Kidney Precision Medicine Project Central Hub

The National Institute of Diabetes and Digestive and Kidney Diseases (NIDDK), part of the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services’ National Institutes of Health (NIH), has announced a forecasted funding opportunity for the Kidney Precision Medicine Project (KPMP) Central Hub under opportunity number NOT-DK-26-303. This initiative builds on work initiated in fiscal year 2017, when the KPMP was established to safely and ethically collect and analyze human kidney biopsy tissue to uncover molecular pathways involved in chronic kidney disease (CKD) and acute kidney injury (AKI). The project expanded in 2022 to strengthen participant recruitment and tissue interrogation capabilities. Following a 2025 recommendation from an external evaluation committee, NIDDK now plans to extend KPMP for an additional five years to ensure continuity and expansion of its objectives. The planned funding opportunity will use cooperative agreement mechanisms (U01 and U24 activity codes) and includes a central coordinating hub. This hub, supported through a single U24 award, will oversee clinical and data coordination, integration, analysis, and sharing. The extension of KPMP will allow the project to continue longitudinal follow-up for approximately 500 existing enrollees, recruit more than 500 new participants for comprehensive molecular analysis, and facilitate discovery and validation of new biological pathways and disease subgroups. These activities are designed to benefit the broader scientific community by maximizing the value of the KPMP dataset for advancing kidney research. Additional U01 awards—up to 14—will support recruitment sites and tissue interrogation sites. Recruitment sites will focus on enrolling new participants, performing kidney biopsies, and collecting observational data, while tissue interrogation sites will apply state-of-the-art technologies under rigorous quality standards to analyze tissue samples. All awardees will work collaboratively across sites to ensure scientific progress and data sharing, reflecting the cooperative agreement structure where the NIH maintains substantial programmatic involvement. The program anticipates one central hub award and multiple related research site awards, with a total program funding estimate of $5,000,000. While the forecast does not specify the exact award ceiling or floor for individual recipients, the structure indicates that the funding will be distributed across both coordination and research components. No cost sharing or matching is required. The funding is intended exclusively for activities related to recruitment, data collection, tissue analysis, integration, and collaborative discovery to support the project’s overarching scientific goals. Eligible applicants include a broad range of organizations such as federally recognized tribal governments, state governments, county governments, institutions of higher education, nonprofit organizations, for-profit entities other than small businesses, independent school districts, and housing authorities. Additional eligibility extends to tribal organizations other than federally recognized governments, U.S. territories and possessions, federal agencies, regional organizations, foreign institutions, and faith- and community-based organizations. This broad eligibility reflects NIH’s intent to include a wide range of institutions with the capacity to contribute to the KPMP. The application is currently forecasted, with an estimated posting date of July 5, 2026. Applications are projected to be due by October 5, 2026, with award announcements expected on June 1, 2027, and project start dates anticipated for July 1, 2027. Because the opportunity is forecasted, no pre-application deadlines or specific submission instructions are yet provided. Applicants will need to monitor Grants.gov and NIH resources for the formal Notice of Funding Opportunity (NOFO) when it is released. Interested applicants may direct inquiries to Debbie S. Gipson, MS, MD, of the National Institute of Diabetes and Digestive and Kidney Diseases, who can be reached at 301-480-2268 or via email at Debbie.Gipson@nih.gov. Dr. Gipson will serve as the primary contact for programmatic and eligibility-related questions. This funding opportunity represents a continuation of a major NIH initiative with the potential to transform kidney disease research and clinical care by enabling detailed and collaborative exploration of human kidney biology.