnostics.

The 2024 deadline for this program has passed.

Click here for Frequently Asked Questions

Inquiries can be directed to:

Scientific: Maya Bader, PhD; mbader@lupusresearch.org
Administrative: Diomaris Gonzalez; dgonzalez@lupusresearch.org

The Targeted Research Program on Engineered Cell Therapies for Lupus is a dedicated funding mechanism for projects that advance the development of next-generation engineered cell therapies with a clear and direct relevance to people with lupus. The award provides up to either $300,000 over two years for pre-clinical studies, including discovery and translational projects, or $600,000 over two years for ancillary studies to ongoing or completed engineered cell therapy clinical trials for lupus. All proposals should be centered around a well-defined translation plan to advance the project to the next development stage.

The 2024 deadline for this program has passed.

Inquiries can be directed to:

Scientific: Maya Bader, PhD; mbader@lupusresearch.org
Administrative: Diomaris Gonzalez; dgonzalez@lupusresearch.org

The Lupus Innovation Award ($300,000 over 2 years) provides support for pioneering, high-risk, high-reward approaches to major challenges in lupus research. Special emphasis is placed on lupus studies exploring fundamental mechanisms, novel targets and pathways, novel technologies, and interdisciplinary approaches. Both early career and established investigators new to lupus with highly innovative ideas are encouraged to apply.

The 2024 deadline for this program has passed.

Inquiries can be directed to:

Scientific: Mara Lennard Richard, PhD, mrichard@lupusresearch.org
Administrative: Diomaris Gonzalez, dgonzalez@lupusresearch.org

The Diversity in Lupus Research Career Development Award ($600,000 over 4 years) is designed to attract outstanding early-career underrepresented minority scientists and provides them with robust and sustained support to establish a competitive independent research program in areas that reflect the LRA’s strategic priorities, which include defining lupus heterogeneity by molecular pathology to stratify patients by active disease mechanisms and integrating the research continuum to bring advances to patients. This award is now also open to investigators whose research into other autoimmune diseases may also be applicable to lupus.

The 2025 deadline for this program has passed.

Inquiries can be directed to:

Scientific: Mara Lennard Richard, PhD, mrichard@lupusresearch.org
Administrative: Diomaris Gonzalez, dgonzalez@lupusresearch.org

The Diversity in Lupus Research Postdoctoral Award ($200,000 over 2 years) is designed to support promising underrepresented minority scientists to help them generate the scientific data and unique research ideas necessary to ultimately transition to an independent researcher role in areas that reflect the LRA’s strategic priorities, which include defining lupus heterogeneity by molecular pathology to stratify patients by active disease mechanisms and integrating the research continuum to bring advances to patients. This award is now also open to fellows whose research into other autoimmune diseases may also be applicable to lupus.

The 2025 deadline for this program has passed.

Inquiries can be directed to:

Scientific: Mara Lennard Richard, PhD, mrichard@lupusresearch.org
Administrative: Diomaris Gonzalez, dgonzalez@lupusresearch.org

The Lupus Research Alliance offers an Administrative Supplement to Promote Diversity in Lupus Research (“Diversity Supplement”) for promising underrepresented minority trainees working with LRA-funded researchers or lupus investigators supported by the National Institutes of Health (NIH), Department of Defense (DOD), or equivalent grants in good standing.

The 2024 deadline for this program has passed.

Inquiries can be directed to:

Scientific: Mara Lennard Richard, PhD, mrichard@lupusresearch.org
Administrative: Diomaris Gonzalez, dgonzalez@lupusresearch.org

Breakthrough T1D (formerly JDRF), the Lupus Research Alliance, and the National Multiple Sclerosis Society have joined forces to identify common mechanisms of autoimmunity. These three leading autoimmune disease organizations are jointly funding research projects looking at common underlying disease mechanisms. Visit https://decodingautoimmunity.org/ for more information.

Inquiries can be directed to:

Maya Bader, PhD, mbader@lupusresearch.org

The primary objective of the Lupus Insight Prize is to identify and recognize an outstanding investigator who has developed a novel research insight in scientific domains relevant to lupus. Click here for more information.

Please see the 2025 Request for Nominations.

Inquiries can be directed to: 

Scientific: Jenna Levy, PhD; jlevy@lupusresearch.org
Administrative: Erin McLaughlin, emclaughlin@lupusresearch.org