DISC4 Awards - Supporting Multidisciplinary, Collaborative Research

About this program

The California Institute for Regenerative Medicine (CIRM) offers DISC5 Awards to support exploratory, discovery-stage research that accelerates development of therapeutics and biomarkers in stem cell biology and regenerative medicine, including disease biology, basic stem cell mechanisms, and innovations in stem-cell–based technologies. Awards fund 3-year projects with approximately $2.5M per award; applications open 14 Nov 2025 and must be submitted by 2:00 PM PST on 30 Jan 2026, and no pre-submission LOI is required. Applicants must be paired co-investigators (co-leads), with multi-institutional teams encouraged and a minimum of two California-based investigators required; proposals must follow the DISC5 Program Announcement and CIRM application requirements, with cycle-specific preference topics (e.g., neurological diseases for 2025) where applicable.