Autism Research Initiative (SFARI): About

Welcome to the Simons Foundation Autism Research Initiative (SFARI). Launched in 2006, SFARI’s mission is to advance the basic science of autism and related neurodevelopmental disorders.

SFARI is part of the Simons Foundation’s Autism and Neuroscience division and benefits from close interactions with the foundation’s Neuroscience Collaborations and Informatics programs. We advance our mission by convening the scientific community, funding innovative research and early career scientists, and developing shared resources that enable discoveries across the field.

The inspiration for SFARI came in 2003, when Jim and Marilyn Simons convened leading scientists to discuss the state of autism research. We continue this tradition through workshops and meetings that bring together researchers from diverse disciplines and members of the autism community. These discussions help identify important scientific questions, encourage new collaborations and shape future SFARI-funded initiatives. Reports from past workshops and meetings are available here.

SFARI also benefits from the expertise of scientific advisors, advisory boards for specific SFARI-supported projects, and external grant review panels. Together, these perspectives help us identify promising approaches and direct our support toward research with the greatest potential to advance the field.

SFARI supports researchers nationally and internationally through grants to individual investigators, collaborative research projects, and early career awards. Our portfolio includes collaborations such as the Autism Rat Models Consortium and the Simons Collaboration on Sex Differences in Autism, as well as support for the Simons Initiative for the Developing Brain at the University of Edinburgh and the Simons Center for the Social Brain at MIT.

Research grants are awarded through a competitive process overseen by the SFARI science team, with external review by expert scientific panels. Current requests for applications and eligibility requirements are posted on our Funding Opportunities page. A brief overview of the criteria SFARI uses to review grant applications can be found here.

SFARI’s current strategic priorities address two main topic areas. Firstly, we aim to deepen our understanding of the genetic architecture of autism through new approaches and technologies. Since its launch, SFARI has made human genetics a central focus of its research support. Identifying genes associated with autism and related neurodevelopmental disorders has revealed the diversity of their genetic underpinnings and laid the groundwork for investigating relevant biological mechanisms. Building on this progress, we seek to connect genetic discoveries with an understanding of brain development, circuit function and the varied characteristics and trajectories of autistic individuals.

Secondly, we aim to support longitudinal, quantitative phenotyping in autism cohorts, including SPARK and Simons Searchlight. These studies will connect phenotypes with underlying biology and to track how they change over time, providing insight into autism’s heterogeneity.

A series of workshops is informing which projects in genetics and quantitative phenotyping we will pursue, with the goal of supporting collaborative efforts in both areas. Consistent with the Simons Foundations’s focus on computational sciences, these projects will benefit from computational approaches and close interaction with the Simons Foundation’s informatics team and in-house experts.

We also invite letters of intent for new, paradigm-shifting approaches to understanding autism through our New Ideas RFA.

Another central tenet of our mission is to invest in pathways that bring outstanding new scientists into autism research. The Fellows-to-Faculty Award supports the transition from postdoctoral training to an independent faculty position. The Shenoy Undergraduate Research Fellowship in Neuroscience (SURFiN) provides research opportunities for undergraduates with limited access to laboratory experience.

In partnership with the Simons Foundation’s Neuroscience Collaborations, SFARI offers an annual request for applications to support scientific conferences and courses that advance the Autism and Neuroscience division’s research priorities.

SFARI is committed to open science. By making data, biospecimens, experimental models and research tools broadly available, we help researchers pursue questions that would be difficult to address within individual laboratories.

Our research cohorts provide complementary opportunities to study autism and related neurodevelopmental disorders:

• The Simons Simplex Collection includes extensive genetic and phenotypic data from more than 2,600 families with one autistic child.
• Simons Searchlight aims to shed light on autism and related neurodevelopmental disorders by collecting high-quality, standardized natural history data and building strong partnerships between researchers, industry, and families.
• SPARK, one of the largest autism research studies and communities, collects genomic and phenotypic data from more than 400,000 individuals to advance autism research.
• The Autism Inpatient Collection includes rigorously characterized children and adolescents with autism, including individuals who are minimally verbal, have substantial adaptive support needs, or experience challenging behaviors.

Researchers can access cohort data through SFARI Base and explore evidence linking genes to autism through SFARI Gene. Additional analysis tools support the exploration of genetic and phenotypic data. Through Research Match, researchers can apply to recruit cohort participants into new studies.

These resources are complemented by induced pluripotent stem cell lines, donated postmortem brain tissue available through Autism BrainNet, and genetically modified mouse, rat and zebrafish models.

Explore the full range of SFARI resources or contact the SFARI Data and Biospecimen Repository team at [email protected] for help identifying and accessing resources relevant to your research.

We are committed to supporting rigorous, creative science that deepens our understanding of autism and related neurodevelopmental disorders. We welcome your input and suggestions for research directions, collaborations and resources that can help advance this work.