Key Dates

Related Announcements

• August 01, 2023 - Secondary Analysis and Integration of Existing Data to Elucidate Cancer Risk and Related Outcomes (R01 Clinical Trial Not Allowed). See NOFO PAR-23-254.
• August 01, 2023 - Secondary Analysis and Integration of Existing Data to Elucidate Cancer Risk and Related Outcomes (R21 Clinical Trials Not Allowed). See NOFO PAR-23-255.
• January 9, 2023 - Notice of Guidance for Data Management and Sharing Plans for the National Institute of Alcohol Abuse and Alcoholism (NIAAA). See Notice NOT-AA-23-001.
• January 9, 2023 - Notice of NIAAA Data-Sharing Information for Human Subjects Grants Research Funded by the National Institute on Alcohol Abuse and Alcoholism (NIAAA) [5th Revision]. See Notice NOT-AA-23-002.
• December 05, 2022 - NCI Small Grants Program for Cancer Research for Years 2023, 2024, and 2025 (NCI Omnibus) (R03 Clinical Trial Optional). See NOFO PAR-23-058.
• November 23, 2022 - Pragmatic Trials across the Cancer Control Continuum (UG3/UH3 Clinical Trial Required). See NOFO PAR-22-256.
• September 01, 2022 - Time-Sensitive Opportunities for Health Research (R61/R33 Clinical Trial Not Allowed). See NOFO PAR-22-233.
• June 13, 2022 - Innovative Approaches to Studying Cancer Communication in the New Information Ecosystem (R01 Clinical Trial Optional). See NOFO PAR-22-164.
• June 13, 2022 - Innovative Approaches to Studying Cancer Communication in the New Information Ecosystem (R21 Clinical Trial Optional). See NOFO PAR-22-165.
• November 22, 2021 - Measures and Methods to Advance Research on Minority Health and Health Disparities-Related Constructs (R01 Clinical Trial Not Allowed). See NOFO PAR-22-072.
• October 12, 2021 - Exploratory Grants in Cancer Control (R21 Clinical Trial Optional). See NOFO PAR-21-341. 
• March 12, 2021 - Modular R01s in Cancer Control and Population Sciences (R01 Clinical Trial Optional). See NOFO PAR-21-190.
• November 12, 2020 - Cancer Prevention and Control Clinical Trials Grant Program (R01 Clinical Trial Required). See NOFO PAR-21-035.
• October 29, 2020 - Supplemental Information to the NIH Policy for Data Management and Sharing: Elements of an NIH Data Management and Sharing Plan. See Notice NOT-OD-21-014.
• July 13, 2020 - Notice of Special Interest: Epidemiology and Prevention in Alcohol Research. See NOSI NOT-AA-20-017.
• May 07, 2020 - NIH Small Research Grant Program (Parent R03 Clinical Trial Not Allowed). See NOFO PA-20-200.
• May 07, 2020 - NIH Exploratory/Developmental Research Grant Program (Parent R21 Clinical Trial Required). See NOFO PA-20-194.
• May 07, 2020 - NIH Exploratory/Developmental Research Grant Program (Parent R21 Clinical Trial Not Allowed). See NOFO PA-20-195.
• May 07, 2020 - NIH Exploratory/Developmental Research Grant Program (Parent R21 Basic Experimental Studies with Humans Required). See NOFO PA-20-196.
• May 05, 2020 - NIH Research Project Grant (Parent R01 Clinical Trial Required). See NOFO PA-20-183.
• May 05, 2020 - NIH Research Project Grant (Parent R01 Clinical Trial Not Allowed). See NOFO PA-20-185.
• May 05, 2020 - NIH Research Project Grant (Parent R01 Basic Experimental Studies with Humans Required). See NOFO PA-20-184.

Issued by

National Institute on Alcohol Abuse and Alcoholism (NIAAA)

National Cancer Institute (NCI)

Purpose

The purpose of this Notice of Special Interest (NOSI) is to solicit applications to advance basic, applied, translational, and methodological research on the epidemiology and prevention of hazardous alcohol consumption and related behaviors, alcohol use disorder, alcohol-related mortality and morbidity, and other alcohol-related problems and consequences. 

