# Fast Grants

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Research charity in the United States

**Fast Grants** was a [charitable initiative](/source/Charitable_organization) administered by the [Mercatus Center](/source/Mercatus_Center) at [George Mason University](/source/George_Mason_University) that distributed [funding](/source/Funding_of_science) for [COVID-19](/source/COVID-19)-related research during the [COVID-19 pandemic](/source/COVID-19_pandemic).[1][2]

## History

Fast Grants was launched in April 2020 by [Tyler Cowen](/source/Tyler_Cowen), director of the Mercatus Center and economics professor at George Mason University; [Patrick Collison](/source/Patrick_Collison), co-founder and CEO of [online payment](/source/Online_payment) processing platform [Stripe](/source/Stripe_(company)); and [Patrick Hsu](/source/Patrick_Hsu), a bioengineering professor at the [University of California, Berkeley](/source/University_of_California%2C_Berkeley), with the stated purpose of providing funding to researchers more quickly than traditional science funding mechanisms.[3]

## Support

The project was supported by donations from [Arnold Ventures](/source/Arnold_Ventures_LLC), [The Audacious Project](/source/The_Audacious_Project), The [Chan Zuckerberg Initiative](/source/Chan_Zuckerberg_Initiative), [John Collison](/source/John_Collison), [Patrick Collison](/source/Patrick_Collison), Crankstart, [Jack Dorsey](/source/Jack_Dorsey), Kim and [Scott Farquhar](/source/Scott_Farquhar), [Paul Graham](/source/Paul_Graham_(programmer)), [Reid Hoffman](/source/Reid_Hoffman), Fiona McKean and [Tobias Lütke](/source/Tobias_L%C3%BCtke), [Yuri and Julia Milner](/source/Yuri_Milner), [Elon Musk](/source/Elon_Musk), Crystal and [Chris Sacca](/source/Chris_Sacca), [Schmidt Futures](/source/Schmidt_Futures), and others.[4][5]

## Grants

Fast Grants provided funding of $10,000-$500,000 per project and aimed to respond to grant applications within two weeks.[2]

As of April 2021, Fast Grants had awarded 250 grants totaling more than $50 million to researchers working on COVID-19 related projects, including testing, clinical work, surveillance, virology, drug development and trials, and PPE.[1][6] Fast Grants provided initial funding for [SalivaDirect](/source/Anne_Wyllie), the saliva test used in the NBA “bubble” in Orlando during the 2020 season.[7] Other notable grant recipients included [Addgene](/source/Addgene), the [Center for Open Science](/source/Center_for_Open_Science), [Susan Athey](/source/Susan_Athey), [Carolyn Bertozzi](/source/Carolyn_Bertozzi), [Catherine Blish](/source/Catherine_Blish), [Pamela Bjorkman](/source/Pamela_Bjorkman), [Susan Daniel](/source/Susan_Daniel), [Barbara Engelhardt](/source/Barbara_Engelhardt), [Laura Esserman](/source/Laura_Esserman), [Judith Frydman](/source/Judith_Frydman), [Amy Gladfelter](/source/Amy_Gladfelter), [Eva Harris](/source/Eva_Harris), [Akiko Iwasaki](/source/Akiko_Iwasaki), [Kevin Kain](/source/Kevin_Kain), [Yoshihiro Kawaoka](/source/Yoshihiro_Kawaoka), [Nevan Krogan](/source/Nevan_Krogan), [Ronald Levy](/source/Ronald_Levy_(scientist)), [Allison McGeer](/source/Allison_McGeer), [Miriam Merad](/source/Miriam_Merad), [Keith Mostov](/source/Keith_Mostov), [Mihai Netea](/source/Mihai_Netea), [Daniel Nomura](/source/Daniel_Nomura), [Melanie Ott](/source/Melanie_Ott), [Bradley Pentelute](/source/Bradley_Pentelute), [Rosalind Picard](/source/Rosalind_Picard), [Hidde Ploegh](/source/Hidde_Ploegh), [Angela Rasmussen](/source/Angela_Rasmussen), [Erica Ollmann Saphire](/source/Erica_Ollmann_Saphire), [Katherine Seley-Radtke](/source/Katherine_Seley-Radtke), [Erec Stebbins](/source/Erec_Stebbins), [Alice Ting](/source/Alice_Ting), [Alain Townsend](/source/Alain_Townsend), [David Veesler](/source/David_Veesler), [Bert Vogelstein](/source/Bert_Vogelstein), [Tania Watts](/source/Tania_Watts), and [Qian Zhang](/source/Qian_Zhang).[4]

