Background Context

The search for innovation in ALS therapeutic discovery relies on a highly specialised global community of researchers and experts. Those in the community with relevant expertise are close knit, with many researchers and experts having a variety of roles that are overlapping. This unique landscape necessitates that the leading experts required for a rigorous assessment often have associations with the organisations or consortia applying or competing for the Prize. Their removal would unduly undermine the technical rigour needed to identify the most promising innovations.

Furthermore, the Longitude Prize on ALS is only made possible through the contribution of essential datasets from our data partners. These organisations are comprised of researchers with deep knowledge in the field and a primary interest in advancing ALS treatments, which is why the Prize accepted applications from research teams associated with these organisations.

Process Deployed to Eliminate Actual COI & Minimise Perceived COI

To ensure the integrity of the selection, all assessors, judges, and funders were required to declare conflicts with the list of entrants, disclosing all professional appointments, consultancies, and research funding, as well as relevant interests held by family members.

As per our policy, no judge or assessor is permitted to be directly involved in the work or development plans of any competing team. Throughout the technical assessment and judging phase, judges and assessors were also recused from all discussions, scoring, and evaluations related to any team with which they had an association.

While some selected teams are affiliated with the same institutions as our judges, it is important to note that no judge stands to directly benefit personally or financially from the grants awarded to the teams.

The development grants are paid directly to the winning organisations to fund the specific project development phase.