Funding Awarded
The Addiction and Substance Misuse Research strategy has involved three calls for funding so far.
- First call
- Second call
- Third call
- Award Committee membership
- Grants funded under the first call (February 2009)
- Grants funded under the third call (April 2010)
First call
The first call was for pilot/proof-of-principle research focusing on studies making better use of the existing 'infrastructure' (e.g. cohorts and clinical networks) which could be further exploited to support innovative addiction research.
Nine grants (total just under £2m) were awarded in February 2009. These awards will support studies spanning underpinning translational neurobiology on the causes of addiction, through to the development of treatments.
Second call
In the strategy’s second call, 32 bids for Cluster Development Contracts were considered by the Strategy Oversight Group and 11 clusters were selected to go forward to the next stage. The Group considered the following criteria when selecting clusters:
- How the proposed clusters met the explicit pubic health and research needs as identified by the MRC and its stakeholders;
- Scientific standing of the researchers in their own field;
- Vision – what do the cluster leaders want to address that is not now possible and what is the expertise that is needed? Cluster leaders were asked to clearly articulate the added value of the proposed cluster’s approach;
- Merit of the networking strategy for selecting scientific experts from outside the addiction field to work with the existing addiction researchers;
- Merit of the networking strategy for selecting stakeholders and evidence of knowledge about who the key stakeholders are.
Third call
The third call for funding was open exclusively to the 11 clusters selected under the second call. This call, funded by the MRC and the ESRC, was for cross-disciplinary, innovative research based on the priority themes identified.
Four grants (total just under £4.3m) were awarded in March 2010.
The 11 bids were reviewed by a panel of international experts in relevant disciplines, including biological, medical and social science: and statistics and economics.
Award Committee membership
Role |
Name |
Organisation |
Chair |
Prof David Leon |
London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine |
Member |
Prof Verity Brown |
University of St Andrew’s |
Member |
Prof Hilary Graham |
University of York |
Member |
Dr James Kennedy |
University of Toronto |
Member |
Dr Fiona Measham |
University of Lancaster |
Member |
Prof Linda Porrino |
Wake Forest University School of Medicine |
Member |
Prof Juergen Rehm |
University of Toronto |
Member |
Prof Lars Terenius |
Karolinska Institute |
Member |
Prof Wim van den Brink |
University of Amsterdam |
Observer |
Dr Dawn Woodgate |
ESRC |
Grants funded under the first call (February 2009)
Grant Holder - Institution |
Title of Research |
Amount |
Dr L Clark |
Predicting Relapse in Treatment-Seeking Pathological Gamblers using Impulsivity and Compulsivity Assays |
£214,404 |
Dr J W Dalley |
Genetic influences underlying impulsivity and risk for drug addiction |
£228,112 |
Professor T Duka |
Understanding alcohol’s effects on inhibition of behaviour; implications for treatment |
£201,416 |
Dr R Elliott |
Neurobiology of cognition and craving in opiate addiction: implications for relapse |
£257,488 |
Dr M Hickman |
ALSPAC and Adolescent Substance Use Trajectories: Consolidation of a UK research resource |
£164,076 |
Dr S Husbands |
Transdermal delivery of a buprenorphine/naltrexone combination for the treatment of polydrug abuse |
£202,480 |
Dr S Kamboj |
Exploring the potential of D-cycloserine and cannabidiol to enhance cue exposure therapies in substance dependence |
£220,072 |
Dr S King |
Molecular and physiological mechanism of GABA(A) receptor function in striatal circuits underlying addiction |
£246,808 |
Professor A Lingford-Hughes |
Imaging D3 receptors in alcoholism. |
£215,592 |
Grants funded under the third call (April 2010)
Grant Holder - Institution |
Title of Research |
Amount |
Dr P Meier |
Alcohol policy modelling and evaluation |
£1,002,605 |
Dr T Millar |
Incidence, prevalence, harms and intervention effects for problem and injecting drug use: crime, morbidity & mortality |
£706,688 |
Professor D Nutt |
New drugs for addiction: focus on attenuating core behavioural components of heroin, cocaine and alcohol addiction |
£1,566,514 |
Professor D Stephens |
GABA-A receptors in accumbens neural circuits underlying drug abuse: novel targets for treatment |
£1,000,000 |