Our Living Legacy: MCPF’s Plan for 2027
Announced October 1, 2026:
32 Years of Moving Research Forward
In 1995, Peter Morton broke his neck in a bicycle accident and was left paralyzed from the neck down, dependent on a ventilator to breathe. His friends responded not with resignation, but with a dream: That All May Walk Again.
For more than 30 years, MCPF and our remarkable community of donors and volunteers have worked to move spinal cord injury research forward. When we began, a cure for paralysis was widely regarded as impossible. Today, the scientific landscape is dramatically different.
We have helped move spinal cord injury research out of the dark ages and into modernity. That progress has come from relentless, global, nose-to-the-grindstone laboratory work. MCPF has deliberately sought out cutting-edge ideas and helped researchers generate the proof-of-concept data necessary to take those ideas to the next level.
That has always been our strategy; now we are taking that strategy into its final chapter.
A Deliberate Sunset
At the end of 2027, MCPF will sunset as an organization.
This is a decision made thoughtfully and with enormous gratitude for everyone who has made MCPF possible. Sunsetting does not mean walking away from the mission, but quite the opposite.
We are using these final 15 months to make one more concentrated investment in the future of SCI research.
The Next Frontier: Artificial Intelligence
Artificial intelligence is rapidly changing what is possible in biomedical research.
In other areas of medicine, AI is already creating capabilities that would have been difficult to imagine only a few years ago. We believe SCI research should have the opportunity to harness those same capabilities.
So, we asked a simple question, and invited 11 of our best laboratories to answer it:
What could happen if some of the world’s best spinal cord injury laboratories put AI to work in ways that have never been attempted before?
Their proposals were required to be imaginative, collaborative, and future oriented. We challenged scientists not simply to apply AI to work they are already doing, but to think about how AI might fundamentally expand what they are capable of discovering, measuring, modeling, predicting, and testing. The proposals we received back have been nothing short of transformational.
A $1 Million Final Investment
MCPF has established a goal of investing $1 million total across three or four of these projects before our sunset at the end of 2027. To do that, we have around $250k to raise.
As always, we will be looking for outstanding science, outstanding scientists, and the potential to accelerate the development of meaningful new treatments for spinal cord injury. But we will also be looking for something more: the potential to change what is possible.
MCPF has intentionally operated much like a venture-capital firm for research—providing early support that allows scientists to establish proof of concept and pursue substantially larger sources of funding. The same philosophy is behind this final investment. We want these projects to have lives far beyond MCPF.
Why AI?
Spinal cord injury is an extraordinarily complicated problem. There is no single switch to flip and no single discovery that will solve every aspect of paralysis. The path forward requires discoveries across many areas of science.
MCPF has supported that broad search for decades—from work involving glial scar formation, stem cells, remyelination and axon growth to biomaterials, neuromodulation and other approaches.
AI offers the possibility of connecting and accelerating many of these areas: It can process enormous amounts of existing data, identify patterns that would otherwise be difficult to find, model complex systems, improve experimental design, and collaborate in entirely new ways.
The purpose of this initiative is not to fund AI for AI’s sake, but to give exceptional SCI scientists new tools to attack an exceptionally difficult problem.
Our Philosophy Remains the Same
Our strategy is changing; our mission is not.
For more than three decades, MCPF has believed that every dollar should count. We have focused our resources on research, maintained a lean organization, and sought projects capable of generating proof-of-concept data that can unlock much larger investments. Our research grants have been subject to expert peer review, with attention to the quality of science, the capabilities of investigators and laboratories, and the potential of a project to accelerate new treatments.
We will bring that same discipline to this final initiative. The difference is that we are now concentrating our remaining resources on a small number of potentially transformative projects.
The Living Legacy Awards
MCPF began with a dream born out of tragedy. That dream brought together friends, volunteers, donors and scientists who refused to accept paralysis as the end of the story.
Thirty-two years later, the science has changed dramatically. We believe the time is right for one final push.
Between now and the end of 2027, we intend to put approximately $1 million behind three or four extraordinary research projects that use artificial intelligence to create capabilities we could scarcely have imagined when MCPF began. This will be our legacy.
Then, MCPF will sunset.
But the work will not. The discoveries will not. And scientists will not.
We hope the impact of the final investments made by MCPF and its donors will continue to move SCI research forward for years to come: That All May Walk Again.
FAQ
Q: Why should I continue supporting MCPF?
A: For the next 15 months, we are concentrating all our remaining resources on a small number of potentially transformative projects. The Living Legacy Awards will be our largest grants to date; your support will empower scientists to kick off their most ambitious projects yet.
Q: I’ve been reading scary things lately about AI; how will these projects be safe?
A: AI is advancing rapidly, and public discussion has raised legitimate concerns about the need for built-in safeguards.
Our grant applicants have proposed use of AI models that do not need unrestricted access to the internet, computer systems, or other external resources. Research teams are planning systems with clearly defined purposes, limited permissions, controlled datasets, human oversight, and monitoring. In other words, these AI models will not be able to act autonomously or make decisions on behalf of scientists.
Q: How will this impact my monthly gift?
A: Monthly charges will continue per your gift schedule until October 1, 2027. Contact anna@mcpf.org at any time to make changes.
Q: Will I be able to continue giving?
A: We will continue accepting gifts as usual through October 1, 2027. Please ensure any mailed gifts are sent in time to be received by that date.
Contact
For more information, please contact Anna Dietrich, Director of Investor Relations, at anna@mcpf.org or 989-277-0650.