The Sontag Foundation

The Sontag Foundation, established in 2002, is a private family foundation strategically focused on advancing brain cancer research. Founders Rick and Susan Sontag were motivated to form the Foundation after Susan’s experience with this poorly understood disease. The Foundation’s signature award, the Distinguished Scientist Award (DSA), is a $750,000 career development grant which is awarded to the best and the brightest early career scientists in the USA and Canada who are conducting research related to this intractable disease. Since being awarded their DSA grant, our grantees have achieved remarkable career success, demonstrated by academic promotions and prestigious leadership appointments within their institutions or professional societies. We are proud to sponsor researchers at almost every major institution in North America. In 2014, Rick and Susan Sontag formed a non-profit called The Brain Tumor Network to support brain tumor patients. This network provides free individualized support to help brain tumor patients overcome treatment obstacles, facilitate access to quality healthcare, and navigate the clinical trial process.