New NIH forms raise concerns

The new, shortened National Institutes of Health grant applications, designed to make the process easier on applicants and reviewers, may have an unintended downside, some researchers say.

Specifically, some critics say the new, shorter forms -- down from 25 to 12 pages for R01 grants -- will favor better writers, making it more difficult for younger investigators to compete for NIH funding. "[The new grant applications] are going to focus people's words, and I do think it will favor better writers," said linkurl:Robert Kalb,;http://www.med.upenn.edu/ins/faculty/kalb.htm a University of Pennsylvania neurologist who is also the chair of the NIH's cellular and molecular biology of neurodegeneration study section. Plus, "it frees the experienced investigator to not provide as much feasibility and preliminary data because they can just cite their previous publications." This, Kalb told __The Scientist__, means that applicants with robust publication histories, proven track records of scientific accomplishment, and more experience writing tersely about their research may have the edge over their younger, less experienced counterparts. The NIH has made efforts to make the peer-review process easier on young scientists, recently announcing guidelines that more generously rank applications submitted by younger investigators, sparking debate in the research community. Kalb, who said that he'll begin reviewing grants submitted to his NIH study section in February, maintained that the shorter applications may hurt the chances of younger researchers. "It will be interesting to see how study sections deal with it," he said. How much latitude will be granted newer investigators? "Your guess is as good as mine," Kalb said. linkurl:Stuart Lipton,;http://www.burnham.org/default.asp?contentID=242 director of the Del E. Webb Neuroscience, Aging and Stem Cell Research Center at the Burnham Institute for Medical Research in California, echoed Kalb's concerns. "Everyone is worried about whether it's going to be a level playing field," he told __The Scientist__. However, Sally Rockey, the NIH's acting deputy director for extramural research, wrote in an email to __The Scientist__ that the shorter applications won't favor more experienced writers. "The new application form is career neutral as to its favorability for established vs. new investigators." "Considerable discussion was given to ensuring a fair review process for applicants of all career stages," Rockey wrote. "The enhancing peer review effort put in place a number of practices to ensure that new and early stage investigators receive appropriate consideration, including a new early stage investigator policy, enhanced review criteria, and clustering of applications for new investigators at the review meeting." To see a side-by-side comparison of former and linkurl:enhanced review criteria,;http://grants.nih.gov/grants/guide/notice-files/not-od-09-025.html which direct referees to assign separate scores for significance, investigators, innovation, approach and environment, in addition to an overall priority score, click linkurl:here.;http://grants.nih.gov/grants/peer/guidelines_general/comparison_of_review_criteria.pdf Another sticking point for the new forms, Lipton added, is that he and his colleagues who are now crafting applications for NIH grants are in need of clarification regarding the order in which they are to list important information. In particular, Lipton said that he and several of his colleagues were concerned about the "Research Strategy" section in the NIH's instructions for completing the new applications. That section seemed to instruct applicants to list preliminary studies that have a bearing on the proposed research after they listed the strategy, methodology, and statistical analyses to be employed in the work. Traditionally in NIH grant applications, researchers refer to preliminary studies before discussing research strategy so that they can refer to the previous work in describing their new experimental set ups. "We agree this is an issue," wrote Rockey, "and we will be making a clarification within the application guide that provides flexibility as to the placement of the preliminary studies within the Research Strategy section." Rockey added that researchers had contacted her office to ask about some additional details, such as changes to margin or font sizes. Font and margin size requirements have not changed, she noted. The first round of applications using the new format is due January 25, 2010. To find more information about filling out the new NIH grant application forms, visit these NIH guides (linkurl:here,;http://enhancing-peer-review.nih.gov/docs/application_changes.pdf linkurl:here;http://grants.nih.gov/grants/guide/notice-files/NOT-OD-09-149.html and linkurl:here).;http://grants.nih.gov/grants/guide/notice-files/NOT-OD-10-016.html
**__Related stories:__***linkurl:Give Young Scientists a Break;http://www.the-scientist.com/article/display/56081/
[November 2009]*linkurl:NIH R01s: No Longer the Best Science;http://www.the-scientist.com/article/display/55930/
[September 2009]

New NIH forms raise concerns

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