Federal Grant Award Summary

The National Institute of Child Health and Human Development (NICHD) awarded The Children's Hospital of Philadelphia Research Institute a $765,377 Project Grant on June 17, 2026, under the Child Health and Human Development Extramural Research program (CFDA 93.865). The award supports a research initiative focused on establishing clinical trial readiness of magnetoencephalography (MEG) biomarkers in children across the autism spectrum. The project will standardize and validate two leading MEG metrics—auditory evoked response latency (M50L) and resting state network functional connectivity—as objective neurobiological markers for autism spectrum disorder. Over the 4.7-year performance period concluding February 28, 2031, the research will employ a 12-week repeated scanning design mimicking typical pharmaceutical trial or behavioral intervention protocols to assess measurement reliability, test-retest variability, and sensitivity to clinically relevant features including autism characteristics, cognitive ability, and language/communication skills.

The deliverables from this funding include the development of rigorous, standardized, and scalable methods for implementing and analyzing these MEG measures to characterize both intra-subject variability (measurement precision) and inter-subject variability in pediatric autism populations. By establishing the clinical utility and reliability of these electrophysiological biomarkers, the research aims to advance their integration into clinical trial design and clinical practice, enabling better stratification of autistic patients for trial inclusion based on biological rather than behavioral criteria alone.