PerspectivesAre you interested in submitting a Perspective Article? Be sure to read The Science Advisory Board's Editorial Guides for Perspective Articles. Click here. Finding Dough: NIH Funding Awaits Your Proposals by Robert F. Ryan, M.S., Ph.D. Are you a graduate student or postdoctoral fellow hoping to go to The National Institutes of Health (NIH) for a research opportunity? Are you a young investigator with a new idea, but not sure if there is funding available to pursue it? Have you been planning to find money to continue along a special line of inquiry, but haven't been sure where to start? Well, this article may be just what you need to find your special niche and the money to do it! It is important to remember there are 27 Institutes and Centers at NIH. I have only provided a start, so please use this article as a guide. Follow your nose and intuition to locate your best funding source(s). This article also includes tips from experts on how to make your grant application stand out from all the others. In addition, I am certain that in a few days, members of The Science Advisory Board will be ready and able to aid you further in what they see as ways to improve your chances to succeed. At this year's 94th Annual AACR meeting in Washington, D.C. (in place of the Toronto meeting), the NIH was among the myriad of institutions and organizations passing out information. NIH had a special room reserved for anyone interested to talking people "in the know." I spoke with Dr. Jennifer Couch who made some helpful suggestions. First, although not the easiest place to find a specific niche, she suggested going to the NIH Grants Page to look at the general opportunities available. She also recommended perusing the Webpages of the NIH Institutes and Centers (ICs) to access information about a particular area of interest and then contact someone in that particular office to ask any questions. Remember, Websites vary considerably in depth and design; what works on one Website will not necessarily work in another. Dr. Couch pointed out that "because NIH is primarily divided into institutes that focus on either a body part(s)(e.g. eye or heart/lung/blood)or a disease(s) (e.g. cancer or allergy/infectious disease), the most straightforward way to find funding opportunities is to consider the disease or organ site most affected or most involved in your work." This approach may be easy if you are already in biological sciences and working on cancer, but what about if you are an engineer who has come up with a clever idea that might be useful in science/medicine? Dr. Couch explained, "[if one is a] technology developer or software engineer, the choice is not so obvious. Those people tend to gravitate towards the small institutes like biomedical engineering. That's appropriate sometimes, but not always. For example, they're developing a chip-based system to detect small amounts of a molecule. Usually that molecule is of primary importance in a disease of some sort, so they can look to that institute for funding opportunities." One clever trick Dr. Couch has found that works well is to use the Google search engine. This may help you circumnavigate the daunting and "difficult" NIH website. For instance, if you want NIH funding for bioinformatics and have heard something about BISTI (Biomedical Information Science and Technology Initiative), then typing BISTI on the Google web search page should instantly bring up the BISTI homepage (3rd and 4th links). If you didn't know BISTI, a simple search using bioinformatics, NIH, and funding on Google provides an excellent page: "Bioinformatics Funding Information Page" which includes a link to NIAID's: How to write a grant application. (If you use the same 3 words on the NIH website, you get 0 matches.) If you are too busy to do this sort of indirect searching, contact either the NIH library or science source or a consultant to aid you in the hunt. Grant ApplicationsDr. Phuong Thi Kim Pham, Program Director at the NCI (National Cancer Institute), was the chairperson of a session on "Opportunities for Cancer Research Funding [by] various NIH Institutes/Centers/Offices." Her presentation included data showing that the NIH ICs have had a decade of historically high success rates for funding grant applications. This information is useful when targeting grant applications to ICs most likely to produce a favorable outcome. Five additional Program Directors presented information relevant to their institutions extramural funding history and Dr. Pham has kindly provided a copy of the slides presented (NIH, NIDDK, NHLBI, NIGMS, NIMH, CSR). Dr. Pham's talk, provides an excellent overall view of the grant process and includes important grant writing tips. For example, you should study the different Study Sections and IC areas of research to: (1) determine the appropriate study section you believe