Key Dates

Related Announcements

• October 9, 2020 - Administrative Supplements to Existing NIH Grants and Cooperative Agreements (Parent Admin Supp Clinical Trial Optional). See NOFO PA-20-272.

Issued by

National Institute on Minority Health and Health Disparities (NIMHD)

All applications to this funding opportunity announcement should fall within the mission of the Institutes/Centers. The following NIH Offices may co-fund applications assigned to those Institutes/Centers.

Office of Data Science Strategy (ODSS)

Purpose

This Notice of Special Interest (NOSI) invites applications for administrative supplements to eligible NIMHD Research Centers in Minority Institutions (RCMI) to support scientific and professional development activities in ethical considerations in artificial intelligence and machine learning (AI/ML)

Background

NIMHD's Research Centers in Minority Institutions (RCMI) program supports specialized research centers in institutions that offer doctoral degrees in the health professions or health-related sciences and have an historical and current commitment to educating underrepresented students. RCMIs play an important role in supporting scientific research, particularly on diseases or conditions that disproportionately impact racial/ethnic minorities and other U.S. populations that experience health disparities. These institutions are uniquely positioned to engage minority populations in research and in the translation of research advances into culturally competent, measurable and sustained improvements in health outcomes. Each RCMI U54 center includes an Investigator Development Core to support the development of highly talented postdoctoral fellows, junior faculty, and other early-stage investigators in basic biomedical, behavioral, and/or clinical sciences. In FY 2021, NIMHD collaborated with the NIH Office of Data Science Strategy (ODSS) to issue a notice of special interest (NOSI) to fund administrative supplements to enhance data science capacity at  RCMI (NOT-MD-21-021). Through the NOSI, six RCMI institutions were funded for two years to support data science relevant activities that help to develop human capital, build partnerships, and enhance infrastructure. All projects successfully implemented training events in data science knowledge areas including artificial intelligence and machine learning (AI/ML) and multiple institutions expressed interest in initiating or further developing AI/ML-relevant training.  Efforts to enhance the data science skills of investigators at RCMI centers align with four primary programmatic goals: (1) enhance institutional research capacity within the areas of basic biomedical, behavioral, and/or clinical research; (2) enable all levels of investigators to become more successful in obtaining competitive extramural support, especially from NIH, particularly on diseases that disproportionately impact minority and other populations that experience health disparities; (3) foster environments conducive to career enhancement with a special emphasis on development of new and early career investigators; and (4) enhance the quality of all scientific inquiry and promote research on minority health and health disparities.

Research Objective

Significant expertise in ethics and AI/ML are expected to be needed to identify and address concerns about the human and clinical impacts of AI/ML technologies on health. The explosion of AI/ML tools such as ChatGBT has made the need for greater development of this expertise in investigators imperative. Ethical expertise may be derived from a range of related disciplines such as philosophy, socio-economic research, history, legal scholarship, ethics in clinical research, and behavioral psychology. Based on the success of the previous NOSI, NIMHD aims to support educational activities under the existing Investigator Development Core such as curriculum development, seminar series, and training courses covering topics such as, but not limited to, overview of the ethics landscape in AI/ML, trustworthy explainable, transparent, and responsible AI, relevant regulations and policies, best practices, machine/algorithmic bias, mitigation strategies to eliminate or reduce bias, validating/testing model for bias, data privacy, other potential risks, opportunities and challenges.

To be eligible for an Administrative Supplement under this NOSI, the parent RCMI U54 award must:

• be awarded under either RFA-MD-17-003, RFA-MD-17-006, RFA-MD-18-012, RFA-MD-20-006, or RFA-MD-22-002.
• be an active NIH award at the time of application (i.e., within five years of the start date of the originally reviewed and approved project period of the existing parent RCMI U54’s competitive segment; or if applicable, within the originally reviewed and approved project period of a funded competitive revision).
• have sufficient time left to complete the studies proposed within this  project period at the time of application.

Applications not responsive to this NOSI:

  Projects that supplement awards that are not eligible under this NOSI.

• Projects that are not within the scope of the peer reviewed and approved parent RCMI project, including competitive revisions. 
• Proposals that are not being used to meet increased costs that are within the scope of the approved award, but were unforeseen when the new or renewal application or grant progress report for non-competing continuation support was submitted.
• Applications from an ineligible institution.

Applications not responsive to these terms will be withdrawn for this NOSI initiative.

Description of circumstances for which administrative supplements are available.

Application and Submission Information

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

• PA-20-272 - 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-20-272 must be followed, with the following additions:

• Application Due Date: July 21, 2023, by 5:00 PM local time of applicant organization.
• All applications to PA-20-272 must be submitted electronically using a single-project application form package with the Competition ID of “FORMS-H-ADMINSUPP-RESEARCH". 
• For funding consideration, applicants must include “NOT-MD-23-013” (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.
• Budget: An eligible applicant institution may propose a maximum budget of $150,000 direct costs, not including consortium F&A costs.  
• Project Period: The proposed project period must be within that of the existing parent award and cannot exceed one year.
• Research Strategy: The Research Strategy section of the application is limited to 6 pages.  
• Institutional Commitment: The applicant RCMI institution should convincingly demonstrate that adequate resources, appropriate and dedicated support, commitment to the success of the supplement. 
• Applicants are strongly encouraged to notify the program official of the parent award in order to facilitate efficient processing of the request.

Inquiries

Please direct all inquiries to:

Rina Das, PhD.
National Institute on Minority Health and Health Disparities
Telephone: 301-496-3996
Email: [email protected]

Nathan Stinson, Jr., PhD, MD, MPH
National Institute on Minority Health and Health Disparities
Telephone: 301-594-8704
Email: [email protected]

Steve Tsang
Office of Data Science Strategy (ODSS)
Email: [email protected]
Phone: 240.627.3330

Fiscal/Grants Management Contact

Priscilla Grant, JD
National Institute on Minority Health and Health Disparities (NIMHD)
Telephone: 301-594-8412
Email: [email protected]