Award Status Changed From Council Review Completed to Pending

On This Page:

• Overview
• First Level of Review - Scientific Review Groups
  • Peer Review Roles and Coming together Overview
  • Scoring
  • Summary Statement
  • Appeals
• Second Level Of Review - Advisory Council/Lath
• Post-Review

Overview

The core values of peer review drive the NIH to seek the highest level of ethical standards, and form the foundation for the laws, regulations, and policies that govern the NIH peer review procedure. The NIH dual peer review arrangement is mandated by statute in accordance with department 492 of the Public Health Service Act and federal regulations governing "Scientific Peer Review of Enquiry Grant Applications and Research and Development Contract Projects". NIH policy is intended to promote a process whereby grant applications submitted to the NIH are evaluated on the basis of a process that strives to exist off-white, equitable, timely, and gratis of bias.

The start level of review is carried out by a Scientific Review Group (SRG; likewise referred to equally written report sections) equanimous primarily of non-federal scientists who have expertise in relevant scientific disciplines and current research areas.

The 2nd level of review is performed past Found and Centre (IC) National Advisory Councils or Boards. Councils are composed of both scientific and public representatives chosen for their expertise, involvement, or activity in matters related to health and disease.

Only applications that are recommended for blessing past both the SRG and the Advisory Quango may be recommended for funding. Last funding decisions are fabricated by the IC Directors.

Applicants can apply eRA Commons to:

• Find contact information for the assigned program and scientific review officers
• Find review meeting and council meeting dates
• Locate the priority score and summary argument after the application is reviewed

First Level of Review

Initial peer review meetings are administered by either the Middle for Scientific Review (CSR) or one of the NIH ICs with funding authority as specified in the funding opportunity announcement (FOA). A list of CSR study sections , their membership rosters, and the topics reviewed by these written report sections tin exist found on the CSR website.  Applicants may utilize the CSR Assisted Referral Tool (Art) to identify CSR study sections that might be advisable for review of your application.

Each FOA specifies all of the review criteria and considerations that will be used in the evaluation of applications submitted for that FOA. Requests for Applications (RFAs) and sure Program Announcements may include additional review criteria and considerations. Other types of funding opportunities (eastward.grand., for construction or fellowship applications) may utilize different review criteria and considerations (Run into the Review Criteria at a Glance). Unless the FOA specifies otherwise, standard NIH review procedures will be followed, including the NIH scoring system described in Not-OD-09-024.

Peer review meetings are announced in the Federal Annals . The meetings are closed to the public, although some meetings may have an open session; the Federal Register provides the details of each meeting.

A. Peer Review Roles and Coming together Overview

Scientific Review Officer:

Each SRG is led by a Scientific Review Officer (SRO). The SRO is an NIH extramural staff scientist and the designated federal official responsible for ensuring that each application receives an objective and fair initial peer review, and that all applicable laws, regulations, and policies are followed.

SROs:

• Analyze the content of each awarding, and check for completeness.
• Certificate and manage conflicts of interest.
• Recruit qualified reviewers based on scientific and technical qualifications and other considerations, including:
  1. Say-so in their scientific field
  2. Dedication to high quality, off-white, and objective reviews
  3. Power to work collegially in a grouping setting
  4. Experience in research grant review
  5. Counterbalanced representation
• Assign applications to reviewers for critique preparation and assignment of individual criterion scores.
• Nourish and oversee authoritative and regulatory aspects of peer review meetings.
• Prepare summary statements for all applications reviewed.

SRG Members

Chair:

• Serves as moderator of the discussion of scientific and technical merit of the applications under review.
• Too serves as a peer reviewer for the meeting.

Reviewers:

• Declare Conflicts of Interest with specific applications following NIH guidance
  • For details, run into the Managing Disharmonize of Interest in NIH Peer Review of Grants and Contracts folio
• Receive access to the grant applications approximately vi weeks prior to the peer review meeting.
• Ensure they maintain the confidentiality of peer review data (Encounter Integrity and Confidentiality in NIH Peer Review)
• Prepare a written critique (as directed by the Scientific Review Officeholder) for each application assigned, based on review criteria and judgment of merit.
• Assign a numerical score to each scored review criterion (run across Review Criteria at a Glance).
• Brand recommendations concerning the scientific and technical merit of applications under review, in the form of final written comments and numerical scores.
• Make recommendations concerning protections for man subjects; inclusion of women, minorities, and children in clinical research; welfare of vertebrate animals; and other areas equally applicable for the application (see guidance for reviewers on Human Subjects Protection and Inclusion, Man Embryonic Stem Cells, and Vertebrate Animals).
• Brand recommendations apropos appropriateness of budget requests (come across Budget Information for Reviewers).