is best suited to REVIEW your application; (2) ascertain which Institute(s) it should be ASSIGNED to (NOTE: she recommends that More than one Institute is BEST, provided you can give appropriate justification) (3) request: a) the appropriate study section to review your application and b) the Institutes your application should be assigned to indicating "Strong Justification" for both based on [your belief in] the reviewers' expertise and your area of research. This point of being careful to evaluate and determine the appropriate study section for your grant was reiterated in a letter I received from Don Luckett, Communications Director for CSR, last week: "Applicants may send a cover letter with their application and suggest that it be reviewed by a particular study section. CSR takes these suggestions very seriously when it assigns applications to its study sections." To make educated suggestions, you may want to review CSR's study section descriptions and rosters posted on CSR's Web site. Once you have begun the process, it is a good idea to get additional outside advice and thoughts from senior researchers about your proposal. Also, I believe it is invaluable to finish your proposal early enough so that one or more of your colleagues could review it. As Don Luckett at CSR wrote me last week "Applicants would do best to consult with more senior grantees at their own institution." In addition, it would be particularly helpful to discuss your plans and ask for revisions of your grant from researchers at your institution who have served on peer review committees, especially the study section you aim to send it to. The advantage of using people at your own institution is that they will not have to worry about reviewing your grant and possible breaches of confidentiality or conflict-of-interest regulations, since they come from the same institution and are therefore unable to review it anyway. If you contact someone outside of your own institution, you should understand there are potentially serious problems with that, as indicated by the policies governing reviewers . They cannot be involved in any aspect of the review, discussion or vote for your grant at any CSR review meeting. This was brought out in a conversation with Dr. Anthony Coelho, Review Policy Officer of the NIH Office of Extramural Research, when he called and emailed me last week to consider revising the article text. Lastly, Dr. Coelho suggests another good idea is to study papers past and present reviewers have published. In addition, Dr. Coelho recommends utilizing the Crisp database, which contains all of the abstracts for funded grants. They will offer you ideas on what has been funded, although not directly offering comments on what you have proposed or written. Dr. Pham further recommended that besides including the standard elements of a grant proposal (i.e., a hypothesis, reasons for doing the planned research, literature, references, and detailed experiences you've had) make sure to address the following key questions:
She also suggested making certain to follow the instructions to the specific form you are completing...they may just have changed and you don't want to be excluded from consideration because you didn't complete a required instruction properly. One last point: Dr. Pham wrote in her slides, "Courtesy goes a long way" and told us that "working closely with the NIH staff is a sure way to get positive outcomes in this complicated grant process." There are obviously many sources of information about grants and the federal funding process. One very interesting book available from NCI is entitled "Everything you wanted to know about the NCI Grants Process... but were afraid to ask." This can be downloaded from the NCI Grants Administration Branch website. For a printed copy contact the NCI Grants Administration Branch directly at (301) 496-7753. If you haven't already heard, NIH is migrating from a paper-based system to an entirely electronic grants submission system. Make sure to check with the appropriate institute to see if they have changed your submission method/forms. Funding OpportunitiesFrom Dr. David Badman, the Hematology Program Director of NIDDK (National Institute of Diabetes and Digestive and Kidney Diseases), there was great news. He indicated that NIDDK has an approximately 50% funding success rate for K01 and K08 grants being submitted (contact Terry Rogers Bishop at tb232j@nih.gov). Even better news is an 87% acceptance for the loan repayment program if you do pediatric/clinical research. The Loan Repayment Program is available from many different ICs at NIH, so make certain to visit the general LRP website for your best fit. During Dr. Badman's presentation, not only did he point out training and career opportunities available, but he also discussed NIDDK's major programs, current Requests For Applications (RFAs), Program Announcements (PAs), feasibility studies and stem cell initiatives. Dr. Liana Harvath, Deputy Director of the Division of Blood Diseases and Resources from NHLBI (National Heart, Lung and Blood Institute) gave an excellent synopsis of important areas being funded during her lecture. In addition, her handout provided an extensive list of training initiatives, award areas and locations to find out more information about one of the largest and best-funded institutes at the NIH. Dr. Jean Chin (NIGMS), the last-minute substitution for Dr. Pamela Marino of NIGMS (National Institute of General Medicine) provided great coverage of the initiatives and major areas funded by NIGMS during her presentation. Dr. Peter Muehrer, Chief of the Health and Behavioral Science Research Branch in NIMH (National Institute of Mental Health) provided only one slide with his name and contact information for pre-application technical assistance. During his presentation, he emphasized the need for more research proposals to study the health and behavioral science of patients with cancer, but indicated that this extended to all areas. He said that depression is the second leading cause of disability worldwide (second only to heart disease) and that it remains unrecognized and untreated in most medical settings. Later Dr. Muehrer told me that since "people with depression report greater levels of subjective suffering than people with most medical disorders, research is sorely needed to examine the prevalence of co-morbid mental disorders and cancer; to identify risk and protective processes for such co-morbidity; and to develop effective interventions aimed at targeting these processes to avoid adverse outcomes associated with both mental disorders and cancer." Finally, Dr. Syed Mussaddaq Quadri, Chief of Oncological Sciences IRG (Integrated Review Group), CSR (Center for Scientific Review) gave excellent coverage in his talk of the new study sections within oncological sciences, the scientific boundaries of review, rules of etiquette and some important CSR Websites. Contact him to obtain the Oncological Sciences (ONC) Guidelines document, which provides extensive coverage of the different sections of the new and improved ONC Study Sections. All of the individuals profiled above will be happy to answer your funding questions and advise you in applying to the NIH for grant money. Therefore, don't hesitate to start contacting them today! Additional NIH funding links include the cancer research training and career development site and extramural funding opportunities, a listing of all active program announcements (PAs), and the active Requests for Applications (RFAs) at NCI. You can also search the NIH as a whole by starting at the OER (Office of Extramural Research) grants web page. There is also a relatively new program in CSR for biomedical and behavioral research scientists interested in careers in science administration entitled CSR Review Internship Program. The Fogarty International Center at NIH helps researchers from outside the United States inquire about special international funding opportunities. Remember that R01 grants are funded for investigators from abroad as well as here in the United States based on the quality of the proposal. Expert AdviceA unique opportunity created by Dr. Jonathan Wiest, Associate Director for Training and Education, CCR (Center for Cancer Research), NCI exists for postdoctoral fellows interested in writing a K22 grant. According to Dr. Wiest, the basic K22 requirements include the completion of at least two years of postdoctoral study, US citizenship or permanent residency, and a project relevant to human cancer. He also stressed that intramural basic scientists at NIH can apply for this award. Ongoing weekly tutorials on how to write a K22 will include critical granting issues, extramural division talks and a presentation from a scientific editor to aid in the writing process. If interested in attending, please contact him to participate (Meeting Time and Location: Friday 4 PM at Bldg 10, Rm 13S235A). Dr. Wiest provided important NCI K22 links: the original PA (1), regulations (2), (3), the K22 submitting links (4) (doesn't always work), the K22 downloadable and fillable 398 forms (which can be submitted directly) (5), and additional instructions (6). And if you need hands-on training , NIH has other training opportunities coming this year! Other ICs also offer K22 awards. Make sure to check with the appropriate K22 listing (NCI, NHGRI, NHLBI, NIAID, NICHD, NIDA, NIDCR, NIDDK, NIEHS, NINDS, NINR).It is important to note that NIEHS fellows interested in the TIP program at NIEHS should contact Dr. Bill Schrader (intramural individuals contact), Dr. Carol Shreffler (scientific/research issues), Dr. Janice Allen (peer review), or Ms. Susan Ricci (financial or grant management). Because extramural