Research We Fund

The AACR supports researchers at all stages of their careers, ensuring that the best and the brightest in the field have the tools and resources they need to pursue innovative projects. Through research funding, scientific achievement awards, and travel grants to attend conferences and meetings, the AACR supports early-career and established scientists as they pursue promising avenues for advancing cancer treatment and prevention.

Your gift to the AACR Foundation can support a researcher – and the next breakthrough.

Early-Career Researcher Awards

These grants provide research support to help foster a successful career path for junior investigators who have completed their postdoctoral training and are newly appointed to faculty research positions. Geared toward investigators early in their independent careers, these grants provide essential funds to help build their laboratory and sustain their research projects. Each award provides the recipient a minimum of $150,000 over two years. Through this program, the AACR has distributed more than $14 million in research funding.

Fellowships

AACR Fellowships provide clinical and postdoctoral fellows with support for their research and help retain talented scientists in the field. Each fellowship offers $50,000 to $55,000 in research funding per year. Through this program, the AACR has distributed more than $13 million in research funding.

Team Science

A growing trend within team science is cross-disciplinary science in which team members with training and expertise in different fields work together to combine or integrate their perspectives in a single research project. The purpose of this exciting new model is to establish and support a focused and intense effort to affect these scientific advances as rapidly as possible. AACR’s Team Science Grants are a cross-disciplinary approach to funding cutting-edge cancer research projects that will result in more rapid advances in the treatment and prevention of cancer. These grants may be focused in any area of basic, translational, or clinical cancer science, and require applicant teams from multiple institutions. They provide at least $1 million for multiple years for team-based research. Through its partnerships with Stand Up To Cancer and the Pancreatic Cancer Action Network, the AACR has awarded $155M in team science research projects.

Scholar-in-Training Awards

AACR Scholar-in-Training Awards provide financial support to graduate students, medical students and residents, and clinical and postdoctoral fellows to travel to AACR scientific meetings they might not otherwise be able to attend. Attending these meetings gives them the opportunity to share their research findings with the cancer research community, interact with their peers, and broaden their scientific knowledge. Through this program, the AACR has given more than 4,000 awards.

Scientific Achievement Awards

The AACR Scientific Achievement Awards Program honors researchers through 19 prestigious awards for their global impact on cancer research.

Throughout its history, the AACR has presented hundreds of awards and lectureships to recognize scientists and physicians who have made significant contributions to the understanding, diagnosis, prevention, and treatment of cancer.