SingHealth Duke-NUS Academic Medicine (AM) Research Grant 2.0 - Transition Project Grant

Closes On

22 Sep 2025

Funding Source

Internal

PI Salary Support

ACP/SDDC Affiliation

ACP Affiliation

Funding Per Grant Amount

S$ 150,000

Qualification

MBBS / BDS / PhD / MD

Academic Appointment

Funding Period

2 years

Citizenship

Foreigner / S / PR

Call Opens

13 Aug 2025

SMC/SDC Registered

Objective

The SingHealth Duke-NUS Academic Medicine (AM) Research Grant 2.0 is to provide funding support to deserving translational and clinical research within the SingHealth Duke-NUS Academic Medicine Centre (AMC).

Main Category Grants:

Transition Project Grant

This grant is intended for established investigators who have demonstrated excellent track records in their relevant areas of research, and who intend to compete for national funding in the next funding cycle. The award value is capped at S$150,000 per successful grant application - to be utilized over a period of up to 2 years.

The Transition Project Grant awardee must apply for an external grant prior to submission of the Final Progress Report and report therein accordingly.

The types of research supported under Transition Project are:

Clinical Research
Translational Research
Health Services Research (HSR)
Clinical Trial

Funding Details

The grant award is up to S$150,000 over a period of 2 years.

Eligibility Criteria

Only investigators/researchers primarily employed in SingHealth and her member institutions are encouraged to apply provided the following criteria are fulfilled.

Upon award of the grant applied for, applicants must not have received funding to conduct their own research project which cumulatively exceeds $300,000. This can be funding from any source e.g., internal, external, philanthropy or industry (i.e., If applicant has already been awarded $150K in research funding in the past, (s)he can only apply for less than $150K of subsequent internal funding as the ultimate intent is for SingHealth researchers to win national or external funding).
Residents in training programmes under SingHealth - who must obtain the appropriate endorsement from their Residency Programme Directors, HOD and ACP Vice Chairs, may also apply, subject to all other terms and conditions of the specific grant-type.
Residents in training programmes under SingHealth - who must obtain the appropriate endorsement from their HODs and ACP vice-chairs, may also apply, subject to all other terms and conditions of the specific grant-type.
Applicants must not have held any national grants or international grants as a PI/Co-PI prior to the award. This excludes low quantum grants of $50,000 on a case-by-case basis (i.e. NCID Catalyst Grant and NMRC Clinician Scientist Seed Funding) (*revised*).
Association/Affiliation with an Academic Clinical Programme (ACP):

a) The PI must be under an ACP or contributing to the growth and development of research in/under an ACP through active collaboration. Justifications must be given to support these research contributions and activities. Applicants will need to complete a self-declaration on the ACP to which their research has contributed and obtain acknowledgement from the respective ACP Vice Chair (Research)*

*Refer to ‘ACP Academic Vice Chair, Research & Administrators Contact list’.

b) If the applicant is unable to fulfil the above condition (i), the applicant should have his/her proposal signed-off by the relevant ACP Vice Chair (Research) and have it endorsed by the ACP’s Academic Chair while keeping the respective ACP Administrators informed. The signing-off in support and as endorsement of the proposal signifies that the applicant is associated to the ACP.
The proposed research project must be conducted within the SingHealth Duke-NUS academic health system and the PI must have an official employment (permanent/contract) in a SingHealth institution throughout the effective grant period.

Under the Translational Research category, the PI must be at least a PhD or MBBS [Singapore Medical Council (SMC) registered if the proposal involves patients] or BDS. Specifically for PhD applicant, he/ she should be already at the PI level (e.g. running a lab or has other grants as PI) or aspiring to be a PI (where strong support and justification from HOD/ Mentor/ Host Institution/ ACP is to be provided with application submission).
For proposals involving patients, the PI or Co-I should be Singapore Medical Council (SMC) or Singapore Dental Council (SDC) registered, as appropriate; or be able to demonstrate ability to access patients through SMC or SDC registered collaborators.
Under the Clinical Trial & Clinical Research categories, PI must be at least an SMC registered Associate Consultant or SDC registered (as appropriate; in compliance to HSA standard).
The project’s aims and objectives, and/or the same protocol have not been funded by other funding agencies.
No outstanding reports from previous SHF-Foundation/AM grants.
Applications that do not fulfil the eligibility criteria will be automatically disqualified from the SingHealth Duke-NUS AM Grant Research Committee (AGRC)’s or the respective platform-specific panels’ review.
All Start-Up and Transition Project Grant applicants must have an appropriate ACP Faculty mentor based in Singapore.

Submission

Each eligible applicant can only submit one application per SingHealth Duke-NUS AM Research Grant Call as the PI (i.e. a PI can only apply for either ‘SingHealth Duke-NUS AM Research Grant 2.0 FY2026’ or ‘SingHealth Duke-NUS AM & NHIC Joint MedTech Grant Call FY2026’).
Where an applicant has previously been awarded a SHF-Foundation/AM Research grants, subsequent grant applications from the same PI must differ substantially from previous awarded grants: Within any single grant category or sub-category, project submissions from the same PI must be substantially and scientifically different (e.g. a PI may be awarded a Start-Up grant in 2014 and a second Start-Up grant in 2016 only if the research ideas of the two grants differ). Final arbitration will be made by the review committee.　
Association/Affiliation with an Academic Clinical Programme (ACP)

1. For PIs who are under an ACP or already contributing to the growth and development of research in/under an ACP through active collaboration, applications must be acknowledged by ACP Vice Chair (Research).
2. If the applicant is unable to fulfil the above condition (a), the applicant should have his/her proposal signed-off by the relevant ACP Vice Chair (Research) and have it endorsed by the ACP's Academic Chair while keeping the respective ACP Administrators informed. The signing-off in support and as endorsement of the proposal signifies that the applicant is associated to the ACP.

Application must be endorsed by the applicant's Head of Department (HOD) and Residency Programme Director (if applicable) prior to the submission to SingHealth Office of Research (OoR) through the Research Office of the Principal Investigator (PI)'s Host Institution. Only applications with following submissions received will be accepted:

- 2 soft copies containing all information (e.g. proposal, CVs) in a single file
1. (1 in word format without signatures and 1 in PDF format with signatures). Electronic signatures are allowed.

Interested applicants, please refer to the application guidelines and respective application forms.

Please refer to the Annex 1– SingHealth Duke-NUS AM Research Grant Funding Guidelines in the application form when doing the budgeting.

Incomplete or late applications will automatically be disqualified from the review.

Important Notes:

SingHealth Office of Research will only process completed applications from eligible applicants.
No change of PI once submitted.
All applications must be made using the prescribed form. Failure to comply with all the requirements will result in the grant application being disqualified from review.
Failure to comply will result in applications being disqualified from the review.
SingHealth PIs are to please refer to your respective Institutional Research Administrators for guidance on internal deadlines and submission procedures set by your institutions.

Contact Person

SingHealth Office of Research (OoR)