2026 CDF – CIHR Bridge Grant

Purpose

The Canadian Dermatology Foundation (CDF) provides seed funding to help Canadian dermatologist–
researchers advance toward successful applications to major national agencies, including the Canadian
Institutes of Health Research (CIHR). These competitions are highly competitive, and many strong proposals
from Canadian dermatologists go unfunded despite excellent peer review.
The CDF-CIHR Bridge Grant is designed to close that gap. It provides bridge funding to an investigator whose
CIHR Project Grant application was scored in the fundable range but not funded for budgetary reasons, so
that they can generate the additional preliminary data needed to strengthen the proposal and resubmit to a
subsequent CIHR competition. The mechanism both recognizes high-quality, nationally competitive
applications and improves the likelihood of success on resubmission.

The Award

• Value: up to $100,000 per award.
• Duration: a maximum of one year.
• Competitions: held twice per year, following each CIHR Project Grant competition (see CIHR website
  for Competition Schedule). In each cycle, the CDF may make one award to the strongest eligible
  application when a qualified proposal is identified. Where more than one eligible application is
  received in a cycle, the proposal with the highest final CIHR ranking/score will be prioritized.

Eligibility

To be eligible for consideration, all of the following must be met:

• The Principal Applicant on the CIHR Project Grant application is a Canadian dermatologist.
• The applicant holds a primary appointment in a Dermatology Department or Division at a Canadian
  university and has grant-holding privileges.
• The CIHR Project Grant application was:
  • Scored by CIHR within the fundable range (final rating ≥3.5), AND
  • Was discussed by the peer review panel (i.e., received Scientific Officer notes)
    but was not funded due to budgetary limitations.
• The applicant does not hold an active 2-year innovation CDF grant at the time of application, unless
  the grant expires within 6 months of the Bridge grant application date.
• The applicant commits to resubmitting the same or a substantially related proposal to CIHR (see
  Conditions of Funding).

Application Requirements

Applications must include all of the following documents. Only complete applications will be reviewed.

1. Original CIHR application: the 10-page application plus references.
2. Original CIHR Summary of Progress.
3. CIHR Biosketch CV for the Primary Applicant to the CDF Bridge Funding competition.
4. CIHR Notice of Decision, including the reviewers’ and Scientific Officer’s comments and the final
   ranking/score.
5. A maximum 2-page letter from the investigator describing how the CDF funds will be used to increase
   the competitiveness of the resubmission.
6. A budget for the requested CDF funds, together with the original budget submitted to CIHR.

Please email all documents as pdf to executivedirector@cdf.ca and name the files using the PI’s name, e.g.
Johnson_summaryofprogress.pdf for easy identification.

Review Process

Applications are assessed by a review panel of three, including the CDF Scientific Chair. Because the scientific
merit of the underlying proposal has already been established through CIHR peer review, the panel focuses
on two questions:

1. Is the proposed plan realistic and feasible within the one-year funding period?
2. Is the proposed work likely to significantly increase the likelihood of the application being funded on
   resubmission to CIHR?

Competition Schedule

The competition is held twice per year, mirroring the CIHR Project Grant schedule:

Because CIHR decisions are released only a few months before the next application deadline, the Bridge
Grant is intended to support investigators who will use approximately one year to generate additional data
and resubmit to a subsequent CIHR competition.

Conditions of Funding

• Resubmission. The recipient commits to resubmitting the same or a substantially related proposal to
  a subsequent CIHR Project Grant competition within 6 months after expiration of the Bridge Grant.
• Retention of funds if successful. If the recipient’s resubmitted CIHR application is successful, the
  recipient keeps the Bridge Grant funds.
• One award per proposal. The Bridge Grant may be awarded only once for a given proposal or
  project. No further Bridge Funding will be provided for the same proposal, even if CIHR invites an
  additional round of revisions or resubmission.
• Other active CDF funding.
  • The applicant must not hold an active two-year CDF Innovation Grant at the time of
    application, because it is unlikely that an investigator can efficiently develop two major
    projects at the same time. This general rule is waived where the two-year granting period
    expires within six months of the application date.
  • Holders of the smaller one-year Pilot Grants are eligible to apply.
  • Bridge Grant recipients remain ineligible to receive additional CDF funding during the year of
    Bridge Grant funding.
• Reporting. The recipient will provide a brief report on the use of funds and the outcome of the CIHR
  resubmission. Any unused funds at the end of the funding period must be reported and returned to
  the CDF.
• Acknowledgement. The CDF must be acknowledged as a funding source in any presentations or
  publications arising from the supported work.

How to Apply

Please email all documents as pdf to executivedirector@cdf.ca and name the files using the PI’s name, e.g. Johnson_summaryofprogress.pdf for easy identification.
Questions regarding eligibility or the application should be directed to the CDF Scientific Advisory Committee Chair at scientific-chair@cdf.ca, well in advance of the deadline.