MRFF – 2026 Genomics Health Futures Grant Opportunity (GO8294)

The Medical Research Future Fund (MRFF) – 2026 Genomics Health Futures Grant Opportunity will provide grants of financial assistance to support medical research and medical innovation projects that:

• Stream 1 (Targeted Call for Research): develop genomic tools and technologies to identify genetic predisposition to cancer and improve screening and targeted intervention. Focus on increased access to genomic testing and on liquid biopsy.
• Stream 2 (Targeted Call for Research): conduct scalable research to enhance novel gene discoveries, increase diagnostic rates and enable disease modelling to support development of targeted therapies or prevention strategies. Research projects funded by this stream should:
  • stratify ways to elucidate the impact of variants of unknown significance in known and novel genes
  • develop the application of gene-specific platforms (including multi-omics) to new and/or established cohorts.
• Stream 3 (Incubator): develop novel methods for using polygenic risk scores to identify subgroups of the population at high risk of common and complex diseases. Funding under Stream 3 is available as follows:
  • Topic A: Cardiovascular disease
  • Topic B: Diabetes
  • Topic C: Other common and/or complex diseases
• Stream 4 (Incubator): develop novel methods for improving accuracy and usefulness of polygenic risk scores to stratify people with common cancers for surveillance and treatment. Funding under Stream 4 is available as follows:
  • Topic A: Breast cancer
  • Topic B: Colorectal cancer
  • Topic C: Prostate cancer
  • Topic D: Other common cancers
• Stream 5 (Targeted Call for Research): undertake research to enhance or streamline uptake of clinical genomics into practice. Research conducted will:
  • use best practice implementation science to identify barriers and system changes required for effective implementation
  • focus on identified populations, geographical locations or health care settings where the proposed research could make the most difference.
• Stream 6 (Accelerator): develop and maintain infrastructure to support research collaboration by enabling data sharing, portability, longevity and connectivity of analysis across Australia. Research conducted should address emerging ethical, legal and social issues associated with the governance of clinical and genomic datasets with particular focus on the application of advanced analytics (for example, artificial intelligence) to enhance the diagnostic utility of genomics.

The intended outcome of the research funded by this grant opportunity is to improve the health and wellbeing of Australians by:

• Stream 1: increasing access to genomic testing
• Stream 2: building capacity for turning genomic knowledge into effective diagnosis, prevention and targeted therapies
• Stream 3: enhancing risk prediction to support early intervention for people with common and complex diseases
• Stream 4: enhancing risk prediction to support early intervention for people with cancer
• Stream 5: improving access to effective, genomics-based diagnostic testing and therapies in health care
• Stream 6: improving the diagnostic utility of genomic data through enhanced data sharing.

This grant opportunity is being administered by NHMRC on behalf of the Australian Government Department of Health, Disability and Ageing.

Further information on MRFF is available from the Department of Health, Disability and Ageing's MRFF website.