funds cannot be used for intramural research, Dr. Schrader told me that, "to avoid penalizing the highly-trained intramural postdoctoral fellows by rendering them ineligible to apply for K22 awards from NIEHS, a mechanism has been established to create an internal pre-application and review by a scientific panel for all K22 applications that intramural Fellows wish to submit." Except for this exception, the K22 awards process, as well as other NIEHS funding opportunities, is administered by DERT (Division of Extramural Research and Training). Remember, each institute administers its K22 program differently, so make sure you contact the appropriate personnel for application details. Dr. Wiest recommended going to the NIH web site and type in the word Kiosk in the search engine. Follow the link entitled "NIH Extramural Training: K Kiosk - Information about NIH Career Development Awards." This page provides information about all K type grants and has a "Career Wizard" to help you in choosing the correct career award. About to write your first regular grant (R01) or looking into other possibilities? There is a similar career wizard on the OER web page. It can help direct you to a good match for your new plans. There are also any people at the NIH are ready and interested in helping you submit a successful grant application. If there is someone specific you need and you know their name, but don't have their contact information, go to the NIH Directory and Email Forwarding Service. Just remember to make certain that your proposal is based on a testable hypothesis, will move the field forward, and is innovative. I wish to extend special thanks to those people at NIH who donated their slides, time, and feedback, which assisted in the completion of this article: Dr. David Badman (badmand@extra.niddk.nih.gov), Program Director, NIDDK Tristan Blanchard (ncipressoffice@mail.nih.gov), NCI Press Office, NCI Dr. Jean Chin (chinj@nigms.nih.gov), Program Director, NIGMS Dr. Jennifer Couch (couchj@ctep.nci.nih.gov ), Program Director, CTEP, NCI Allison Davis (davisa@nigms.nih.gov), Office of Communication and Public Liaison, NIGMS Jan Ehrman (ehrmanj@mail.nih.gov), OD (Office of the Director), Office of Communications and Public Liaison (OCPL) Dr. Liana Harvath (harvathl@nhlbi.nih.gov), Deputy Director of the Division of Blood Diseases and Resources, NHLBI Dr. Pamela Marino (marinop@gm1.nigms.nih.gov ), Program Director, NIGMS Dr. Peter Muehrer (pmuehrer@nih.gov ), Chief, Health & Behavioral Science Research Branch, NIMH John Peterson (peterso4@niehs.nih.gov), OCPL (Office of Communications and Public Liaison), NIEHS Dr. Phuong Thi Kim Pham (pp64n@nih.gov), Program Director, OCTR (Office of Centers, Training and Resources), OD (Office of the Director), NCI Dr. Syed Mussaddaq Quadri (quadris@csr.nih.gov), Chief of Oncological Sciences IRG, CSR Dr. Bill Schrader (schrader@niehs.nih.gov), Deputy Scientific Director, Division of Intramural Research, NIEHS Dr. Jonathan Wiest (wiestj@nih.od.gov ), Associate Director for Training and Education, CCR, NCI NCI Grants Administration Branch (http://www3.cancer.gov/admin/gab/ ), [(301) 496-7753] ### Robert F. Ryan, M.S., Ph.D. BioScience Information and Consulting Rfryan2000@aol.com or BioScienceInfo@aol.com  His company provides services to researchers in search of scientific information as well as funding opportunities available in their disciplines. BioSci Info also aids individual researchers and pharmaceutical companies in all aspects of initiating, writing and reviewing documents through to submission and acceptance by the FDA. Dr. Ryan is a molecular biologist and geneticist with expertise in molecular biology, protein characterization, biochemistry, translational science and clinical protocols. Dr. Ryan completed his M.S. degree while studying Sickle Cell and other hemoglobinopathies at The Medical College of Georgia. Later, Dr. Ryan received his Ph.D. in molecular genetics from Thomas Jefferson University in Philadelphia, PA where he characterized the DNA and RNA binding properties of the zinc finger proteins TFIIIA and p43. His Post-Doctoral training was completed at The Wistar Institute, Philadelphia and The National Institutes of Health (NIH) in Bethesda, MD, studying mechanisms of transcriptional repression and the binding properties of the glucocorticoid receptor in vivo. He has published research articles in Experimental Cell Research, MCB, Nucleic Acids Research, PNAS, Sphere and The British Journal of Hematology. His primary interests are in teaching, writing, increasing translational science and initiating new cancer treatments while differentiating responding from non-responding patients. Dr. Ryan has been a member of The Science Advisory Board since October, 2001.### << Previous Next >> [ View All Perspectives ] |
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