October 14, 2021
PA-20-183 - NIH Research Project Grant (Parent R01 Clinical Trial Required)
PA-20-185 - NIH Research Project Grant (Parent R01 Clinical Trial Not Allowed)
National Heart, Lung, and Blood Institute (NHLBI)
National Institute on Aging (NIA)
National Institute of Neurological Disorders and Stroke (NINDS)
The purpose of this Notice is to inform potential applicants about an area of special interest to NHLBI, NINDS and NIA in research to understand mechanisms of vascular contributions to cognitive impairment and dementia (VCID) and to develop new approaches for the treatment of VCID.
Background and Research Objectives
This Notice is intended to encourage collaborative and multidisciplinary research to understand VCID, which is defined as the aging neurovascular unit being confronted with and failing to cope with biological insults due to systemic and cerebral vascular disease, proteinopathy including Alzheimer’s biology, metabolic disease, and immune response, resulting in cognitive decline. VCID research overlays multiple clinical diagnoses, including cerebro- and cardio-vascular disease, stroke, AD dementia and other types of dementia, some of which involve neither AD dementia or stroke.
Dementia is a public health crisis and is an umbrella term that describes loss of cognitive function, including thinking, remembering, reasoning, as well as behavioral abilities, that is severe enough to interfere with one’s daily life. Alzheimer’s disease (AD) is the most common clinical dementia diagnosis, but it is increasingly recognized that AD as a clinical syndrome has mixed pathology and multifactorial etiology. Having biomarker evidence of AD is not equivalent of AD clinical syndrome. Individuals with AD pathology (Aβ deposition and pathologic tau) might not develop dementia without underlying vascular dysfunctions or other co-existing conditions. Vascular pathology is frequently part of typical clinical AD. Human pathology findings suggest that over 50% of clinical AD patients have vascular injuries. Because of the mixed pathology and diverse etiology of dementia, a holistic approach with trans-disciplinary research teams would be needed to understand the diverse and overlapping pathologies leading to dementia.
Besides the effects of aging, chronic systemic comorbidities are associated with cognitive outcomes and the common dementia-associated pathologies. NINDS, NIA and NHLBI have shared interests in VCID. As the NIH lead for VCID, NINDS has broad interests in all areas of this topic. NHLBI has particular interest in VCID related to sequelae of heart, lung, blood and sleep disorders. NIA’s interests in VCID are related to Alzheimer’s disease and Alzheimer’s related dementia.
Application and Submission Information
This notice applies to application receipt dates on or after February 5, 2022 and subsequent receipt dates through May 8, 2025.
Submit applications for this initiative using one of the following funding opportunity announcements (FOAs) or any reissues of these announcements.
- PA-20-185 NIH Research Project Grant (Parent R01 Clinical Trial Not Allowed)
- PA-20-183 NIH Research Project Grant (Parent R01 Clinical Trial Required)
Note: NHLBI and NINDS will accept only mechanistic studies that meet the NIH definition of a clinical trial (see NOT-HL-18-662 and NOT-NS-18-011) in response to PA-20-183 NIH Research Project Grant (Parent R01 Clinical Trial Required) and its reissues. For additional information, please see the NHLBI Policy Regarding Submission of Clinical Trial Applications Notice for help in identifying the most appropriate FOA (see NOT-HL-18-611).
All instructions in the SF424 (R&R) Application Guide and the funding opportunity announcement used for submission must be followed, with the following additions:
- For funding consideration, applicants must include “NOT-HL-23-002” (without quotation marks) in the Agency Routing Identifier field (box 4B) of the SF424 R&R form. Applications without this information in box 4B will not be considered for this initiative.
Applications nonresponsive to terms of this NOSI will not be considered for the NOSI initiative.
Scientific/Research Contact(s)
Jue Chen, Ph.D.
National Heart, Lung, and Blood Institute (NHLBI)
Telephone: 301-435-0550
Email:jue.chen@nih.gov
Roderick Corriveau, Ph.D.
National Institute of Neurological Disorders and Stroke (NINDS)
Telephone: 301-496-5680
Email:roderick.corriveau@nih.gov
Miroslaw Mackiewicz, Ph.D.
National Institute on Aging (NIA)
Telephone: 301-496-9350
Email: miroslaw.mackiewicz@nih.gov
Peer Review Contact(s)
Examine your eRA Commons account for review assignment and contact information (information appears two weeks after the submission due date).
Financial/Grants Management Contact(s)
National Heart, Lung, and Blood Institute
Telephone: 301-827-8016
Email: brasilea@nhlbi.nih.gov
Chief Grants Management Officer
National Institute of Neurological Disorders and Stroke (NINDS)
Email:ChiefGrantsManagementOfficer@ninds.nih.gov
Mitchell Whitfield
National Institute on Aging (NIA)
Telephone: 301-402-7700
Email:Mitchell.Whitfield@nih.gov
and Human Services (HHS)