Other NIH Staff

• Federal officials who have need-to-know or pertinent related responsibilities are permitted to attend closed review meetings.
• NIH Institute/Centre staff or other federal staff members wishing to nourish an SRG meeting must have advance approving from the responsible SRO. These individuals may provide programmatic or grants management input at the SRO's discretion.

Applicants

• Must maintain the integrity of the peer review process by not contacting reviewers to influence the outcome of the review; not sending data directly to a reviewer; and not accessing information related to the review. There are consequences to whatever of these actions (Encounter Integrity and Confidentiality in NIH Peer Review).

B. Peer Review Criteria and Considerations

Review Criteria for Research Grants and Cooperative Agreements (for criteria for other types of grants, similar training grants, please come across Review Criteria at a Glance )

The mission of the NIH is to support science in pursuit of knowledge about the biology and behavior of living systems and to utilize that knowledge to extend salubrious life and reduce affliction and disability. Applications submitted in back up of the NIH mission are evaluated for scientific and technical merit through the NIH peer review arrangement.

Overall Impact: Reviewers will provide an overall touch score to reverberate their assessment of the likelihood for the projection to exert a sustained, powerful influence on the research field(s) involved, in consideration of the following review criteria, and additional review criteria (as applicable for the project proposed).

Scored Review Criteria

• Significance
• Investigator(due south)
• Innovation
• Approach
• Environment

Additional Review Criteria. Every bit applicable for the projection proposed, reviewers will evaluate the following additional items while determining scientific and technical merit and in providing an overall impact score, but volition not give separate scores for these items.

• Report Timeline (specific to applications involving clinical trials)
• Protections for Homo Subjects
• Inclusion of Women, Minorities, and Children
• Vertebrate Animals
• Biohazards
• Resubmission
• Renewal
• Revision

Additional Review Considerations. As applicable for the project proposed, reviewers will consider each of the following items, merely will not requite scores for these items and should not consider them in providing an overall touch score.

• Applications from Strange Organizations
• Select Agent
• Resource Sharing Plans
• Authentication of Key Biological and/or Chemical Resource
• Budget and Menses Support

C. Scoring

The NIH utilizes a nine-point rating scale (1 = exceptional; 9 = poor) for all applications; the same scale is used for overall impact scores and for criterion scores (Scoring Guidance).
Before the SRG meeting, each reviewer assigned to an application gives a dissever score for each of (at least) five review criteria (i.e., Significance, Investigator(southward), Innovation, Approach, and Environment for inquiry grants and cooperative agreements; see Review Criteria at a Glance). For all applications the individual scores of the assigned reviewers and discussant(s) for these criteria are reported to the applicant.

In improver, each reviewer assigned to an application gives a preliminary overall bear upon score for that awarding. In many review meetings, the preliminary scores are used to determine which applications volition be discussed in full at the meeting. For each application that is discussed at the meeting, a final impact score is given past each eligible commission member (without conflicts of involvement) including the assigned reviewers. Each member's score reflects his/her evaluation of the overall touch on that the project is likely to have on the research field(s) involved.

The final overall impact score for each discussed application is determined by computing the hateful score from all the eligible members' final touch scores, and multiplying the average by 10; the terminal overall impact score is reported on the summary argument. Thus, the last overall impact scores range from 10 (high touch) through xc (low impact). Numerical impact scores are not reported for applications that are not discussed (ND), which may be reported every bit ++ on the face up page of the summary statement and typically rank in the bottom half of the applications.

Applicants simply receiving their scores or summary statements should consult our Next Steps page for detailed guidance. Applicants seeking advice beyond that available online may desire to contact the NIH Plan Official listed at the top of the summary argument.

An awarding may be designated Not Recommended for Farther Consideration (NRFC) by the SRG if it lacks significant and substantial merit; presents serious ethical problems in the protection of human subjects from research risks; or presents serious ethical problems in the use of vertebrate animals, biohazards, and/or select agents. Applications designated equally NRFC practice not proceed to the second level of peer review (National Informational Council/Lath) considering they cannot be funded.

