The National Center for Advancing Translational Sciences (NCATS) informs Program Directors/Principal Investigators (PDs/PIs) holding active Rare Diseases Clinical Research Consortia (RDCRC) for the Rare Diseases Clinical Research Network (RDCRN) (U54) awards of the opportunity to submit administrative supplement requests through the NIH Parent Funding Opportunity Announcement (FOA), PA-18-591, “Administrative Supplements to Existing NIH Grants and Cooperative Agreements (Parent Admin Supp Clinical Trial Optional)”.

These supplements may provide short-term and/or catalytic support for projects with a significant and unmet needs. Applicants for the administrative supplements are encouraged to form new collaborations to enhance the reach and impact of the activity. Administrative supplements must add value to the science proposed in the aims of the original project; as such, they must be within the scientific scope of the parent grant. Enthusiasm will be higher for requests that describe a clear outcome and that have the potential for greatest impact across the RDCRN and these outcomes will be subsequently distributed or shared throughout the consortium.

The RDCRN Program has also identified specific areas of interest in accordance with its aim to advance the diagnosis, management, and treatment of rare diseases with a focus on clinical trial readiness. The RDCRN priority research areas that would be appropriate for requests for supplemental funding include, but are not limited to, the topics listed here:

• Methods to accelerate diagnosis
• Genomic analysis/characterization, interpretation (e.g., Gene Curation leveraging ClinGen resources)
• Novel precision or personalized approaches to treatment
• Outreach to increase research participant diversity
• Addressing health disparities
• Expanding focus on women’s health
• Expanding focus on mental health issues
• Expanding age range of research participants
• Evolving technologies (e.g., remote data capture, augmented reality) to facilitate the assessment, management and treatment of rare diseases.
• Trans-network research on common interests (e.g., shared molecular etiologies, research or data collections approaches)

Administrative supplement requests for support of clinical trials will not be accepted and/or considered in response to this funding opportunity announcement.

Applications should demonstrate how the supplement can be completed within the project period. As applicable, the proposed research effort should be supported by a strong rationale and should contribute to advancing translational sciences.

Applicants are strongly encouraged to discuss these potential requests with their Program Official listed in the Notice of Grant Award of the parent grant.

Award Project Period

Administrative supplements are limited to 12 months.

Budget and Available Funds

Supplement budget requests may not exceed $150,000 per year direct costs and must reflect actual needs of the proposed project. There is no guarantee that funds are available from NCATS or for any specific grant.

Application and Submission Information

Eligible Individuals (Program Director/Principal Investigator)

Applicants must hold an active RDCRN award: only parent RDCRN cooperative agreement awards funded through the following FOA (and any reissues of this announcement) are eligible to request supplemental funding under this NOSI:

• RFA-TR-18-020: Rare Diseases Clinical Research Consortia (RDCRC) for the Rare Diseases Clinical Research Network (RDCRN) (U54 Clinical Trial Optional)

For supplements to parent awards that include multiple PDs/PIs, the supplement may be requested by any or all of the PDs/PIs (in accordance with the existing leadership plan) and must be submitted by the awardee institution of the parent award.

Submitting an Application

Applications for this initiative must be submitted using the following opportunity or its subsequent reissued equivalent.

• PA-18-591 - Administrative Supplements to Existing NIH Grants and Cooperative Agreements (Parent Admin Supp Clinical Trial Optional)

All instructions in the SF424 (R&R) Application Guide and PA-18-591 must be followed, with the following additions:

• For funding consideration, applicants must include “NOT-TR-20-006” (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.
• To facilitate efficient processing of the request, applicants are strongly encouraged to notify Tiina Urv (urvtiin@mail.nih.gov), as well as the assigned IC program officer and IC grants management specialist for the parent award that a request has been submitted in response to this NOSI.
• The Research Strategy section of the application is limited to 6 pages.
• Applicant organizations may submit only one application per fiscal year to this NOSI.
• The process for Streamlined Submissions using the eRA Commons cannot be used for this initiative.
• All applications must be submitted electronically using a single-project application form package. Please note, that for single and multi-project applications applicants must use the form package with the Competition ID of “FORMS-E-ADMINSUPP-RESEARCH". Use one of the methods described in PA-18-591. Paper submissions and applications submitted as attachments will be returned.
• Application Due Date April 1, 2020; April 1, 2021; and April 1, 2022, by 5:00 PM local time of applicant organization.