NOW ACCEPTING APPLICATIONS!

Issue Date: November 24, 2025
Application Due Date: January 5, 2026 by 11:59 pm ET
Grant Selection Notification: By May 22, 2026
Period of Performance: 1 year
Amount of Grant: Up to $50,000 per grant
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The Focused Projects Grant for Junior Investigators is our career development grant that supports early career investigators dedicated to focusing their research on basic, translational, clinical, or population sleep and circadian science.

This opportunity provides seed funding for mentored research projects to jumpstart an early career investigator’s research career and provide the necessary support and resources needed to establish a track record of funding.

Note: Cycle 1 of the 2026 Focused Projects Grant for Junior Investigators is open only to projects that address one of the following topics:

  • Restless Leg Syndrome
  • Idiopathic Hypersomnia
  • Pediatric Sleep
  • Diagnosis, Management and Treatment of Sleep Apnea

See the Funding Opportunity Description below for additional detail.

The following individuals are eligible to apply:

  • Individuals with an MD, DO, DDS, DMD, DNP, DNSc, PharmD, PhD, or equivalent professional degree.
  • Individuals within 10 years of their terminal degree, post-doctoral training, or clinical training.
  • International applicants, who meet all the eligibility criteria and whose sponsoring organization can accept the payment of grant funds in U.S. dollars, are eligible to apply.

The following individuals are not eligible to apply:

  • Individuals who have received independent research funding of more than $250,000 are not eligible to apply. This does not apply to post-doctoral/ fellowship level training grants primarily covering the applicant’s salary (e.g., NRSAs).
  • Individuals who have a financial conflict of interest or have the potential to incur significant financial benefit from the proposed work and beyond the work itself are not eligible to apply.
  • Current AASM and AASM Foundation Board of Directors members are not eligible to apply and cannot be listed as a PI, co-PI, key personnel, mentor (paid or unpaid) or paid consultant for one year after their term ends.

Note: In rare instances, AASM and AASM Foundation Board members may serve as unpaid consultants on an application, however, this requires Executive Committee approval prior to submitting the application.

The Focused Projects Grant for Junior Investigators supports early career investigators dedicated to focusing their research on basic, translational, clinical, or population sleep and circadian science. This grant provides seed funding for mentored research projects to jumpstart an early career investigator’s research career and provide the necessary support and resources needed to establish a track record of funding.

 Research Focus

The Focused Projects Grant for Junior Investigators is open to mentored, general and specific topical projects that that address one or more important unanswered scientific questions related to sleep and circadian science, sleep disorders, and/or sleep health. The applicant must select one of the following topics.

Restless Leg Syndrome: Open to mentored projects that will address one of these topics related to restless leg syndrome (RLS):

  1. Investigations focused on further identifying specific endotypes and phenotypes of RLS that relate to particular subgroups of patients (e.g., pediatrics, women, pregnancy, diabetes, iron deficiency, ADHD)
  2. Research oriented toward uncovering therapeutic precision when treating specific RLS/PLMD populations/phenotypes (e.g., patients with augmentation, pediatrics, women)
  3. Studies that spur the development of new technologies to detect, manage, and/or treat RLS/PLMD.
  4. Investigations utilizing tele-based, or remote diagnostic/management technologies and protocols and treatment outcomes for RLS/PLMD populations.

Idiopathic Hypersomnia: Open to mentored projects that will address one or more important unanswered scientific questions related to idiopathic hypersomnia (IH).

 Pediatric Sleep: Open to mentored projects that address one or more important unanswered scientific questions related to pediatric sleep, sleep disorders and/or sleep health.

Diagnosis, Management and Treatment of Sleep Apnea: Open to mentored projects that address known research gaps in the diagnosis, management and/or treatment of OSA. There have been several publications that have noted the limitations, challenges, and gaps in research with diagnosing and treating OSA, examples of which include the 2022 Agency for Healthcare Research and Quality Technology Assessment on positive airway pressure therapy and the 2021 journal SLEEP publication on apnea-hypopnea index. Projects that address these gaps must advance the fields of sleep medicine and population sleep health. Only applications that address known research gaps in the diagnosis and/or treatment of OSA will be considered responsive. Priority will be given to projects that propose following outcomes for 6 months or longer. Examples of research topics of interest are provided below.