Background

Advancing knowledge about the epidemiology of alcohol use is fundamental to improving the public health. One prominent objective is to better understand the heterogeneity in developmental trajectories of alcohol use, risky drinking, and alcohol use disorders. We know that people who initiate alcohol use at younger ages are more likely to develop alcohol use disorders. However, much is unknown about the chain of events between early initiation, episodic excessive drinking, frequent heavy drinking, and the development of an alcohol use disorder. Much is also unknown about how the various risk and protective factors at the micro- and macro-levels at different stages of life interact with each other. 

Research is needed to address gaps in existing knowledge and scale up effective prevention programs. It is also needed to investigate emerging trends (e.g., increase in deaths from alcohol-associated liver disease, increase in women’s alcohol use and related harms, and upward trends in drinking among older adults as the Baby Boomer cohort ages) and develop prevention and intervention strategies at the various or multiple levels (individual, interpersonal, community, societal) to counteract them.

The salience of specific risk and protective factors varies over the life course, as well as by biological sex, gender identity, race, ethnicity, and socioeconomic status. Consequently, prevention strategies can be tailored to optimize effectiveness for a particular target group or a particular life stage.

The outcomes targeted by prevention interventions are various. Some seek to reduce early onset, binge drinking, high-intensity drinking, and alcohol use disorders. Others target health conditions including hepatic disease, cardiovascular disease, and cancer. Others target overdose, unintentional injuries (e.g., traffic crashes and falls), interpersonal violence, or suicide. The whole matrix of risk and protective factors by alcohol-related outcomes describes a rich set of potential interventions that can be developed and targeted.

Specific Areas of Research Interest

National Institute on Alcohol Abuse and Alcoholism (NIAAA)

Given these considerations, this NOSI encourages studies that address NIAAA's priorities in epidemiology and prevention research, including, but not limited to, the following:

