March 28, 2016

New Streamlined Subrecipient Commitment Form

The Sponsored Projects Office has issued a revised Subrecipient Commitment Form. The form has been streamlined and reduced in length from five to three pages. SPO has also provided new instructions to make it easier for subrecipients around the world to understand and complete the form.

SPO encourages the campus to begin using the new form as soon as possible for the benefit of our subrecipient organizations. If an older version of the form has already been submitted to SPO, there is no need to submit the new form. However, the new form will be required for proposals submitted after April 15, 2016.

March 23, 2016

New Partnership to Help Fund Unfunded NIH Proposals

Dr. Michael Lauer, the NIH Deputy Director for Extramural Research, published A Pilot Partnership to Find Private Support for Unfunded Applications in his Open Mike blog at NIH.

Excerpted from the March 23, 2016 blog post:
The Online Partnership to Accelerate Research (OnPAR) program, operated by Leidos Life Sciences, will act as a matchmaker between unfunded NIH applicants and private research funders. OnPAR’s growing list of private funders currently includes the Juvenile Diabetes Research Foundation, National Alopecia Areata Foundation, Children’s Tumor Foundation, Adenoid Cystic Carcinoma Research Foundation, Breast Cancer Research Foundation, Melanoma Research Alliance, and Parent Project Muscular Dystrophy. We anticipate that more private funders and federal research agencies will be added to this program in the future.

To begin the process, NIH program officers will inform select applicants about potential funding opportunities via the OnPAR pilot. Select applicants include those who have a) have undergone Council review within the past year, b) have scored well (i.e., within the 30th percentile or promising non-percentiled applications), c) were unfunded and d) have research proposals that fall under the missions of the participating private funders. Applicants, at their discretion, can decide whether to submit materials to OnPAR for consideration of private funding.
More information is available in a March 23 Science Translational Medicine article, Funding unfunded NIH research application.

March 01, 2016

Getting Ready for Revised Forms from NIH: FORMS-D

The National Institutes of Health has been developing updated application forms, identified as FORMS-D, that must be used for all applications submitted for due dates on or after May 25, 2016. NIH intends to have the new forms available by March 25. NIH Guide notice NIH & AHRQ Announce Upcoming Changes to Policies, Instructions and Forms for 2016 Grant Applications (NOT-OD-16-004) provides information on planned changes to the forms.

To prepare for the change, NIH is developing resources for applicants, including a “completely revamped application guide that is much easier to use and understand.” NIH Extramural News Gearing Up for FORMS-D gives a brief summary. For more details, see NIH eSubmission Items of Interest – February 29, 2016. This covers topics such as FORMS-D application changes, timing, impact on continuous submission, impact on administrative requests, and identifying which form version was used for an application.

March 23, 2016 update: Reminder: NIH & AHRQ Grant Application Changes for Due Dates On or After May 25, 2016 (NOT-OD-16-081)
March 28, 2016 update: Restructured and Streamlined Application Guides and Supplemental Instructions Available for Applications Due Dates On or After May 25, 2016 (NOT-OD-16-084)