BGRI – Global Wheat Health Alliance Seed Grants in Translational Wheat Health


Competitive awards for advanced undergraduate and graduate students at U.S. universities working to move wheat disease resistance from discovery into farmers’ fields.

About the Seed Grants

Wheat pathogens now evolve and spread faster than the scientific workforce can deploy countermeasures. New races of wheat rust and emerging threats such as wheat blast require a pipeline of trained breeders, pathologists, and molecular biologists who can work across institutions and borders. The Global Wheat Health Alliance (GWHA) was established to connect gene discovery, field testing, and pre-emptive breeding so that stronger disease resistance reaches new wheat varieties and hybrids.
The BGRI-GWHA Seed Grants are the competitive research component of the Global Wheat Health Alliance. Two grant opportunities are available to advanced undergraduate and graduate students at U.S. universities:
Focused Seed Grant
Up to $10,000
For focused, student-led research projects.
Translational Team Grant
Up to $20,000
For projects of greater scope conducted in formal partnership with a NARS or CIMMYT program.
Projects must address at least one Priority Focus Area and advance a GWHA objective. They should be short, well-defined projects that produce technologies, tools, data, or other products that a breeding program or national agricultural research system (NARS) partner can use.
Program administration:
The BGRI-GWHA Seed Grant Program is administered by the Borlaug Global Rust Initiative (BGRI) at Cornell University on behalf of the Global Wheat Health Alliance, which is co-led by CIMMYT and Cornell/BGRI.
At a Glance
Focused Seed Grant
Up to $10,000
Translational Team Grant
Up to $20,000
Proposals due
September 30, 2026
Awards announced
October 12, 2026

Award Types and Amounts

Track Amount Purpose and expected scope
Track A
Focused Seed Grant
 Up to $10,000 A student-led research project addressing one Priority Focus Area (see focal areas below). Typical uses: a phenotyping season at a GWHA field site, a targeted genotyping or sequencing run, validation of a marker or diagnostic, or a structured data analysis of existing GWHA material. At least one GWHA, CIMMYT, or NARS collaborator is expected.
Track B
Translational Team Grant
 Up to $20,000 A student-led project of greater scope than a focused seed grant conducted in formal partnership with a NARS or CIMMYT program, with a deliverable that a breeding program or national program will use: a validated protocol, a characterized resistance source moved into an adapted background, a surveillance or diagnostic workflow transferred to a partner institution, or an interoperable dataset. A written concurrence from the named partner is required.

The BGRI will fund as many strong proposals as available funds allow and reserves the right to fund at a level below the amount requested or to shift the balance between the two tracks as the applicant pool warrants.

Project period
Awards are made for up to 18 months, allowing a project to span a full crop season and, where needed, a confirmation season.
•
Earliest start date: October 15, 2026.
•
Project completion: All project activity must conclude and all funds must be expended no later than April 30, 2028.
•
No-cost extensions: Extensions beyond April 30, 2028 cannot be granted. The end date is fixed by the terms of the award.

Priority Focus Areas

Competitive proposals must address at least one of the following priority focus areas. Each focal area is coordinated with gene discovery and marker development, field testing and disease phenotyping, and pre-emptive breeding. Note that every application must state a translational pathway.

A.
Moving resistance into farmer-ready wheat
Pre-emptive breeding work that advances characterized resistance, singly or stacked, into adapted or elite backgrounds, or that shortens the path from a validated source to a line a partner program will test.
B.
Gene discovery and marker development
Identification or validation of new resistance sources, resistance gene stacks, or susceptibility gene targets, and the diagnostic markers that make them deployable by a breeding program.
C.
Wheat blast resistance diversification
Work that broadens the narrow genetic base of wheat blast resistance, characterizes pathogen variability, or tests deployment strategies in blast-affected environments.
D.
Disease phenotyping and data quality
Standardized, large-scale disease evaluation at GWHA field sites in Kenya, Mexico, Bolivia, Bangladesh, and Ethiopia, including protocol harmonization, scoring reliability, image-based or sensor-based phenotyping, and making resulting data interoperable and reusable.
E.
Pathogen surveillance and diagnostic tool adoption
Work that puts surveillance data, diagnostic assays, or advisory tools into routine use by a national program, including the training, validation, and workflow adaptation that adoption actually requires.
Required for every proposal
State your translational pathway
Who will use the result, in what decision, and by when?
Projects that end at a publication without a named user are not competitive.

