NSW Health and Medical Research

Cardiovascular Research Capacity Program

Supporting high-quality cardiovascular researchers to increase national and international competitiveness of NSW cardiovascular research.

In June 2018, the NSW Government announced a $150 million investment over 10 years into cardiovascular research. NSW’s Cardiovascular Research Capacity Program funds high quality cardiovascular research in NSW in order to drive scientific discoveries, support the development of novel and innovative therapies, and improve health outcomes for patients with cardiovascular disease.

Cardiovascular Senior and Early-Mid Career Researcher Grants 2025

Key dates

Indicative Grant Timeline
Senior and Early-Mid Career Researcher Grants open 14 April 2025
Workshop – writing a winning grant application 6 May 2025
Pitching sessions for applicants (obtain feedback on your proposed research project) May – June 2025
Applications close 5pm AEST 10 September 2025
Applicants notified of outcome By 30 January 2026
Research commences April 2026

 

Application and submission process

Funding for these grants will be provided for three-year research projects. All researchers are encouraged to apply, including clinician researchers, Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander researchers, researchers from culturally and linguistically diverse backgrounds and primary carers who have experienced career disruptions.

Please see below the instructions for submitting an application (these are also included on page 2 of the Application Form and page 4 of the Grant Guidelines).

  1. All applications should be submitted by email to MOH-OHMRGrants@health.nsw.gov.au by 5pm (AEST) on 10 September 2025.
  2. Applicants must use the Senior and EMC Researcher Grants 2025 Application Form and attach any supporting evidence.
  3. All applications will receive an email acknowledging receipt within 72 hours. It is the applicant’s responsibility to follow up if no acknowledgement email is received.
  4. The maximum email size is 20MB. Larger emails will be rejected by the NSW Health server and applicants may not be notified that the email has been rejected.
  5. Any queries may be directed to MOH-OHMRGrants@health.nsw.gov.au.
  • Cardiovascular Senior and Early-Mid Career Grant Application Form 2025

    DOCX - 144 KB

Workshop – writing a winning grant application

The Office for Health and Medical Research and the NSW Cardiovascular Research Network (CVRN) are hosting a workshop to support researchers intending to apply for the Senior and Early-Mid Career Researcher Grants Program. The purpose of the workshop is to support researchers with their grant applications, offering tips and advice on how to write a successful application, to increase the strength and competitiveness of applications. The program will include presentations on key components of the grant application, delivered by experienced researchers, previous successful recipients and grant administrators.

Date: Tuesday, 6 May 2025

Location: Hybrid – online via Microsoft Teams and face-to-face at the NSW Ministry of Health, 1 Reserve Road, St Leonards

Registration for the workshop is available here.

Online pitching sessions for applicants

Pitching sessions enable researchers to receive feedback on their proposed project by ‘pitching’ their idea to a panel of senior researchers.

These sessions will be held online between Tuesday 20 May and Wednesday 4 June 2025. Participation in a pitching session is optional and is a confidential opportunity to pitch your grant proposal to an expert panel for feedback.

If you would like to participate, please express your interest when registering for the Workshop. You will be required to complete and submit a project summary form and 2-page CV prior to your session.

Dates/Times: Between Tuesday 20 May and Wednesday 4 June 2025

Duration: 20 minutes per pitching session

Location: Online via Microsoft Teams

Please express your interest in participating in a pitching session when you register for the workshop.

Educational resources and previous workshops

  • Videos of the 2024 workshop can be viewed on YouTube here. 
  • Slide presentations from the 2024 workshop can be downloaded: Part 1 and Part 2. 
  • Videos from the 2023 workshop can be viewed on YouTube here. 
  • There are more education resources on developing a grant application available on the OHMR website here. 

Frequently asked questions

What is the Cardiovascular Research Capacity Program? 

The Cardiovascular Research Capacity Program is an investment by the NSW Government in high quality cardiovascular research of $150 million over 10 years. The program aims to drive scientific discoveries, develop new and innovative treatments, fund research with the potential to prevent cardiovascular disease and improve health and wellbeing outcomes for people with disease. 

What type of research is eligible for Senior and Early-Mid Career Researcher grants? 

The program funds cardiovascular research which encompasses all diseases and conditions of the heart and blood vessels. Funding will support researchers working in cardiovascular research across basic science, biomedical, clinical medicine and health services research, data science, and population health research. Grants also support research towards the development of novel therapeutics. 

Approximately 60% of total funding will be allocated to basic science research and 40% to clinical medicine and science research, health services research, data science, and population health research. 

 How long is the grant period and how much funding is awarded? 

 Senior and Early-Mid Career Researcher Grants have a 3-year duration. 

  • Senior Researcher Grants will be awarded a maximum of $750,000.
  • Early-Mid Career Researcher Grants will be awarded a maximum of $450,000*.

