The Community Jameel Imperial College COVID-19 Excellence Fund was launched in June 2020 to provide support for research projects into the impact, understanding, prevention, diagnosis, and treatment of COVID-19.

The £1M fund was co-created by Community Jameel and Imperial, with Imperial’s contribution coming from the President’s Excellence Fund, which provides discretionary funding to support research of exceptional merit. Building on College’s previous COVID Research Fund, this Excellence Fund will fund awards between £50,000 and £200,000 for novel and essential high impact research projects that need additional funding to be scaled up.

Imperial has been at the forefront of the global response to the pandemic, with academics from across the College channelling their expertise to advise the public and policymakers, develop new vaccines and therapies, create new diagnostic tests and to understand the broader impact of COVID-19 infection. The rapid funding provided by the COVID-19 Excellence Fund will enable the most innovative projects to progress at an accelerated pace, without being held back by a lack of resources.

Awards are made by the COVID-19 Research Fund Review Committee, a panel made up of senior researchers and College leaders, advised by our clinical, virological and public health colleagues. Seven awards were made in the first round (July 2020) and fundraising is underway to enable a second round later in the year.

Our partnership with the global philanthropy Community Jameel has played a vital role in shaping Imperial’s response to the pandemic. In addition to joining the College in the creation of the Community Jameel Imperial College COVID-19 Excellence Fund, last year Community Jameel co-founded the Abdul Latif Jameel Institute for Disease and Emergency Analytics. The Jameel Institute is headed by Professor Neil Ferguson, whose landmark reports are influencing COVID-19 policies around the world.

Information on making an application

The first round of the COVID-19 Excellence Fund is now closed to applications. Imperial staff can visit the Research Office website for information about current research funding for COVID-19 research available from the College.  Note that the Excellence Fund is separate to the Imperial COVID Research Fund, which awards grants of less than £50,000. Find out more about the Research Fund.