• Use a life course approach to examine the interplay of alcohol use and other risk and protective factors at micro- and macro-levels, from preconception to older adulthood, and across generations, that leads to alcohol misuse and related consequences as well as disabilities, mental health conditions, cancer and other chronic diseases, and premature or accelerated aging. Develop and evaluate methods to examine time-varying drinking patterns at different life stages and across the life course and evaluate the effects of alcohol exposure during particular windows of susceptibility.
• Use systems science methods to model the complex, dynamic interactions of multiple factors that influence drinking behaviors and that lead to alcohol-related harms. Use such models to conduct in silico experiments of interventions to prevent or reduce adverse consequences associated with alcohol consumption.
• Develop and evaluate prevention and intervention strategies tailored for developmental periods and specific populations (e.g., individuals with a disability and/or mental health conditions, and NIH-designated U.S. health disparity populations, including racial and ethnic minority groups, people with lower socioeconomic status, underserved rural communities, and sexual and gender minority groups) when universal approaches are less effective.
• Advance understanding of sex and gender influences in alcohol misuse. Develop and evaluate novel strategies to reduce alcohol misuse among females across the lifespan, e.g., in adolescent girls and pregnant and breastfeeding people.
• Advance prevention of fetal alcohol spectrum disorders and reduce consequences of prenatal alcohol exposure for individuals and families.
• Develop and evaluate strategies to prevent underage drinking and associated adverse consequences.
• Develop and evaluate strategies to prevent and reduce harmful alcohol use among young adults, in college and non-college enrolled, especially those in the military and the civilian work force and other less studied populations.
• Identify coping strategies specific to cultural stress and determine which coping strategies ameliorate or exacerbate the capacity for cultural stress to potentiate alcohol use among underage populations and young adults.
• Understand how subjective response to alcohol and craving change during the developmentally-critical period of adolescence and young adulthood. Understand factors compelling youth and young adults to progress from initial alcohol use to harmful use to alcohol use disorder.
• Identify the factors driving high-intensity drinking and evaluate strategies to reduce its prevalence.
• Understand the nature and extent of harms that misuse of alcohol imposes on others and evaluate interventions to prevent or reduce such harms.
• Develop and evaluate interventions to facilitate positive changes in health and behavior in an aging population, such as promoting drinking reduction or abstention, increasing awareness of alcohol’s health effects and common alcohol-interactive medications, and increasing health care access and quality such as treatment for alcohol-related problems and screening and management of chronic conditions.
• Advance alcohol screening, brief intervention, and referral to treatment/prevention (ASBIRT/P) and its implementation. Improve effectiveness and address research gaps (e.g., ASBI in adolescents in primary care and pediatric emergency departments, co-occurring alcohol and other substance use, and comorbid conditions such as post-traumatic stress disorder and depression).
• Design and evaluate novel strategies to improve adoption, implementation, and sustainability of ASBI in healthcare, community-based, and other settings and its modifications that address co-occurring conditions.
• Study the effect of public policy and other societal-level strategies on alcohol use, other substance use, and alcohol related harms at the various levels.
• Advance understanding of the role of advertising, marketing, counter-marketing, and warning labels on alcohol use and related outcomes in relevant population subgroups.
• Study the effects/role physical activity plays in the prevention or initiation of alcohol use.
• Examine risk and protective factors and harms associated with concurrent or simultaneous use of alcohol with other substances, such as tobacco and nicotine (including vaping), cannabis, opioids (including fentanyl), and other drugs. Identify and evaluate strategies to prevent adverse consequences associated with co-use of alcohol and other substances.
• Examine the linkages between alcohol misuse and various health conditions, both mental and somatic, and develop and evaluate interventions targeting common factors and sharing biopsychosocial pathways of multimorbidity to increase intervention effectiveness and improve health and well-being.
• Further the development, validation, use and implementation of ecological momentary assessment and other techniques for measuring drinking patterns, testing or refining etiology models, and developing and evaluating in-the-moment prevention.
• Leverage wearable biosensors, digital technologies (including virtual reality), and data science (including artificial intelligence, machine learning, and natural language processing) to advance alcohol epidemiology and prevention research. Assess the balance of risks and benefits. Integrate ethics into the design, such as privacy protection, data security, consent, model equity and interpretability, accountability, and respecting participant autonomy.
• Expand understanding of the role of social determinants of health, root causes of health disparities, and the utility or influence of gamification, social media, or mass media in the etiology, prevention, diagnosis, and treatment of and recovery from alcohol-related problems, including alcohol use disorder, across the lifespan.
• Expand understanding how to use social media to disseminate messages on prevention of alcohol misuse and related consequences. 

National Cancer Institute (NCI)

NCI-specific areas of programmatic interest include, but are not limited to:

• Epidemiology and etiology of alcohol and cancer incidence and mortality.
• Epidemiology and etiology of co-use of alcohol and other substances, particularly tobacco.
• Epidemiological and etiological studies addressing the effects of reducing alcohol use on cancer risk.
• Improving measurement and methods to assess alcohol use over the life course for epidemiological studies: for example, to develop and evaluate assessment tools (including digital technologies and ecological momentary assessment) and develop and evaluate methods to examine time-varying drinking patterns at different life stages and across the life course.
• Population level efforts to address alcohol use for cancer prevention and control.
• Develop and evaluate interventions among adult cancer survivors to promote drinking reduction or abstention, increasing awareness of alcohol’s effects on cancer, and increasing alcohol risk reduction in cancer care.
• Develop and evaluate strategies to prevent and reduce harmful alcohol use among adolescent and young adult cancer survivors.
• Efforts to understand and address the role of alcohol in cancer related health disparities involving individuals with disabilities, mental health conditions, and NIH-designated U.S. health disparity populations, including racial and ethnic minority groups, people with lower socioeconomic status, underserved rural communities, and sexual and gender minority groups.

