NEW YORK (GenomeWeb News) – The National Institutes of Health has announced a new grant program as part of the stimulus bill that is designed to support research at educational institutions that provide advanced degrees for “a significant number” of US scientists, but which are not yet major recipients of NIH support.
The Academic Research Enhancement Awards are trans-NIH grants, and will support a variety of research projects with up to $300,000 in direct and administrative costs. NIH expects to grant up to 50 of these awards in fiscal 2010. They are funded by the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act of 2009.
These grants, called AREA for short, are aimed at creating opportunities for scientists and institutions that otherwise would not be likely to participate in NIH programs. The grants are designed to fund small-scale health related research projects proposed by faculty members of eligible colleges, universities, schools, and components of domestic institutions.
These grants could include pilot research projects and feasibility studies; development, testing, and refinement of research techniques; secondary analysis of available data sets; and similar discrete research projects that demonstrate research capability.
NIH expects that AREA-funded researchers will benefit from the opportunity to conduct independent research; that the institutions will benefit from the support; and that the students will benefit from exposure to and participation in biomedical research.