NMRC Senior Clinician Scientist Award (CSA)

Objective

The Senior Clinician Scientist Award (CSA) and aim to provide salary & funding support for selected outstanding clinician scientists, to enable them to carry out internationally competitive translational and clinical research, to bring bench discoveries to bedside applications.

Funding details

The award includes up to $1.75M grant support, with 30% indirect costs and and between 0.5 FTE and 0.7 FTE salary support for protected time in research over 5 years. 

Eligibility Criteria

Qualifications ⁱ

• Medical/Dental applicants should hold medical qualifications (e.g. MBBS, MD, BDS or equivalent), and with specialty training beyond medical or dental school. ⁱⁱ Those without specialty training may apply if they are in clinical practice, excluding House Officers, Medical Officers, and Residents.
• Healthcare professionals with non-medical qualifications, such as nurses, pharmacists, optometrists and other allied health professions listed on this website in clinical practice and hold PhD (or equivalent) or a postgraduate qualification listed (non-exhaustive list) are eligible.
• Other applicants (e.g. non-clinically qualified or non-practising healthcare professionals) may be considered on a case-by-case basis, if the proposed work is in human clinical research (i.e., research involving direct interaction with human subjects, excluding laboratory-only studies without clinical application), and they hold PhD (or equivalent).

Appointment

Applicant must hold the following appointments:

• A primary appointment in a public healthcare institution (PHI) or autonomous university in Singapore and be salaried by the institutioniii at the point of applicationⁱⁱⁱ; and
• A regular-rank faculty/academic appointment in one of the Academic Medical Centres or medical schools within 3 months of award conveyance. Applicant not holding/pledged such an appointment can be considered if there is a support letter from the PHI Chief Executive Officer, and co-signed by the cluster Group Director (Research) or equivalent authority.^iv

Other Requirements

• Applicants must have been an independent PI on at least one national or international peer-reviewed research grant, with the grant quantum equivalent to an Individual Research Grant (IRG) (i.e. approx. $1M).
• Applicant must be a Singapore citizen or Permanent Resident (SC/PR) at the point of application. Non-SC/PR may be considered on an exception basis if they have worked for at least five (5) consecutive years in healthcare research or as practising healthcare professionals at Singapore-based PHIs or autonomous universities. Such applicants must demonstrate their commitment to Singapore's healthcare research system through substantive local contributions, such as publications, collaborations, mentorship, and/or capacity building within Singapore's healthcare research community. They also must present clear plans for continued engagement, such as future research collaborations, knowledge transfer, mentoring plans, and long-term career commitment to Singapore's healthcare research system.
• Applicant must generally not be beyond the retirement age in the year of grant call.ⁱ
• Applicant is only allowed up to 2 resubmissions following an unsuccessful first submission.
• Applicant may only submit one application to the NMRC Talent Awards (i.e. STaR, Senior CSA, CSA, Senior HCSA, HCSA, Senior CIA, CIA and TA) for each round of grant call.

Note:

ⁱRecipients of NMRC Human Capital Awards (i.e., STaR, (Senior) CSA, (Senior) HCSA, (Senior) CIA or CIDA) and Transition Award are exempted.

ⁱⁱ Clinicians with recognised specialty training are:

1. Clinicians who are accredited by the MOH Specialists Accreditation Board (SAB), Dental Specialists Accreditation Board (DSAB) and Family Physicians Accreditation Board (FPAB).
2. Clinicians who do not fulfil the above but are able to demonstrate completion of specialist training in countries which do not have specialist boards/colleges and are holding consultant positions as a specialist may be considered on a case-by-case basis.

ⁱⁱⁱ A*STAR CS scholar from the National Science Scholarship (NSS) (MBBS-PhD) or NSS (MD-PhD) schemes and fulfil the following may apply:

1. hold a primary appointment in a PHI or autonomous university in Singapore; or
2. hold a primary appointment in A*STAR and a joint appointment in the PHI/autonomous university, and the grant application is supported by the PHI/autonomous university. The PHI/autonomous university is to consider if the applicant is able to demonstrate that he/she can act as a bridge between A*STAR and the healthcare system.

The grant application must be submitted through the PHI/autonomous university as the host institution.

^iv The support letter should highlight the existing framework and governance within the PHI that allow sustained research career and opportunities available to the applicant, as well as the availability of a conducive and facilitation structure where high quality research can be undertaken

Submission

All applications must be submitted and endorsed by:

• Institution's Head of Department online via Research Grants Portal (RGP) and
• Institution’s Director/ CEO / Dean of Medical School on 'Other Support Template’ [if Duke-NUS is selected as the Academic Institution (AI)] through Host Institution Research Office
  • Letters/emails of support from the applicant’s respective ACP chairs for the putting up of applicant for a regular-ranked faculty/ academic appointment at Duke-NUS is required (if applicant do not have any regular ranked appointment)

Note:

• SingHealth PIs are to please refer to your respective Institutional Research Administrators for guidance on internal deadlines and submission procedures set by your institutions.
• AI’s endorsement is now required under ‘Other Support template’ of the application form from the Application package instead. 

Contact Person

Ms Joefina LimEmail: joefina.lim@mohh.com.sg

Additional Information

• For more information on CSA, please visit NMRC's website here.
• Please download the Application package.