DoD Combat Readiness - Translational Research Award | HT9425 23 S CRRP

Opportunity Information: Apply for HT9425 23 S CRRP

The DoD Combat Readiness - Translational Research Award (TRA) under the Combat Readiness Requirements Program (CRRP) is designed to improve pre-hospital survivability for Warfighters by pushing practical, near-term medical solutions closer to the point of injury. The core idea is to fund hypothesis-driven, high-impact applied research that can move promising innovations into real-world clinical or operational use, especially for prolonged field care and en route care in austere, contested, or resource-limited combat environments. While the focus is military medical readiness, the program recognizes that military and civilian trauma care influence each other, so projects that also advance civilian trauma care are allowed as long as they remain aligned with military pre-hospital needs and realities.

A defining feature of this opportunity is its emphasis on translation and “leveraging” existing resources. In this context, leveraging means building a proposed project on already-available assets (such as prior datasets, prototypes, platforms, established methods, mature preclinical evidence, existing collaborations, or operational pathways) in order to accelerate technical maturity and amplify the practical payoff. The DoD is looking for research that produces “knowledge products” (knowledge with clear potential to improve health outcomes) and/or solutions that speed the introduction of military-relevant medical products, technologies, and practice guidelines into clinical and operational settings. Projects are expected to account for the real constraints of the battlefield: variable provider skill levels, limited equipment, difficult evacuation timelines, harsh environmental conditions, and the need for solutions that work outside ideal hospital settings.

The award supports applied, preclinical, and certain types of clinical research, but it does not support fundamental basic science. The solicitation draws a clear line between basic research (aimed at understanding mechanisms without a specific application in mind) and applied translational work meant to validate a path into practice. Importantly, clinical trials are not permitted under this funding opportunity. Specifically, studies intended for FDA drug licensure or pivotal/definitive device testing for FDA clearance are not allowed. The announcement also notes that studies requiring an Exception From Informed Consent (EFIC) cannot be supported, which matters for emergency research designs that might otherwise be considered in trauma settings.

Even though clinical trials are disallowed, the opportunity does allow clinical research that is observational in nature and does not prospectively assign participants to interventions to measure safety, efficacy, or effectiveness outcomes. Examples that can fit include certain patient-oriented studies (like mechanisms of disease in humans, biomarker/diagnostic work, imaging-based detection, health disparities research, and technology development that does not test an intervention’s effects), along with epidemiologic, behavioral, outcomes, and health services research that also does not meet the clinical trial definition. The key distinction the program uses is whether human subjects are prospectively assigned to an intervention to evaluate health-related outcomes; if so, it is a clinical trial and is not eligible here.

From a competitiveness standpoint, the program requires preliminary data, meaning applicants need to show credible evidence that the concept is already grounded and ready for a translational push. Applications must also include a well-developed statistical analysis plan, including power/sample size justification aligned to the study objectives, plus a data management plan and use of an appropriate database to preserve data integrity. This requirement signals that the DoD expects well-controlled, decision-ready studies rather than exploratory efforts. The solicitation also stresses rigor and reproducibility, including expectations around randomization, blinding, sample-size estimation, and data handling, and it points applicants to widely used standards for transparent reporting. If animal studies are included, an Animal Research Plan is required, and applicants are expected to plan and report in line with recognized animal research rigor guidelines.

The practical award parameters are fairly tight and action-oriented. The period of performance is 2 years, and the anticipated total costs per award should not exceed $1.1 million. Overall, the program expected to allocate about $4.4 million total to fund roughly four awards, with actual funding dependent on federal budget availability and the strength of applications through scientific and programmatic review. Awards were expected to be made no later than September 30, 2024, and the funds associated with this fiscal year were described as available for use for a limited time window consistent with federal rules (with FY23 funds expiring for use in 2029).

Eligibility is broadly open (“unrestricted”), meaning a wide range of organizations can apply, subject to any specific constraints in the full announcement. The DoD also leaves flexibility in how awards are issued: projects may be supported through grants, cooperative agreements, procurement contracts, or Other Transaction (OT) agreements. Which instrument is used depends on the anticipated relationship and level of government involvement, and it is determined during negotiation. This matters because a cooperative agreement can involve substantial DoD involvement in the work, while a standard grant generally implies less direct involvement, and OTs can offer more flexible terms aligned with commercial-style development pathways.

Finally, the opportunity comes with substantial compliance and data-sharing expectations typical of DoD medical research. Any DoD-funded work involving human data, human specimens, human subjects, or cadavers must go through USAMRDC human research oversight in addition to local IRB review, and applicants should plan for the added regulatory timeline (the announcement suggests allowing up to about three months after submission of complete materials). Multi-site, non-exempt U.S. studies must plan for a single IRB arrangement under the Common Rule requirements. Animal research similarly requires both local IACUC review and DoD-level animal care and use oversight, with a review timeline that can take several months. The DoD also signals an expectation that data and resources generated under awards be made broadly available to the research community and the public when appropriate, and for traumatic brain injury (TBI)-focused projects with prospectively collected human TBI data, the program requires data sharing through the FITBIR informatics system to support reuse, reanalysis, and cross-study comparisons.

• The Department of Defense, Dept. of the Army -- USAMRAA in the science and technology and other research and development sector is offering a public funding opportunity titled "DoD Combat Readiness - Translational Research Award" and is now available to receive applicants.
• Interested and eligible applicants and submit their applications by referencing the CFDA number(s): 12.420.
• This funding opportunity was created on May 17, 2023.
• Applicants must submit their applications by Jul 20, 2023. (Agency may still review applications by suitable applicants for the remaining/unused allocated funding in 2026.)
• The number of recipients for this funding is limited to 4 candidate(s).
• Eligible applicants include: Unrestricted (i.e., open to any type of entity above), subject to any clarification in text field entitled Additional Information on Eligibility.

Apply for HT9425 23 S CRRP

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