FY 1999 FUNDING AND OPERATING GUIDELINES

National Heart, Lung, and Blood Institute
National Institutes of Health

Archive Edition

Funding and Operating Guidelines
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GOALS

The NHLBI will continue to apply National Institutes of Health (NIH) cost management guidelines in making Research Project Grant (RPG) awards.

FUNDING AND OPERATING GUIDELINES

The NHLBI will use the following guidelines for funding RPGs:

New (Type 1) Research Project and Program Project Grants:

•The Institute will award the Council recommended level except for specific programmatic and administrative adjustments.

Competing Renewal (Type 2) Research Project and Merit Extension (Type 4) Awards:

•The Institute will award the Council recommended level, or 10 percent more than the amount of recurring direct costs awarded for the last year of the preceding project period, whichever is less, except for specific programmatic and administrative adjustments. One time equipment costs will be added to the renewal award above the 10 percent increase.

•If the proposed award is to result in a reduction greater than 25 percent from Council recommended level, the NHLBI program staff will contact the principal investigator and the applicant institution before an award is processed to obtain: EITHER (a) a statement that the project can be accomplished with the proposed level of support, OR (b) a revised statement of aims and a revised budget for the planned award level.

•First Independent Research and Transition (FIRST) awards that are ending their initial project period and are competing for renewal as regular research grants are considered new (Type 1) grants for funding purposes and therefore are not subject to the 10% limitation for Type 2 awards.

Competing Renewal (Type 2) Program Project Grants:

•The Institute will award the Council recommended level except for specific programmatic and administrative adjustments. The Fiscal Year 1999 guidelines for Program Project Grants allowed the applicant to request either (a) 10 percent more than the amount of recurring direct costs awarded for the last year of the preceding project period, or (b) $1,140,000, whichever is greater. Facilities and administrative costs (indirect costs) on subcontracts are excluded from these calculations.

Noncompeting Renewal (Type 5) Grant:

•The Institute intends to award the level for FY 1999 as shown on the last award notice, except for specifically identified programmatic adjustments such as unobligated balances and overlapping support. Future year commitments on these awards will continue to increase 4 percent annually for competing awards made prior to FY 1997 and 3 percent annually for competing awards made in FY 1997 and thereafter.

Future Year Commitments on FY 1999 new and competing renewal awards :

Generally, future year commitments listed on the Notice of Grant Award will reflect an annual 3 percent escalation over the previous year, or the Council recommended amount for a given year, whichever is less. The Institute may adjust this amount for programmatic needs in selected cases.

General Guidance:

•The Institute is likely to identify certain categories of grants as appropriate for programmatic adjustments, such as some clinical trials and population-based studies. However, programmatic adjustments will be the exception rather than the rule.

•The Institute will award in full, and earmark as such, any portion of a research project grant that constitutes a minority supplement, a supplement to an investigator with a disability, or a workforce re-entry supplement. However, the guidelines above will be applied to the remainder of the grant. All future year commitment levels will show total cost, which is the sum of direct, and facilities and administrative (indirect) costs.

SET ASIDE FOR PROGRAM PROJECTS

Within the amount available for competing research project grants, the Institute will continue to set aside funds for program project grants. The set aside amount, which is related to past levels of support, is designed to achieve stability of support for this mechanism. In addition, the Institute will review the priority score assigned to each subproject, and its relationship to the overall program project, when making funding decisions.

DURATION OF GRANTS

To achieve an average length of four years, the NHLBI will calculate the average length of research project grants awarded at each Council. To reach the average length of four years, the Institute will reduce research project grants recommended for five years to four years beginning with those grants with the least favorable percentile scores and continuing to those with the most favorable percentile scores. The four year average length is currently reached at a percentile of 6.1. With this approach grants recommended for 4 years will not be reduced to 3 years by the Institute. Please note that Small Business Innovation Research (SBIR and STTR) awards are excluded from this calculation.