  •  Identifying patient-important outcomes and understanding how they are impacted with treatment (e.g., sleepiness, quality of life).
  • Exploring novel ways to characterize OSA (e.g., new/alternative measures, new framework combining multiple measures).
  • Building knowledge about personalized OSA care through endotyping, phenotyping, and biomarkers (e.g., identifying patients at most risk of clinically important OSA outcomes).
  • Understanding patient preferences and satisfaction with different OSA treatment options.
  • Understanding OSA treatment adherence (e.g., barrier to adherence, how adherence relates to outcomes, strategies to address barriers, predictors of adherence to treatment).
  • Comparative effectiveness research, especially in special populations (e.g., pediatrics, women, older adults, people with comorbidities), of:
  • Alternate metrics for diagnosis or characterization of OSA severity
  • Interventions and delivery methods to treat OSA.
  • Interventions (e.g., technology, behavioral, psychological, pharmacologic) to improve OSA treatment adherence.

 Mentoring

Since this is a Career Development Grant for early career investigators, individuals must identify a research mentor in the application with the skills, knowledge, and resources to provide mentorship to the applicant in sleep and circadian research. Applicants are encouraged to identify more than one mentor (i.e., a mentoring team) if expert advice is needed in all aspects of the project. In such cases, a primary mentor must be clearly identified in the application. The applicant must work with the mentor(s) to prepare the application.

 Number of Applications and Budgetary/Scientific Overlap Policy

Applicants submitting multiple applications and applications with budgetary/scientific overlap: Applicants may apply for multiple AASM Foundation grants; however, proposals with budgetary or scientific overlap cannot be submitted for multiple requests for applications within the same grant cycle. All applicants are required to disclose any potential overlap in the Other Support section of their application.

Applicants with an open AASM Foundation Grant: Individuals who are serving as Principal Investigators on an active AASM Foundation grant at the time of the application deadline may apply for a new AASM Foundation grant only if they can demonstrate that there is no budgetary or scientific overlap between the open grant and the proposed project. If overlap exists, the applicant must provide a plan to close the current grant if the new application is funded, such as relinquishing the current grant or completing it before initiating the new project.

Grant recipients who receive additional funding for projects that have budgetary/scientific overlap: Successful AASM Foundation grant recipients, who receive external funds for projects that have budgetary or scientific overlap with a grant approved by the AASM Foundation, must notify the AASM Foundation immediately and either: 1) relinquish the AASM Foundation grant and return any unspent funds or 2) submit a formal request to retain AASM Foundation funding, including any proposed revisions to the project plan, aims/objectives, and budget and budget justification. To maintain AASM Foundation funding, the request must detail how there is no budgetary overlap. Scientific overlap is permissible in certain cases. Failure to disclose scientific or budgetary overlap to the AASM Foundation is considered a breach in contract and will result in immediate termination of the grant, requirement to return unspent funds, and ineligibility for future AASM Foundation funding opportunities.

 Resubmission Policy

Past applicants of the Focused Projects Grant for Junior Investigators who were not funded are allowed a single resubmission within 12 months of receipt of the original application notification.

If resubmitting an original and unfunded application, the applicant must still meet all eligibility criteria listed under the Eligibility section of this request for applications. The resubmission must include a response to the reviewer’s critique and a response to the original application’s reviewers.

Resubmission of an original application for one grant program across another grant program is not permitted.

The Focused Projects Grant for Junior Investigators provides funds for one year and can be for up to $50,000 per grant, depending on the research focus. There are no restrictions on the distribution of expenses, however, indirect costs are capped at 8%. The grant is issued as a contract between the AASM Foundation and the grantee’s institution. A sample contract is available here.

Restless Leg Syndrome: Up to $50,000 for 1 year, with indirect costs capped at 8%

  • Funded by the Restless Legs Syndrome Foundation and AASM general funds

Idiopathic Hypersomnia: Up to $50,000 for 1 year, with indirect costs capped at 8%

  • Funded by the Hypersomnia Foundation and AASM general funds

Diagnosis, Management and Treatment of Sleep Apnea: Up to $50,000 for 1 year, with indirect costs capped at 8%

  • Funded by ResMed and AASM Foundation general funds

Note: ResMed will not be involved in any aspect of designing, conducting, managing, or directing the applicant’s project. In addition, ResMed will not be involved in the AASM Foundation’s grantmaking process, including the review process for applications, making funding recommendations or decisions, progress and final reporting, and post-award requests (no-cost extensions, reallocation of funds, change in scope or personnel, etc.).