D. Summary Statement

Applications that are not discussed at the coming together volition be given the designation "ND" (which may exist reported as ++ on the face folio of the summary statement) as an overall bear on score, but the applicant, every bit well as NIH staff, will see the written comments and scores from the assigned reviewers and discussants for each of the scored review criteria as feedback on their summary statement.

Understanding the Percentile

• A percentile is the approximate percent of applications that received a meliorate overall impact score from the study section during the past yr (see blog on Paylines, Percentiles and Success Rates ).
• For applications reviewed in ad hoc written report sections, a different base of operations may exist used to calculate percentiles.
• All percentiles are reported as whole numbers.
• Only a subset of all applications receive percentiles. The types of applications that are percentiled vary across unlike NIH Institutes and Centers.
• The summary statement will place the base that was used to determine the percentile.

E. Appeals

NIH established a peer review appeal system (meet NOT-OD-11-064) to provide investigators and applicant organizations the opportunity to seek reconsideration of the initial review results if, afterwards consideration of the summary argument, they believe the review process was flawed for reasons of either bias of a reviewer, disharmonize of interest, absence of advisable expertise, or factual errors by one or more reviewers that could accept substantially contradistinct the review outcome. This policy does non utilize to appeals of the technical evaluation of R&D contract projects through the NIH peer review process, appeals of NIH funding decisions, or appeals of decisions apropos extensions of MERIT honor.

2nd Level of Review - Informational Council or Lath

Who Reviews the Application?

The Advisory Council/Board of the potential awarding Plant/Middle performs the 2nd level of review (See Advisory Councils or Boards page). Advisory Councils/Boards are composed of scientists from the extramural enquiry community and public representatives (NIH Federal Advisory Committee Data ). Members are called by the respective IC and are approved by the Department of Health and Homo Services. For certain committees, members are appointed by the President of the United States.

Recommendation Process

• NIH program staff members examine applications and consider the overall impact scores given during the peer review process, percentile rankings (if applicable) and the summary statements in light of the Establish/Center's priorities.
• Program staff provide a grant-funding plan to the Advisory Board/Council. Council members take access to applications and summary statements pending funding for that IC in that council round.
• Council members conduct a Special Council Review of grant applications from investigators who currently receive $i meg or more in direct costs of NIH funding to support Research Project Grants (see Non-OD-12-140). This additional review is to make up one's mind if additional funds should be provided to already well-supported investigators and does non represent a cap on NIH funding.
• The Advisory Quango/Board also considers the Establish/Center's goals and needs and advises the Plant/Center director concerning funding decisions.
• The Institute/Eye director makes final funding decisions based on staff and Advisory Quango/Board communication.

Post-Review

Not Funded - Next Steps ?

The NIH receives thousands of applications for each application receipt circular and contest for funding tin can exist fierce. If the original application is not funded, applicants may resubmit the application, making changes that address reviewer concerns, or they may submit a new awarding. One time an applicant receives a summary statement, they are directed to information on Next Steps, and they may contact the NIH program official assigned to their application for guidance.

Fundable Score - Side by side Steps?

Some of the ICs publish paylines as part of their funding strategies to guide applicants on their likelihood of receiving funding. Awarding scores can only exist compared against the payline for the fiscal year when the awarding will be considered for funding, which is not necessarily the year when it was submitted. There may be a delay of several months to determine paylines at the beginning of fiscal years. If the application is assigned to an IC that does non announce a payline, the program official listed at the top of the summary statement may be able to provide guidance on the likelihood of funding. After the Informational Council coming together, if an application results in an accolade, the bidder will be working closely with the programme official of the funding Institute or Center on scientific and programmatic matters and a Grants Management Officer on budgetary or administrative issues. The Grants Direction Specialist will contact the applicant to collect information needed to prepare the award.

How to Volunteer to Be a Reviewer
For those interested in volunteering on NIH review panels, delight see:

• Becoming a Peer Reviewer page

Those interested in becoming a reviewer for a specific NIH IC should browse the individual IC websites for information on contacting SROs at the ICs.

More than Details

For more than details near Peer Review, visit Peer Review Policies & Practices.

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Source: https://grants.nih.gov/grants/peer-review.htm

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