Center for Genomic and Phenomic Studies in Autism (U24)

The summary for the Center for Genomic and Phenomic Studies in Autism (U24) grant is detailed below. This summary states who is eligible for the grant, how much grant money will be awarded, current and past deadlines, Catalog of Federal Domestic Assistance (CFDA) numbers, and a sampling of similar government grants. Verify the accuracy of the data FederalGrants.com provides by visiting the webpage noted in the Link to Full Announcement section or by contacting the appropriate person listed as the Grant Announcement Contact. If any section is incomplete, please visit the website for the National Institutes of Health, which is the U.S. government agency offering this grant.

Center for Genomic and Phenomic Studies in Autism (U24): -NIMH seeks to establish the Center for Genomic and Phenomic Studies on Autism, which will contribute to the improvement and enrichment of research resources to be distributed for basic and translational research on autism under the rubric of the NIMH Human Genetics Initiative (http://zork.wustl.edu/nimh/home/NIMH_Gen_Initiative.html) and the National Database for Autism Research (NDAR; http://ndar.nih.gov/index.asp)). A specific goal of the Center will be to collect data and biomaterials from autistic probands and their relatives for utilization in the next rounds of interdisciplinary genomic and basic and translational neuroscience research, including clinical trials. A strong interest of this program is to collect an ethnically diverse sample. The Center will initially leverage available resources such as an NIH-funded hospital-based General Clinical Research Center (GCRC; http://www.gcrconline.org/) or a similar resource to provide bridging infrastructure and expertise in efficient clinical screening and systematic nationwide recruitment (especially in regard to ethnically diverse populations), database management, bioinformatics, high-throughput diagnostic assessments (of cognitive and intellectual functioning, language and communication skills, social functioning and adaptive functioning), quantitative dysmorphology utilizing state-of-the-art 3D morphometry and scanning of the craniofacial surface, cytogenetic analysis, clinical trials and regulatory issues, bioethics and human consent issues, and rapid data sharing. Specific services to be performed by the Center include recruitment of over 1500 autistic probands and their relatives from multiplex families (especially those drawn from ethnically diverse populations); high-throughput diagnostics; high-throughput phenomics; utilization of "dynamic phenotyping," starting with initial phenotypes drawn from the current literature, and followed by use of modern psychometric theory to extract multidimensional endophenotypes; development of phenotype selection algorithms to identify the most promising candidates for translational research; identification of specific phenotypic and endophenotypic endpoints for use in clinical trials; phenomics database design and management; bioinformatics approaches to automate the processes of modeling, integration, organization, mining and visualization of phenotypic data; and proof-of-concept pilot projects to identify robust high-throughput autism endophenotypes.