Pediatric Sleep: Up to $50,000 for 1 year, with indirect costs capped at 8%

  • Funded by AASM general funds

A grant review committee, appointed by the AASM Foundation Executive Committee, will evaluate and score all submitted applications. Factors that will be taken into consideration include:

  1. Significance: Strong scientific premise of planned research in addressing important problems or critical barriers needed to progress the sleep medicine field.
  2. Mentorship and Career Development: The planned mentorship and career development activities will facilitate the applicant’s success by filling gaps in their knowledge, skills, and abilities. The mentors and key personnel are well-suited to support the project and the applicant’s growth.
  3. Approach: Planned research (overall strategy, methodology, and analyses) is scientifically sound, plan addresses protection of human subjects from research risks and inclusion/exclusion of individuals justified (if applicable).
  4. Environment: Institutional support and availability of equipment and other physical resources for the planned research.

Only materials submitted within the application will be used in the evaluation of applications. The AASM Foundation Executive Committee will make final funding decisions based on the scientific grant review committee scores and critiques.

Payment #1 – Upon execution of contract 90%
Payment #2 – Upon receipt and approval of Final Report 10%

If unique circumstances are explained in the budget justification of the applicant’s proposal, the Board of Directors will consider requests for an alternate payment schedule, with a maximum variance of 10%.

Note: Once a contract is executed for the grant, reallocation of funds of <10% does not require approval.

Outcomes are an essential component of this grant. All proposals must identify the goals and appropriate outcome measures of the research. The outcomes should align with the goals and objectives stated in the applicant’s proposal for this grant. As such, the following deliverables are required:

  • The applicants must address the specific aims and any major modification requires AASM Foundation Board of Directors or Executive Committee approval.
  • The AASM Foundation expects that the research funded by this grant will lead to the publication of original research in peer-reviewed journals, such as the Journal of Clinical Sleep Medicine, and submission of an abstract to the Associated Professional Sleep Societies (APSS) for presentation at the annual SLEEP meeting. The plan and costs for these deliverables must be stated in the application.
  • The applicant must submit progress and final reports during the project period and set deadlines, describing project activities and results, as outlined below. Failure to submit reports per the established schedule will result in withholding grant payments from the sponsoring organization and the grant recipient becoming ineligible to apply for future AASM Foundation funding until all outstanding reporting is up to date.

Progress Reports Every six months
Final Report Within 90 days of grant completion

The due dates for progress and final reports are established after a grant contract is executed between AASM Foundation and sponsoring organization.

If using human or animal subjects, the applicant will be responsible for obtaining Institutional Review Board (IRB) or Institutional Animal Care and use Committee (IACUC) approval. The IRB or IACUC letter of approval for the specified project must be on file with the AASM Foundation office prior to the execution of the contract. No funds will be released for the project without receipt of written approval by an IRB or IACUC. Failure to obtain IRB or IACUC approval will result in retraction of the grant.

Step 1: AASM Foundation Grant Request registration

To apply for this grant, you must register on AASM Foundation Online Portal. Please refer to the AASM Foundation Application User Guide for guidance on creating an account.

Step 2: Complete application

ACCESS THE 2026 FOCUSED PROJECTS GRANT FOR JUNIOR INVESTIGATORS (CYCLE 1) APPLICATION

New and resubmission applications must be completed and submitted through AASM Foundation Online Portal. Instructions for required forms are available via the online submission system. For an overview of the information that is requested on the application form, please download the Focused Project Grant for Junior Investigators Application Template.

Frequently asked questions for our grant programs can be found here.

Eligibility questions may need to be reviewed by a member of the AASM Foundation Executive Committee, so please allow for at least a 1-week response time for eligibility questions. For all other inquiries, please allow a minimum of two business days for a response. Please note that inquiries submitted two business days prior to an application deadline may not be answered in time.