Palo Alto Veterans Institute For Research

Palo Alto Veterans Institute For Research, doing business as Pavir, is a tax-exempt nonprofit research organization that acts as a prime recipient of federal grant awards in biomedical and clinical research, with a small subcontractor footprint on service contracts. The organization holds no federal contracts but serves as recipient of project grants and cooperative agreements across multiple federal research agencies, with particular concentration in the Defense Health Agency and the National Institutes of Health.

Pavir's research portfolio centers on veteran health and translational biomedical science. Representative recent awards include a $1.163 million project grant from the Defense Health Agency (CFDA 12.420) awarded July 1, 2026, for three-year research investigating endothelial-to-mesenchymal transition and cardiovascular disease in veterans with burn pit exposures, performed at the Palo Alto facility with Stanford University collaboration; a $2.398 million Defense Health Agency project grant (CFDA 12.420) awarded September 1, 2024, to increase access to evidence-based PTSD treatment through behavioral health technician-delivered written exposure therapy, with sub-awards to the University of Texas Health Science Center at San Antonio and the Henry M. Jackson Foundation; a $542,730 National Institute on Aging project grant (CFDA 93.866) awarded June 15, 2026, for five-year research on chromatin signaling mechanisms in metabolic aging and disease, with focus on the sirtuin protein SIRT7; and a $551,464 National Institute on Alcohol Abuse and Alcoholism project grant (CFDA 93.273) awarded September 20, 2025, for a randomized controlled trial evaluating deep transcranial magnetic stimulation for alcohol use disorder.

Customer concentration is heavily skewed toward health research. The Defense Health Agency leads by potential value at $8.6 million across 26 awards, driven by military medical research and development priorities. The National Institutes of Health dominates by award count, with 79 awards across the National Institutes of Health portfolio, including 30 from the National Heart Lung and Blood Institute and 24 from the National Institute on Aging; the combined NIH footprint represents the bulk of Pavir's prime grant activity. The Department of the Army Medical Command accounts for 14 awards. Awards span cardiovascular disease, neuroscience, aging, substance use disorders, burn trauma, lymphatic regeneration, genomic studies, and veteran mental health.

Pavir operates as a prime recipient on 212 awards (74% of the portfolio) and as a sub-recipient on 76 awards (26%), reflecting a research organization model built around direct federal funding relationships rather than contract teaming. The organization's sub-recipient activity concentrates on Stanford University prime awards and work through the Henry M. Jackson Foundation. Seventeen awards face ultimate completion within the next twenty-four months, representing near-term recompete risk.

The organization's federal grant activity has grown materially. Awards per year increased from six in 2022 to forty in 2024, declining to twenty-four in 2025 and seven year-to-date in 2026. Service Contract Inventory coverage is minimal—only two SCI-reportable records across fiscal years 2022 through 2024, with 5.3 FTEs in FY2022 and 0.4 FTEs in FY2024—indicating that Pavir's federal footprint is dominated by research grants rather than service contracts. The organization's combined potential value across all awards stands at $8.6 million, though obligated dollars ($339.5 million) far exceed potential value, suggesting substantial completion and reobligation of prior-year awards.

Pavir is affiliated with VA Palo Alto Health Care System and Stanford University, leveraging both institutions' research infrastructure and clinical capacity to deliver federally funded research in clinical trials, preclinical models, genomic studies, and translational work targeting veteran populations and broader public health priorities in aging, cardiovascular disease, and neuropsychiatric conditions.