Application Details

Eligibility

Who can apply and what is required of applicants and faculty advisors.
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Student status:
The applicant must be an advanced undergraduate, or a student enrolled in an MSc, MPS, or PhD program, at an accredited university in the United States, and in good academic standing at the time of application and for the full period of performance.
•
Student leadership:
The applicant must be the intellectual lead of the proposed work. Faculty may not apply on a student’s behalf.
•
Faculty advisor:
A faculty advisor must confirm enrollment, endorse the project, and confirm that it can be completed within 18 months.
•
Undergraduate applicants:
Advanced undergraduate applicants must be within two years of completing their degree and must have a faculty advisor who commits to supervising the work through its completion.
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Graduation timing:
Students expecting to defend or graduate before the project end date should propose a scope that concludes before their departure, and must say so in the narrative.
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Application limit:
One application per student. A faculty advisor may endorse more than one applicant.

How to Apply

What to include in your proposal PDF, including page limits, letters, budget, and other required materials.
Assemble the following as a single combined PDF. Use 11-point type and one-inch margins.
1.
Cover page.
Project title, applicant name, degree level and program, expected completion date, institution, faculty advisor, track applied for, total amount requested, and the priority focus area addressed.
2.
Abstract, 150 words maximum.
Written for a general audience and suitable for publication on the BGRI website.
3.
Narrative, 1,000 words maximum.
Cover objectives, the focus area addressed and why, main tasks and their sequence across the period of performance, collaborators including the named GWHA, CIMMYT, or NARS partner, expected outcomes, and the translational pathway. Figures and references do not count toward the word limit.
4.
Budget and justification, one page.
Include a line-item table with a short justification for each line. State any cost share or complementary support.
5.
Faculty advisor letter, one page.
Confirm enrollment and good standing, endorse the project, and confirm feasibility within 18 months.
6.
Partner concurrence.
Required for Track B and encouraged for Track A. A signed letter or forwarded email from the named GWHA, CIMMYT, or NARS partner confirming their role is acceptable.
7.
Applicant CV, two pages maximum.
Proposal deadline: September 30, 2026, at 5:00 p.m. ET. Applications must be submitted online.
Proposals that exceed the stated limits, omit a required component, or arrive after the deadline will not be reviewed.

Review Criteria

How proposals will be scored, including scientific quality, translation, partnerships, and budget.
Criterion Weight
Alignment with GWHA objectives and a stated priority focus area 25%
Translational pathway: a named user, a specific decision, and a credible timeline 25%
Scientific quality and feasibility within 18 months and the requested budget 20%
Quality of the partnership and co-mentorship with a GWHA, CIMMYT, or NARS collaborator 15%
Budget realism and value for money 15%

Important Dates

Key dates for questions, proposal submission, awards, project start, and completion.
September 2, 2026
Call released
September 18, 2026
Deadline for questions
September 30, 2026, 5:00 p.m. ET
Proposals due
October 1 to 9, 2026
Panel review
October 12, 2026
Awards announced
October 15, 2026
Earliest start of the period of performance
Month 9 of the award
Interim progress report due
April 30, 2028
All activity complete, all funds expended
May 15, 2028
Final report due
Ready to apply?
Proposals are due September 30, 2026, at 5:00 p.m. ET.
Questions?
Dr. Maricelis Acevedo
Director for Science, Borlaug Global Rust Initiative; Research Professor, School of Integrative Plant Science, Cornell University
ma934@cornell.edu
About the Global Wheat Health Alliance
The Global Wheat Health Alliance is co-led by CIMMYT and Cornell University / BGRI, with the John Innes Centre, the University of Maryland, the Ethiopian Institute of Agricultural Research, the Kenya Agricultural and Livestock Research Organization, the Bangladesh Wheat and Maize Research Institute, and the Instituto Nacional de Innovacion Agropecuaria y Forestal of Bolivia.

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