Archive for July, 2008
July 31, 2008 at 4:24 pm
· Filed under Research News, Tobacco "Research"
You likely know by now that the U.S. House of Representatives passed by a veto-proof margin a bill (H.R. 1108) giving the FDA power to regulate tobacco products. As the NYT notes, “The legislation was partly the result of negotiations with Philip Morris USA, the nation’s largest cigarette company, which split with other companies by endorsing it.” (NYT gives a nice summary of the bill’s provisions that I won’t repeat here.) The other tobacco companies refer to this bill as the “Marlboro Monopoly Act.”
Indeed, Philip Morris spokesman Bill Phelps plainly states that “We remain committed to securing the benefits that legislation would provide for our consumers and stockholders.” Read the rest of this entry »
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July 29, 2008 at 12:51 pm
· Filed under Grantsmanship, NIH Advice
I am shocked – shocked – to read in Nature that the NIH peer review “system fails to account for individual bias, and places undue weight on panel members who have not even read the proposals.”
Valen Johnson, a biostatistician at the University of Texas M.D. Anderson Cancer, proposes use of an innovative statistical model to analyze R01 peer-review ratings in the Proc Natl Acad Sci this week. Using data from CSR reviews of ~19,000 proposals (involving ~14,000 reviewers or 2.8 reviewers per proposal) from 2005, Johnson looked for evaluation trends. Johnson found that “variability inherent to rater scores, and differences in the criteria used by individual raters to assign scores to proposals, have an enormous impact on funding decisions.” As summarized by Nature, Johnson also “found that the top grants were largely unaffected by reader bias, but that such bias did impact grants closer to the funding cut-off line.” Read the rest of this entry »
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July 23, 2008 at 4:37 pm
· Filed under Biomedical Research Ethics
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July 21, 2008 at 12:46 pm
· Filed under Biomedical Research Ethics
Update (more details in comments below): As noted below, Purdue has stripped him of his endowed professorship and limited his role in mentoring graduate students … but forgot to mention this to federal sponsors as well as the Purdue office of sponsored programs, which accepted an NSF award to Taleyarkhan for a project that involves graduate students.
As noted by Inside Higher Ed , The Chronicle of Higher Education, Nature, and Science, third (well, I guess the fourth) time is apparently the charm at Purdue, as demonstrated by this 38-page report investigated and prepared by a panel comprising mainly scientists external to the University.
Read the rest of this entry »
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July 17, 2008 at 1:36 am
· Filed under Grantsmanship, NIH Advice, Research News
According to the NIH Roadmap Website, the Great Zerhouni (via OER) will be issuing a Funding Opportunity Announcement this summer for the Transformative R01 Program (T-R01) “designed to stimulate disruption of existing paradigms or creation of paradigms where none exists” by supporting “highly creative, ‘out-of-the-box’ projects.” Research priorities (“Special Areas of Highlighted Need”) include:
Understanding and Incenting Behavior Change
3-D Tissue Models
Functional Variation in Mitochondria
Transition from Acute to Chronic Pain
Formulation of novel protein capture reagents
Evidence for Pharmacogenomics clinical studies
“Incenting”? Also note that the “T-R01 Program represents a High Risk/High Reward Demonstration Project in which novel approaches to peer review and program management are to be piloted.” In other words, start thinking in 12-page essays.
Update: In fact, start thinking in terms of 12-page transformative essays today. The first T-R01 RFA was just released: Epigenomics of Human Health and Disease with a Sept 28 LOI due date and an Oct 28 receipt date. Details below in a separate comment.
Read the rest of this entry »
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July 6, 2008 at 5:30 pm
· Filed under Grantsmanship, NIH Advice
The July issue of the American Journal of Medicine has an interesting report by Martin et al. that asks “Why Are Peer Review Outcomes Less Favorable for Clinical Science than for Basic Science Grant Applications?“
Jumping ahead, the answer is not entirely satisfying:
“current data suggest that nearly all of the difference in review outcomes for clinical and nonclinical applications is due to a failure to adequately address human subject protection requirements and to a lower rate of submission of competing continuation applications by clinical applicants.”
To arrive at this conclusion, the authors examined CSR-reviewed R01s from Oct 2000 through May 2004 (12 rounds), so a couple years in doubling, a couple years after (though none of the recent lean years). Clinical research applications were those identified as such on the face page (box checked for human subjects involvement). They used the NIH definition for new investigator.
Aggregate data (new & experienced PIs, A0-A1-A2 submissions, Type 1 & Type 2 applications) show that 22.53% of all nonclinical R01s score within the 30th percentile compared with 17.85% of clinical R01s. (correction per Whimple’s comment below)
Conversely (unfortunate strategy for clinical research applicants), 28.3% nonclinical PIs submit Type 2 applications compared with 20% of the clinical PI pool. Thus, the overall success rate of clinical R01s takes a hit due to this lower rate of competing renewals. Read the rest of this entry »
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July 2, 2008 at 1:39 pm
· Filed under Grantsmanship, NIH Advice
Update: The NIH notes the Application Guide is now available for these Adobe-based SF424 pilot FOAs.
The NIH is piloting new Adobe application forms in 3 RFAs with receipt dates in October: RFA-AI-08-020, RFA-DE-09-001 (R01), and RFA-DE-09-002 (R21) (the latter two were originally posted with PureEdge application forms and were reposted on July 1 with the new Adobe forms, which must be used). The SF424 Application Guide for Adobe forms will be available on or before August 1, 2008. Full conversion from PureEdge to Adobe forms is planned for December 2008. A quick summary of the NIH notice on these matters is available from our very helpful friends at NIAID.
In other news (from NIAID), NIH has scheduled the transition to electronic application of the following grant types:
Career development awards (K) — February 12, 2009.
Fellowships (F) — April 8, 2009.
Institutional Training Grants (T) — September 25, 2009.
Still undetermined is the date for moving multiproject grants into the electronic sphere.
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July 1, 2008 at 4:14 pm
· Filed under Funding Opportunities, NIH Advice, NSF Info, Research News
Update: Arlen Spector (R, Penn) & Tom Harkin (D, Iowa) will introduce a bill requesting an additional $5.2 Billion in FY08 supplemental funding for the NIH, of which $1.2 billion will be earmarked for the National Cancer Institute.
From H.R. 2642 (Supplemental Appropriations Act, 2008 – signed into law by our very own Dear Leader on June 30):
For an additional amount for `Office of the Director’, $150,000,000, which shall be transferred to the Institutes and Centers of the National Institutes of Health and to the Common Fund Read the rest of this entry »
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