The difficulty of obtaining funding to support one's research is an issue faced by academic scientists at every level. Coming from a research background myself, I am familiar with the struggle and was pleased to hear that Stanford's Faculty Senate recently approved a new funding opportunity for clinical fellows and MD postdocs. According to an article in the Stanford Report:
Under the trial plan, up to 10 postdoctoral MD fellows a year will be able to submit grant applications - one time only - as principal investigators on projects.
Harry Greenberg, MD, senior associate dean for research at the School of Medicine, explained the experimental nature of the plan in a quote:
What you have before you is a very limited proposal to evaluate whether we can provide certain exceptional postdoctoral MD fellows with the opportunity to get an R01 grant [Research Project Grant from the National Institutes of Health] that will help them in getting their first faculty position.
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