Funding Cycle IV - Letter of Intent Submission in April 2000

In the fourth ROTRF funding cycle, 134 letters of intent were received from scientists around the world. About a third of the applications came from the United States (36%), while 13% came from the UK. In total, North America accounted for 44% of the applicants and Europe for 46%. The remaining 10% of the applicants came from Australia, New Zealand and Asia.

The Scientific Advisory Committee of the ROTRF evaluated all the applications, which were submitted electronically via the ROTRF’s homepage (www.ROTRF.org), for originality and scientific excellence. The top 21 applications were invited to submit a full paper application and subsequently underwent a second thorough review by the Scientific Advisory Committee and the Board of Trustees.

ROTRF Grants were finally awarded to 13 applicants: five from the USA; three from the UK; two from Canada; and one each from France, Israel and Poland. Almost 40% of the Grantees in ROTRF funding cycle IV are female.

The abstracts of the novel and promising research projects are presented on the following pages. Their research interests focus mainly on the improvement of long-term graft survival and prevention of chronic organ dysfunction, induction of tolerance, the development of new immunosuppressive agents, and the improvement of donor organ preservation.

In this fourth cycle of ROTRF Grant Awards, a total of 2.0 million Swiss Francs was allocated.