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2009 FREA Application Guidelines
Eligibility
Tenured or tenure-earning FIU faculty
Faculty with federal and/or
private foundation funds totaling $50,000 or more
are NOT
eligible to apply for a Faculty Research Enhancement
Award..
Award Limitations
1. Each faculty member is limited to one application
submission per
year.
2. Each award will be up to a maximum of $10,000 (direct
costs)
3. Funds may be requested for any scientifically justifiable
budget category (e.g., chemical and biological supplies,
OPS, sequencing charges, purchase and maintenance of
animals, etc) with the following
exceptions:
Faculty salary
Tuition fees
Travel
Equipment/Instrument (costing
$1000 or more)
Service contracts
Consultants
Books/Journal subscriptions
4. Project must be completed and funds must
be spent within the 12 month of the award and a report
submitted to the ABR Office.
Instructions
Read and follow the instructions carefully.
Prepare the application using PHS 398 Forms (as listed
below) and follow NIH guidelines with respect to font type,
size, spacing and page margins. Downloadable Instructions
and Form Files for PHS 398 (Revised 11/2007) can be obtained
at http://grants.nih.gov/grants/funding/phs398/phs398.html
Do not exceed the page limitations set for
FREA applications (see below) which differ from those set
for a regular PHS 398 application.
The
FREA application must be complete and include the following:
Form
Page 1: Face Page
Form Page 2: Summary
Form Page 3: Research Grant Table of
Contents
Form Page 4: Detailed Budget for Initial
Budget Period
Form Page 5: Budget for Entire Proposed
Project Period
Biographical Sketch Format Page
Resources Format Page
Checklist Form Page
Personal Data Form Page
Research Plan: Continuation Format Page
(Do not exceed 15 pages for the
four sections)
Specific Aim(s) [1 page]
Background and Significance [2 3
pages]
Preliminary Studies (if available)
[2 3 pages]
Research Design and Methods
Human Subjects, Use of Animals, Biohazards
Bibliography
Targeted/Planned Enrollment Table Format
Page (if applicable)
Inclusion Enrollment Report Format Page (if
applicable)
Other Support Format Page:
Senior/key Personnel Report Format Page
Appendix: A copy of the Approval statement
from IACUC and/or IRB for projects involving vertebrate
animals and/or human subjects, respectively.
FREA applications must be submitted to the
ABR office electronically (abr@fiu.edu or smiths@fiu.edu
) as a single file WORD attachment containing all the
necessary forms and sections as outlined above.
Abstract/Summary:
Choose
a specifically descriptive title. Limit abstract to the
space designated. The abstract should contain a statement of
objectives (specific aims), methods to be employed and the
biomedical significance of the proposed research. State
briefly the hypothesis to be tested and what the proposed
research intends to accomplish for the duration of the
award. Provide a summary of the research plan and the
methods to be employed.
Budget :
Limited to $10,000 (direct costs).
Indicate your effort on the
proposed project
Justify all budget requests in the
various categories, e.g., personnel (what their role
will be on the project), equipment, animals etc.
Only equipment/instruments costing less than $1,000
can be included in the budget. If requesting support
for an OPS position, employment cannot extend beyond
the 12 month period of the award.
The award can be used to purchase
supplies such as animal food, reagents, biologicals,
chemicals, glassware, etc. It can also be used for
sequencing charges, and to cover incidentals such as
duplicating costs related to the project.
The award may NOT be used for
travel, tuition fees or faculty salary.
Research Plan .
A full discussion on developing the research
plan can be found at http://grants.nih.gov/grants/writing_application.htm#developPlan.
Excerpts from that document are provided for your
convenience. For a FREA application
you may not exceed 15 pages for the four sections of
the pilot project applicationSpecific Aims (1 page),
Background/Significance (2 to 3 pages), Preliminary studies
(2 to 3 pages), Research Design and Methods; however, there
is no requirement that all pages allotted be used.
The
research plan component of the application should include
the following four sections:
Specific Aims :
What you plan to do, i.e., what you intend to accomplish?
NIH normally does not fund "fishing
expeditions", however, as the FREA program is intended to
generate preliminary data or facilitate a new exploratory
approach, a certain degree of "fishing" can be proposed.
However, it is to your advantage to show feasibility. State
the hypothesis to be tested or the specific question(s) that
will be addressed. Avoid descriptive aims.
The purpose of the Specific Aims section is
to clearly and concisely describe what the proposed research
is intended to accomplish. List your aims and then all the
experiments youll do to support each aim. Keep in mind that
your experiments support your aims, and your aims are the
test of your hypothesis. A strong grant application is
driven by a strong, solid hypothesis with clear research
objectives. You may also want to make a brief statement
concerning the innovation of your proposed research.
Specific aims should:
Include specific research
objectives
Be hypothesis-based
Be obtainable within the
proposed timeframe
Fit together in an overall
framework
Be well-focused rather than
broad and diffuse
Limited to one page.
