Skip to main content

NIH stimulus to fund old grants

Rather than funding new grants, the NIH's Office of the Director will spend the vast majority of its $8.2 billion stimulus check to finance grants that have already been reviewed and to supplement existing grants. A smaller sliver -- some $100 million to $200 million -- will fund new two-year "challenge grants," which will support cutting-edge short projects, and will require researchers to report the number of jobs created or preserved by the grant to show that the money is boosting local econ

Written byElie Dolgin
| 1 min read

Register for free to listen to this article
Listen with Speechify
0:00
1:00
Rather than funding new grants, the NIH's Office of the Director will spend the vast majority of its $8.2 billion stimulus check to finance grants that have already been reviewed and to supplement existing grants. A smaller sliver -- some $100 million to $200 million -- will fund new two-year "challenge grants," which will support cutting-edge short projects, and will require researchers to report the number of jobs created or preserved by the grant to show that the money is boosting local economies. A new Request For Applications (RFA) is expected to be issued in the coming week or two. The NIH will also consider the geographic distribution of the grants it gives in order to target regions where the economy is especially faltering, the NIH's acting director linkurl:Raynard Kington;https://www.nih.gov/about/director/index.htm said at a news conference yesterday, according to__ linkurl:ScienceInsider.;https://blogs.sciencemag.org/scienceinsider/2009/02/nih-grant-pipel.html __Because the NIH needs to invest the stimulus money within two years, it is opting not to issue wide calls for new applications. Rather, it hopes that by backing applications already in the funding queue or injecting capital into existing research, it will be able to rapidly save and create jobs for postdocs, technicians and summer students, as well as finance the purchase of new equipment and other lab resources.
**__Related stories:__***linkurl:NIH wins stimulus jackpot;https://www.the-scientist.com/blog/display/55418/
[12th February 2009]*linkurl:How to spend the NIH stimulus;https://www.the-scientist.com/blog/display/55413/
[11th February 2009]
Interested in reading more?

Become a Member of

The Scientist Logo
Receive full access to more than 35 years of archives, as well as TS Digest, digital editions of The Scientist, feature stories, and much more!
Already a member?
Add The Scientist as a preferred source on Google

Add The Scientist as a preferred Google source to see more of our trusted coverage.

Meet the Author

Related articles background image
August 2026 Digest cover
August 2026

Epic Fail: Sea-Monkeys Sabotage Fieldwork

When Barry Hicks set out to photograph thrombolites, thousands of unexpected visitors photobombed his underwater images.

View this Issue
Overcoming Immunotherapy Resistance in Liver Cancer

Overcoming Immunotherapy Resistance in Liver Cancer

Axion Biosystems
Optimizing NGS Library Preparation for Reliable Sequencing Data

Optimizing NGS Library Preparation for Reliable Sequencing Data

Covaris
Using TCR Repertoire Sequencing to Advance Immunology Research

Using TCR Repertoire Sequencing to Advance Immunology Research

Miltenyi
Mapping Clonal Mosaicism in Aging Tissues

Mapping Clonal Mosaicism in Aging Tissues

Mission bio

Products

Sino Biological Logo

Sino Biological Launches SuperNuclease ® Pro with Free Trial Program

Sino Biological Logo

Sino Biological Launches Precisely Characterized Full-Length p-Tau217 Protein to Advance Next-Generation Alzheimer’s Biomarker Assay Development

A photo of a scientist placing the Resipher device on a 96-well plate.

Resipher: Continuous Live-Cell Mitochondrial Respiration Monitoring in 96-Well Plates

Lucid Scientific logo
Conceptual image of ice and frost.

The VAULT100 PRO: Inside the most advanced Stirling Ultracold ULT freezer ever built.

Stirling Ultracold logo