 *A small number of outstanding Early-Mid Career Researcher Grant applicants may be awarded an additional $300,000 ($100,000 per year for the 3-year duration of the grant) to enhance the proposed project. Applicants wishing to be considered for this additional funding are required to provide a separate additional budget and justification for this. The proposed research project should be structured to ensure that the main $450,000 component of the research is able to be completed as a standalone project without the requested additional funding, as requests for additional funding will be considered separately based on merit and the availability of funds. 

 How can the funding be spent? 

 Grants are for research projects or programs and can cover a combination of salaries of the research team (clinical and/or non-clinical), backfill for clinicians to quarantine research time, consumables and equipment. 

 Grants may not be spent on capital works, maintenance, organisational overheads, basic office equipment, rent or utilities. The Host Organisation is required to provide appropriate infrastructure support. 

 Who is eligible for Early-Mid Career and Senior Researcher grants? 

 All researchers are encouraged to apply, including clinician researchers, Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander researchers, researchers from culturally and linguistically diverse backgrounds and primary carers who have experienced career disruptions. 

 For the purpose of these Grants: 

  • an Early-Mid Career Researcher is defined as a researcher who is within 15 years of the conferral of their PhD (or equivalent) on the date on which applications close and has not reached full professorial level. PhD students who expect to have their PhD conferred by 31 December 2025 are eligible to apply. Early-Mid Career Researcher Grant applicants will be assessed in three categories: 0-2 years post-PhD, 3-7 years post-PhD and 8-15 years post-PhD. Note: Please also refer to the section titled Relative to opportunity in the Guidelines.
  • a Senior Researcher is defined as a researcher who is 15 years or more postdoctoral OR a researcher who is less than 15 years postdoctoral, but who has reached full Professor level. Note: Associate Professors may apply as Early-Mid Career researchers if they are less than 15 years postdoctoral.

 Which organisations can host Early-Mid Career and Senior Researcher grants? 

 The host organisation must conduct health and medical research in NSW and must be a NSW-based university, medical research institute, not-for-profit organisation or a local health district or other NSW public health organisation. The host organisation must agree to employ the researcher and to provide appropriate infrastructure support for the duration of the grant. 

 Funds will not be paid to Local Health Districts. Host organisations may choose to use a separate organisation to administer the funding, referred to in the Guidelines as an administering organisation. 

Can I apply for multiple grants from the NSW Cardiovascular Research Capacity Program? 

Only one Senior Researcher OR Early-Mid Career Researcher grant application will be accepted per applicant for each round.  

Cardiovascular Elite Grants 2025

Elite Postdoctoral Researcher Grants and Research Leader Grants encourage highly talented cardiovascular researchers to move to NSW from interstate or overseas.

Since the introduction of these grants, 8 Cardiovascular Elite Grants have brought researchers to NSW from China, Japan, New Zealand, the United States, the United Kingdom, Canada and other parts of Australia.

The Office for Health and Medical Research will not be accepting nominations for Elite Grants in the first half of 2025.

This will enable us to review our current processes. Elite Grants are also being evaluated as part of the broader mid-term evaluation of the Cardiovascular Research Capacity Program and we look forward to incorporating improvements to the administration of Elite grants in line with any recommendations from the evaluation.

Elite Grant Guidelines for 2025 will be uploaded to this page when they are available.

Round 4 recipients:

  • Professor Julie McMullen
    Project – Targeting mechanisms underlying exercise-induced protection to prevent and treat cardio-metabolic disease in males and females.
  • Dr Izzy Jayasinghe
    Project – Visualising the unseen proteomic heterogeneity of the human heart

 

Cardiovascular Senior and Early-Mid Career Researcher Grants 2024

The 2024 round of Senior and Early-Mid Career Researcher Grants is now closed.

2023 recipients: Please see full list here.

Educational resources and previous workshops

The Office for Health and Medical Research and the NSW Cardiovascular Research Network (CVRN) hosted a workshop on 9 May 2024. The purpose of the workshop was to support researchers intending to apply for the Senior and Early-Mid Career Researcher Grants Program in 2024. There were also online pitching sessions available. Registration for both the workshop and pitching sessions has now closed.

  • Videos of the 2024 workshop can be viewed on YouTube here.
  • Slide presentations from the 2024 workshop can be downloaded: Part 1 and Part 2.
  • Videos from the 2023 workshop can be viewed on YouTube here.
  • There are more education resources on developing a grant application available on the OHMR website here.

Previous Grant opportunities

Cardiovascular Collaborative Grants 2024

  • Cardiovascular Collaborative Grant Application Form 2024

    DOCX - 251 KB

Senior and Early-Mid Career Grant

  • Senior and EMC Researcher Grant Application Form 2024

    DOCX - 152 KB

Elite Research Leadership Grant

  • Elite Research Leadership Nomination Form 2022

    DOCX - 84 KB

Elite Postdoctoral Researcher Grant

  • Elite Postdoctoral Researcher Nomination Form 2022

    DOCX - 82 KB

Updated 1 week ago

A scientist at the Victor Chang Cardiac Research Institute investigates how to prevent heart attacks