As of January 2022, new Fast Grants applications were paused due to a lack of additional funding.[8]

## Impact

The Fast Grants program inspired[*[citation needed](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Citation_needed)*] multiple other well-funded efforts that replicate its low overhead, high impact funding model. Some examples include Impetus Grants for longevity research (>$30M of funding), [Robert Downey Jr.](/source/Robert_Downey_Jr.)'s Footprint Coalition for climate change, and Superalignment Fast Grants from [OpenAI](/source/OpenAI) for safe AI development ($10M of funding).

## References

1. ^ [***a***](#cite_ref-wapo_1-0) [***b***](#cite_ref-wapo_1-1) Hobson, Will. ["Scientists wait months for coronavirus research grants. This economist is trying to fix that"](https://www.washingtonpost.com/lifestyle/style/scientists-wait-months-for-coronavirus-research-grants-this-economist-is-trying-to-fix-that/2020/04/29/b5c8a3e0-896e-11ea-9dfd-990f9dcc71fc_story.html). *The Washington Post*. Retrieved 13 July 2020.

1. ^ [***a***](#cite_ref-vox_2-0) [***b***](#cite_ref-vox_2-1) Piper, Kelsey (21 April 2020). ["This new charity offers scientists coronavirus grants in 48 hours"](https://www.vox.com/future-perfect/2020/4/21/21228156/coronavirus-fast-grants-tyler-cowen-patrick-collison). *Vox*.

1. **[^](#cite_ref-3)** Else, Holly (2021-08-03). ["COVID 'Fast Grants' sped up pandemic science"](https://www.nature.com/articles/d41586-021-02111-7). *Nature*. [doi](/source/Doi_(identifier)):[10.1038/d41586-021-02111-7](https://doi.org/10.1038%2Fd41586-021-02111-7). [PMID](/source/PMID_(identifier)) [34345037](https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/34345037). [S2CID](/source/S2CID_(identifier)) [236916209](https://api.semanticscholar.org/CorpusID:236916209).

1. ^ [***a***](#cite_ref-:0_4-0) [***b***](#cite_ref-:0_4-1) ["Fast Grants"](https://fastgrants.org/). *Fast Grants*. Retrieved 2023-05-21.{{[cite web](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Template:Cite_web)}}: CS1 maint: deprecated archival service ([link](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Category:CS1_maint:_deprecated_archival_service))

1. **[^](#cite_ref-5)** ["A group of tech billionaires is funding 'fast grants' of up to $500,000 for COVID-19 research, with every grant decision made in less than 48 hours"](https://web.archive.org/web/20220118101901/https://www.businessinsider.in/tech/enterprise/news/a-group-of-tech-billionaires-is-funding-fast-grants-of-up-to-500000-for-covid-19-research-with-every-grant-decision-made-in-less-than-48-hours/articleshow/75038007.cms). *Business Insider*. Archived from [the original](https://www.businessinsider.in/tech/enterprise/news/a-group-of-tech-billionaires-is-funding-fast-grants-of-up-to-500000-for-covid-19-research-with-every-grant-decision-made-in-less-than-48-hours/articleshow/75038007.cms) on 2022-01-18. Retrieved 2022-01-18.

1. **[^](#cite_ref-6)** ["What We Learned Doing Fast Grants"](https://future.a16z.com/what-we-learned-doing-fast-grants/). *Future*. 15 June 2021. Retrieved 15 June 2021.

1. **[^](#cite_ref-7)** ["Yale-sponsored COVID-19 test was partially funded by Fast Grant program"](https://www2.gmu.edu/news/2020-08/yale-sponsored-covid-19-test-was-partially-funded-fast-grant-program). *George Mason University*. Retrieved 2021-05-03.

1. **[^](#cite_ref-8)** ["Fast Grants"](https://fastgrants.org). 2022-01-13. [Archived](https://web.archive.org/web/20220113045217/https://fastgrants.org/) from the original on 2022-01-13. Retrieved 2022-01-18.

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Adapted from the Wikipedia article [Fast Grants](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fast_Grants) by Wikipedia contributors ([contributor history](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fast_Grants?action=history)). Available under [Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 International](https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/). Changes may have been made.