This proposal is a supplement to Parent Grant P30AR079206, “Chicago Center on Musculoskeletal Pain (C-COMP)” (2021-2026), which aims to establish a resource-based center to foster and support research and training aimed at understanding the mechanisms underlying pain associated with musculoskeletal (MSK) and rheumatic diseases, with the ultimate goal of better managing and preventing it. The long-term broad objectives of C-COMP are: (1) To foster high-quality, innovative, standardized, focused research on the topic of pain in rheumatic and MSK diseases; (2) To promote translationally relevant cross-disciplinary research, based on collaborations between MSK researchers and pain researchers/neuroscientists; and (3) To expand the Research Community in this area, and increase extramural funding for this understudied topic. Pilot funding for innovative and meritorious proposals is a key element of C-COMP’s Enrichment Program’s role in driving the field forward by advancing high quality research in the area of musculoskeletal pain, as well as expanding the field of research. This supplement directly addresses the NOSI Goal B: “Expand rheumatic, skin, and musculoskeletal disease pain research capacity (cohorts, technologies or data) beyond current research base/collaborators”, by seeking to expand the number of pilot grants to be awarded in the next cycle from 4 to 6 awards of $25K each. Indirectly, successful pilot grants will contribute to Goal A: “Generate supporting evidence towards a future innovative study or new scientific direction in pain research in rheumatic, skin, and musculoskeletal diseases”. We propose to expand the pilot funding by $50K, so that we can award two more grants – for a total of 6 awards in cycle 2. All pilot grant awardees from both cycles will be invited to Chicago to participate in the first C- COMP Annual Symposium on December 4 2023. We anticipate this approach will increase the reach and effectiveness of C-COMP and produce a longterm beneficial impact on research into pain associated with rheumatic and musculoskeletal diseases.