The Genome Center invites proposals for pilot projects that merit support by the Genome Center. These seed grants award up to $2,000 to spend at any of the Cores. Only UC Davis labs can be eligible for these grants. The Genome Center seed grants are available year-round. For the DNA Technologies Core, the seed grant program has two major objectives:

• introduce UC Davis labs to high-throughput sequencing or genotyping methods (applies to labs that have not used our technologies before)
• support the development of new genomic and transcriptomic methods/protocols

A seed grant application should be informal but should be about one page long and include:

• a short introduction on the scientific question being addressed and a short outline of the project
• a sentence on how the project would fit in with at least one of the objectives of the seed grant program
• an outline of the planned data analysis (will there be a qualified analyst and computational resources available ?)
• a listing of the specific services to be provided by our Core
• a budget (including an account number in case the costs exceed the grant amount).

We highly suggest discussing your proposal prior to submission of an application with the core manager. Please see the consultation link on the home page. After approval of a seed grant, samples have to be submitted within three months, for the project to stay eligible for the seed grant support.  Please understand that funds will be allocated to other projects, if the time frame is exceeded. Equivalent pilot grants are also available through the Bioinformatics core. Please contact the Bioinformatics Core here: bioinformatics.core@ucdavis.edu.