Background and Significance :
What has already been done in the field. Why is the work
important? Include a critical evaluation and review of
existing knowledge in the field. Identify the gaps the
proposed research intends to fill. This section should
describe the literature, support your views and hypothesis
while also noting any scientific controversies in the field.
Make sure that key references are identified..
Critically evaluate existing knowledge that
leads to your pilot project, and specifically identify the
gaps that the project is intended to fill. Explain why the
literature about your research leads you to think this topic
needs study. Provide information that directly pertains to
the scientific need for your project and explicitly state
the significance of the research and if the aims of the
project are achieved what the payoff to biomedical or
behavioral sciences and (if applicable) to public health
might be? In this section:
Show that you have critically
evaluated existing knowledge, including
background literature and relevant data.
Include references that
reflect up-to-date knowledge of the field
Specify existing gaps that the
project is intended to fill
Identify controversies that
the project is designed to resolve
Conveys the importance and
relevance of the research aims
Highlight potential impacts
Address how research results
can be applied
Preliminary Studies :
What you have already done on the proposed project.
Although the goal of a pilot project or
feasibility study is to collect data to support a "full"
research grant application, pilot project PIs should not
omit this section. Use this section to support your
hypothesis and the future direction of your research, and to
show your expertise and knowledge of the experimental
approach, methods, data collection and analyses to be employed in your project.
"Preliminary" data relevant to the pilot project may consist
of your own publications in the field, publications of other
researchers, unpublished data from your own laboratory or
others, or a combination of these. This section of the
application is intended to establish the PIs experience and
competence to pursue the study and the likelihood of
success. If you do not have the required expertise for a
scientific methodology, enlist a mentor or consultant and
include a letter of support or agreement in the Appendix of
the application. Thus
Discuss how previous work
leads to the current proposal
Emphasize how the previous
work demonstrates feasibility of proposed
methods
Research Design and Methods :
How you will fulfill Aim(s), how you will do the work.
Methods must relate to Specific Aim(s). For
clarity, number the research design to correspond to the
numbers of Specific Aims. Be clear about the methods and
experimental design you will use. Be clear in describing the
experimental details of your proposal. Avoid proposing
experiments based on general observations. This section is
critical for demonstrating that the applicant has developed
a clear, organized and thoughtful study design that tests
the central hypothesis and is not a list of recipes for
methods, experiments and data collection. Describe any novel
concepts, approaches, tools, or technologies for the
proposed pilot project. Discuss the potential difficulties
and limitations of the proposed procedures and alternative
approaches to achieve the aims. Provide a tentative sequence
or timetable for the project (keep in mind that the award is
only for 12 months. The methods section should
Provide an overview of the
proposed design and conceptual framework
Include details related to
specific methodology; explain why the proposed
methods are the best to accomplish the study
goals
Describe any novel concepts,
approaches, tools or techniques
Include details of how data
will be collected and the results analyzed
Consider required statistical
techniques
Include proposed work plan and
timeline
Consider and discuss potential
limitations and alternative approaches to
achieve study aims
Bibliography :
Provide a bibliography of any references cited in the
Research Plan. Each reference must include the names of all
authors (in the same sequence in which they appear in the
publication), the article and journal title, book title,
volume number, page numbers, and year of publication.
Appendix Materials :
Do not include in the Appendix essential information that
should be within the body of the grant application. The
appendices should contain supportive or supplemental
information such as letters of support or commitment from
collaborators, and if applicable, IRB approvals, sample
consent forms, IACUC approvals as appropriate, etc. Letters
of commitment should clearly spell out the roles of the
collaborators.
Human Subjects: If the research will
include human subjects, describe the criteria for
participant inclusion in the research and the protections
put in place to protect the participants from research risks
as well as the recruitment and data collection schedule.
Use of Animals :
Describe how the animals are housed. Also indicate when the
animal protocol was reviewed and approved as well as the
reviewer of the protocol. Confirm that your institution has
an Animal Welfare Assurance on file with the Office of
Laboratory Animal Welfare and provide the assurance number
and effective dates of the assurance.
All projects that involve animals or human
subjects must be reviewed by the Institutional Animal Care
and Use Committee and Institutional Review Board
respectively; and a copy of the approval, on the
institutions letterhead, must be submitted with the
application.
Biohazards :
Identify any select agents to be used in the proposed
research and describe institutional procedures for the safe
handling and disposal of such agents. Also describe the
training that is provided for individuals that handle select
agents. (Select agents are hazardous biological agents and
toxins that Health and Human Services or the US Department
of Agriculture has identified as having the potential to
pose a severe threat to public health and safety, to animal
and plant health, or to animal and plant products.) CDC
maintains a list of HHS and USDA Select Agents and toxins.
(http://www.cdc.gov/od/sap/docs/salist.pdf)
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