The Bridge to Independence Award program serves as an overall scientific support system to help early-career scientists successfully launch their independent research positions. Fellows receive a commitment of $495,000 over three years, activated upon assumption of a tenure-track professorship, as well as a designated $10,000 gift for professional development activities to be spent during the transition year.

In October and November 2021, SFARI held the fall 2021 science meeting virtually. Across three webinars, nine SFARI-funded researchers discussed their latest findings in autism research to an audience of over 300 attendees, including current and past SFARI Investigators, SFARI collaborators and postdocs training in SFARI-funded labs.

SFARI is pleased to announce that seven Director Awards were awarded in 2021. These projects include, but are not limited to, studies that aim to develop new tools and resources for autism research and studies whose goals are beyond the focus of existing SFARI request for applications.

New phenotypic and genomic data are available from participants enrolled in SPARK. Currently available data include phenotypic information from 283,520 people, including more than 111,000 individuals with ASD, as well as whole-exome sequencing and genome-wide genotyping data from 72,262 participants; of these, 3,227 genomes and 31,641 exomes are from individuals with ASD.

Olga Troyanskaya and colleagues developed a bioinformatics framework for the identification and prioritization of disease-associated enhancers.

SFARI 2022 Pilot Award request for applications (RFA) is now open. Grants awarded through this RFA are intended to provide early support for exploratory ideas, particularly those with novel hypotheses for autism.

SFARI’s requests for grant applications (RFAs) underwent a number of changes in 2021. In 2022, we will largely continue on the course set last year. There will be a single call for Pilot Awards and new calls for the Human Cognitive and Behavioral Science and the Genomics of ASD RFAs.

This issue of the SFARI newsletter includes: (1) SFARI 2021 Pilot awardees announced, (2) Bridge to Independence Award – Request for applications, (3) New iPSC lines from Simons Searchlight participants are now available, (4) SFARI Gene to introduce EAGLE, a new ASD-relevance gene scoring system, (5) Simons Searchlight to host conference on CSNK2A1, HIVEP2, MED13L and SETBP1 genes, (6) A Conversation with Steven Hyman about animal models for autism research, (7) A Conversation with SFARI scientists Alan Packer, Pamela Feliciano and Misia Kowanda about SFARI Gene lists, (8) SFARI publications, (9) Analysis of postmortem brain tissue from the Autism BrainNet Collection – Request for applications, (10) SFARI Supplement to Enhance Equity and Diversity (SEED) – Request for applications, (11) SPARK Research Match Diversity, Equity and Inclusivity – Request for applications.

Simons Searchlight will host the CSNK2A1, HIVEP2, MED13L and SETBP1 Family and Scientific Conference on Aug 4-7, 2022, in Baltimore. Basic and clinical researchers, carriers of these genetic changes and their families are invited to participate.