Application and Submission Information

 Applicants must select the IC and associated notice of funding opportunity (NOFO)  to use for submission of an application in response to this NOSI.  Applicants using NIH Parent Announcements (listed below) will be assigned to those ICs on this NOSI that have indicated those NOFOs are acceptable and based on usual application-IC assignment practices.

This notice applies to due dates on or after October 5, 2023 and subsequent receipt dates through September 6, 2026. 

Submit applications for this initiative using one of the following NOFOs or any reissues of these announcements through the expiration date of this notice.

All instructions in the SF424 (R&R) Application Guide and the NOFO used for submission must be followed, with the following additions:

• For funding consideration, applicants must include “NOT-AA-23-018” (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 submitted to NIAAA are expected to adhere to NIAAA’s expectations for Data Management and Sharing Plans. As described in  NOT-AA-23-001, NIAAA expects specific information in the Data Management and Sharing Plan (DMS Plan) to be included in NIAAA grant applications for due dates on or after January 25, 2023. In addition to the general NIH guidance regarding the information to include in the DMS Plan (NOT-OD-21-014, Supplemental Information to the NIH Policy for Data Management and Sharing: Elements of an NIH Data Management and Sharing Plan, and the NIH Data Management and Sharing Plan format page), NIAAA expects that the DMS Plan elements contain the following specific information:

Elements of the Data Management and Sharing Plan

Data Type:

This section should include details about the research subject, including species, sex, and cohort size. If specimens are collected from specimen sources, the type of specimen is to be listed, i.e., blood, tissue, urine, and whether the sample was collected in a prospective or retrospective time period.

The data type specifies the nature of data: omics, medical and non-medical imaging, biological types (biochemical assays and biophysical such as X-ray and NMR, preclinical assays, electrophysiology), and phenotypic. Additional data to be included, i.e., associated metadata, epidemiology and surveillance, social/behavioral, clinical trials results, survey/questionnaire, and algorithms or simulations.

Standards:

For human subject data, a measure(s) of alcohol quantity and frequency is expected to be reported. Measures may include lifetime use, 30-day quantity and frequency, and/or maximum drinks per 24 hours. Demographic data should include sex, age, race, and ethnicity. Applicants are encouraged to consult the PhenX (https://www.phenxtoolkit.org/index.php) website and the Alcohol, Tobacco and Other Substances and the Demographics domains for protocols.

Studies that include animal models should include the alcohol exposure paradigm, age of the animal at the start and end of the alcohol exposure, a measure of alcohol consumption or exposure. A blood alcohol concentration measurement is recommended.

Data Preservation, Access, and Associated Timelines:

For additional information on submitting scientific data from studies with human subjects, see "Notice of NIAAA Data-Sharing Information for Human Subjects Grants Research Funded by the National Institute on Alcohol Abuse and Alcoholism (NIAAA) [5th Revision]" (NOT-AA-23-002). For data types without human subjects, applicants will provide the name(s) of the repositories where the scientific data and metadata will be archived.

Applications nonresponsive to terms of this NOSI will not be considered for the NOSI initiative.

Inquiries

Please direct all inquiries to the contacts in Section VII of the listed notice of funding opportunity with the following additions/substitutions:

Scientific/Research Contact(s)

Robert Freeman, Ph.D.
National Institute on Alcohol Abuse and Alcoholism (NIAAA)
Telephone: 301-443-8820
Email: rfreeman@mail.nih.gov

David Berrigan, Ph.D., M.P.H.
National Cancer Institute (NCI)
Telephone: 240-276-6752
Email: berrigad@nih.gov

Tanya Agurs-Collins, Ph.D., R.D.
National Cancer Institute (NCI)
Telephone: 240-276-6956
Email: collinsta@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)

Judy Fox
National Institute on Alcohol Abuse and Alcoholism (NIAAA)
Telephone: 301-443-4704
Email: jfox@mail.nih.gov

Crystal Wolfrey
National Cancer Institute (NCI)
Telephone: 240-276-6277
Email: wolfreyc@mail.nih.gov