Pandemic preparedness and response: Host-pathogen interactions of infectious diseases with epidemic potential

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Grant Name

Funder

Horizon Europe Framework Programme (HORIZON)

European Commission

Research Field

Viruses

Vaccines

Public health and epidemiology

Clinical development, Phase I

Crimean Congo Haemorrhagic Fever

Emerging Epidemics

West Nile

Chikingunya

Prevention programme

Foresight

Dengue

Deadline

2024-04-11 (Expired)

Grant Size

€50000000

Eligibility

General conditions

1. Admissibility conditions: described in Annex A and Annex E of the Horizon Europe Work Programme General Annexes.

Proposal page limits and layout: described in Part B of the Application Form available in the Submission System.

2. Eligible countries: described in Annex B of the Work Programme General Annexes.

A number of non-EU/non-Associated Countries that are not automatically eligible for funding have made specific provisions for making funding available for their participants in Horizon Europe projects. See the information in the Horizon Europe Programme Guide.

3. Other eligibility conditions: described in Annex B of the Work Programme General Annexes.

In recognition of the opening of the US National Institutes of Health’s programmes to European researchers, any legal entity established in the United States of America is eligible to receive Union funding.

The Joint Research Centre (JRC) may participate as member of the consortium selected for funding.

4. Financial and operational capacity and exclusion: described in Annex C of the Work Programme General Annexes.

5. Evaluation and award:

Award criteria, scoring and thresholds are described in Annex D of the Work Programme General Annexes.

The thresholds for each criterion will be 4 (Excellence), 4 (Impact) and 3 (Implementation). The cumulative threshold will be 12.

Submission and evaluation processes are described in Annex F of the Work Programme General Annexes and the Online Manual.

Indicative timeline for evaluation and grant agreement: described in Annex F of the Work Programme General Annexes.

6. Legal and financial set-up of the grants: described in Annex G of the Work Programme General Annexes.

Specific conditions

7. Specific conditions: described in the specific topic of the Work Programme.

Documents

Call documents:

Standard application form (HE RIA, IA) - call-specific application form is available in the Submission System

Standard evaluation form (HE RIA, IA)

HE General MGA v1.0

Information on clinical studies (HE)

Additional documents:

HE Main Work Programme 2023–2024 – 1. General Introduction

HE Main Work Programme 2023–2024 – 4. Health

HE Main Work Programme 2023–2024 – 13. General Annexes

HE Programme Guide

HE Framework Programme and Rules for Participation Regulation 2021/695

HE Specific Programme Decision 2021/764

EU Financial Regulation

Rules for Legal Entity Validation, LEAR Appointment and Financial Capacity Assessment

EU Grants AGA — Annotated Model Grant Agreement

Funding & Tenders Portal Online Manual

Funding & Tenders Portal Terms and Conditions

Funding & Tenders Portal Privacy Statement

Grant Number

HORIZON-HLTH-2024-DISEASE-08-20

Description

ExpectedOutcome:

This topic aims at supporting activities that are enabling or contributing to one or several expected impacts of destination 3 “Tackling diseases and reducing disease burden”. To that end, proposals under this topic should aim for delivering results that are directed, tailored towards and contributing to all of the following expected outcomes:

The scientific and clinical communities have an increased knowledge on viruses with epidemic potential and in particular a better understanding of pathogen–host interactions for the targeted development of vaccines and inhibitors for the prevention of viral infection and the viral transmission during pathogenesis.
The scientific and clinical communities have access to novel approaches for the prevention and treatment for emerging and re-emerging infections in the context of epidemic and pandemic preparedness.
The scientific and clinical communities have access to experimental vaccine candidates and candidates that inhibit cellular uptake of viruses against emerging or re-emerging viral infections for further clinical investigation.

A diverse and robust development pipeline of vaccine candidates and candidates that inhibit cellular uptake of viruses is available to fight emerging and re-emerging viral infections, increasing therapeutic options for clinical deployment in case of an epidemic or pandemic.

Scope:

As shown by the COVID-19 pandemic, infectious diseases remain a major threat to health and health security in the EU and globally. Viral disease emergence is expected to accelerate due to among other factors, climate change, and thus a proactive approach to the development of vaccines and inhibitors for the cellular uptake of viruses in preparedness for future infectious disease outbreaks is needed. The availability of vaccines and candidates that inhibit cellular uptake of viruses would provide a critical preparedness measure against future health threats, in particular against pathogens with high pandemic potential meeting the criteria identified by the Health Emergency Preparedness and Response Authority (HERA)[1].

Proposals should follow innovative approaches to characterise host-pathogen interactions with a view to inhibit viral replication, viral proteases, viral exit strategies and to develop therapeutic antibodies and vaccines that target viruses with high epidemic or pandemic potential for the EU. Proposals should focus on the following viruses: Hendra and Nipah virus, Lassa virus, Crimean Congo haemorrhagic fever virus, Rift Valley fever virus, Ebola and Marburg virus, Dengue virus, Yellow Fever virus, Zika virus, West Nile fever virus and Chikungunya virus. Proposal should take into account sex and gender aspects.

Proposals should aim to diversify and accelerate the global therapeutic research and development pipeline for emerging and re-emerging viral infections, and to strengthen the current leading role of the EU in therapeutic research and development, and therefore contributing to the work of the European Health Emergency Preparedness and Response Authority (HERA).

Proposals should address several of the following areas:

Identification and characterisation of receptors on the host cell that enable the docking and internalisation of a virus with a particular emphasis on the diversity of cellular entry receptors and tissue specificity.
Identification and characterisation of viral surface proteins that are capable of interacting with host target cells.
Characterisation of the mechanism of viral uptake in the host cell with regard to the topology and the dynamics of the host receptor – virus ligand interaction.
Identification of receptor and ligand (sub)units that could be targeted by preventive or therapeutic intervention.

Proposals could consider the inclusion of the European Commission's Joint Research Centre (JRC) research infrastructure (Nanobiotechnology laboratory) for biophysical characterisation of recombinant proteins, antigens and therapeutic antibodies, and its expertise at the interface between the research activities and regulatory aspects. In that respect, the JRC will consider collaborating with any successful proposal and this collaboration, when relevant, should be established after the proposal’s approval.

Applicants envisaging to include clinical studies should provide details of their clinical studies in the dedicated annex using the template provided in the submission system. See definition of clinical studies in the introduction to this work programme part.

[1]https://health.ec.europa.eu/system/files/2022-07/hera_factsheet_health-threat_mcm.pdf

Funding resources
Purdue Grant Writing Lab: Introduction to Grant Writing	Open Link
University of Wisconsin Writing Center: Planning and Writing a Grant Proposal	Open Link