The current research programs of the National Brain Tumor Society can be classified into two different categories:

 
Basic & Translational

 
NBTS closely examined the "traditional" funding process for its basic and translational grants. Leading researchers have confirmed that this open process is valuable to advancing the field’s understanding and to enabling scientists to establish data that is critical as they apply to NIH for RO1 grants or other federal funding.

Our request for proposals model invites applications related to all types of brain tumors and for investigations at various stages of understanding those tumor types. These grant applications are subjected to a peer-review process based upon the NIH evaluation model. Read more about our grant review process.

These grants are for one or two years and provide up to $100,000 per year for an investigation. Primary investigators provide progress reports to NBTS.

These basic/translational grants may be underwritten by an individual donor through a Chair of Research; however, all projects are vetted through the NBTS peer review process to ensure that donors’ funds go to the strongest possible science.

 
Collaborations

 
To maximize the impact of funding certain types of research or studies, NBTS often collaborates with like organizations.

• Low-Grade Glioma Initiative
  From 2006 to 2008, BTS worked with founding families of the PLGA Foundation to review and fund grants related to a specific group of pediatric tumor types: low-grade gliomas (including juvenile pilocytic astrocytomas, or JPAs and fibrillary astrocytomas).
   
• SPORE Collaborative
  Public-private partnership to fund two promising clinical trials through brain tumor SPORE (Specialized Programs of Research Excellence).
   
• Brain Tumor Funders' Collaborative
  Eight private funders provided multi-year grants to three clinical investigations.
   
• Prevalence Study through Central Brain Tumor Registry of the United States (CBTRUS)
  This study will update data on the number of persons who are currently living with a brain tumor diagnosis (prevalence). Adult and pediatric primary brain tumor prevalence will be estimated for the US population for 2010.
   
• AACR/NBTF Fellowship
  A one-year fellowship funded by NBTS and the American Association for Cancer Research to support early-career brain tumor researchers.
   
• AANS/CNS Section on Brain Tumors Award
  American Association of Neurological Surgeons (AANS) along with the Congress of Neurological Surgeons (CNS) Section on Tumors, awards a grant to the best translational research proposal on brain tumors.