Spinal Muscular Atrophy Foundation

• The foundation exists to accelerate treatments for spinal muscular atrophy and funds only work with an immediate impact on late translational research or clinical trials, so a small charity should apply only if its work sits in that area.
• Only principal investigators can apply, so an organisation without a principal investigator leading the request should not apply in its own name.
• Researchers send a letter of intent to info@smafoundation.org, and the filing gives its application method as rolling, although grant applications are accepted only by invitation.
• Its geographic focus is given as worldwide, and about 8 in 10 of its grants to organisations fall between $69,000 and $220,000, with a median of about $140,000, so a request in that region is realistic, though the largest grant was about $655,000 and that band is not a ceiling.
• In its latest filing, 53% of grant dollars to organisations went to organisations it had funded in earlier filings, so existing relationships with the foundation are likely to matter.

The largest grants to organisations in the foundation’s latest filing:

• Johns Hopkins University · Characterization of gene expression in motor neurons in sma
  $238,8142024 tax year
• Swiss Federal Institute of Technology Lausanne · Testing of mitochondrial modulators in sma models
  $218,0062024 tax year
• Stanford University · Generation of spinal cord motor neurons from pluripotent cells
  $207,0002024 tax year
• University of Florida · Characterization of muscle environment in sma
  $197,9072024 tax year
• Stanford University · Oversight on the stanford-sma foundation regenerative medicine program projects
  $167,8252024 tax year
• University of Edinburgh · Characterization of neuromuscular junctions in sma
  $141,2122024 tax year
• Stanford University · Characterization of neuron-glial-immune cell interactions in sma
  $117,4942024 tax year
• Boston Children's Hospital · Testing therapeutics that promote neuron growth in sma models
  $98,5712024 tax year

Grants to organisations listed in the foundation’s Form 990-PF filings. Grants to individuals are not shown.

Figures from the foundation’s IRS Form 990-PF filings. Assets are at fair market value at year end. The document icon links to each year’s filing on ProPublica Nonprofit Explorer.