Adelaide Tovar, a postdoctoral geneticist at the University of Michigan, prepares cell samples in a science laboratory on campus. Tovar is one of about 200 young scientists who will lose research funding because the Trump administration abruptly ended the National Institute of Health's MOSAIC grant program. (Mike Hawkins) Mike Hawkins hide caption
Adelaide Tovar, a University of Michigan scientist who researches genes related to diabetes, used to feel like an impostor in a laboratory. Tovar, 32, grew up poor and was the first in her family to graduate from high school. During her first year in college, she realized she didn't know how to study.
But after years of studying biology and genetics, Tovar finally got proof that she belonged. Last fall, the National Institutes of Health awarded her a prestigious grant. It would fund her research and put her on track to be a university professor and eventually launch a laboratory of her own.
"I felt like receiving the award was a form of acceptance, like I had finally made it," Tovar said. "But I think many of us now fear that this is going to poison the rest of our careers."
Tovar is one of nearly 200 early-career scientists across the nation whose research and job prospects have been jeopardized by the sudden termination of the NIH's MOSAIC grant program, one of many ended by sweeping cuts across the federal scientific agencies. The grant was created by the first Trump administration to foster a new generation of diverse scientists in biomedical research, then defunded in the second Trump administration's ongoing purge of diversity, equity, and inclusion programs.
In interviews with KFF Health News, Tovar and three other grant recipients worried that the loss of funding - coupled with President Donald Trump's crusade against diversity programs - may transform a grant that was supposed to jump-start their careers into a blemish on their résumés that could cost them the jobs and funding that make their research possible.
Erica Rodriguez, a scientist and MOSAIC grant awardee at Columbia University, uses a microscope to help her solder a circuit board as part of her brain research. The Trump administration defunded the MOSAIC grant program as part of a purge of diversity-focused initiatives. (Tyler Gibson) Tyler Gibson hide caption
"We might end up blacklisted by the NIH because of having this award - for who we are," said Erica Rodriguez, 35, a grant recipient at Columbia University who conducts brain research that could lead to a better understanding of psychiatric disorders.
"Because not only is it for people with diverse backgrounds," she said, "but it's for people who advocate for other people with diverse backgrounds."
The MOSAIC program - short for "Maximizing Opportunities for Scientific and Academic Independent Careers" - was created in 2019 to provide early-career support to promising scientists from "underrepresented backgrounds" with a long-term goal to "enhance diversity in the biomedical research workforce," according to NIH grant documents.
The five-year grant was awarded to scientists who have finished their doctorates and work in research laboratories at universities across the country. In the first two years, scientists generally receive $100,000 to $150,000, which is largely used to pay their salaries.
By the third year, the scientists are expected to have been hired as a professor, likely at a different university, where the grant funding helps them launch their own research lab. In the final three years of the grant, funding increases to about $250,000 a year, which is used to buy supplies and hire other early career scientists to work in the lab, completing the cycle.
MOSAIC awardees were chosen using a definition of diversity beyond race, gender, and disability. It includes those who grew up in poor households or rural areas or were raised by parents who do not have college degrees. Many of those chosen for the grant also have a history of supporting other budding scientists from underrepresented backgrounds.
MOSAIC funds research on cancer, Alzheimer's disease, spinal cord injuries, cochlear implants, fentanyl overdoses, stroke recovery, neurodevelopmental disorders, and more.
But in recent weeks the NIH has notified most MOSAIC recipients that the program was "terminated" and their funding will end by this summer, regardless of the years left on their grant, according to NIH emails reviewed by KFF Health News. Other awardees have received no official notification and only learned through word of mouth that their funding was canceled.
Vianca Rodriguez Feliciano, a spokesperson for the Department of Health and Human Services, confirmed in an email statement to KFF Health News that MOSAIC had been defunded. She said the grants "no longer align" with agency priorities or the president's executive orders "eliminating wasteful, ideologically driven DEI initiatives."