Key Dates

Related Announcements

• December 2, 2025 - Research Security Training Requirements for NIH.  See Notice NOT-OD-26-017.  
• December 2, 2025 - NIH’s Implementation of Common Forms for Biographical Sketch and Current and Pending (Other) Support for Due Dates on or after January 25, 2026. See Notice NOT-OD-26-018.  
• February 04, 2026 - Adjusted Timeline for NIH’s Implementation of Common Forms. See Notice NOT-OD-26-033.

Issued by

NATIONAL INSTITUTES OF HEALTH (NIH)

Agency for Healthcare Research and Quality (AHRQ)
Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC)
Department of Veterans Affairs (VA)

Purpose

This Notice provides the key dates that were announced in the ‘Expectations’ section of the previous Guide Notice (see NOT-OD-26-033) and important guidance on the adjusted implementation timeline for Common Forms for Biographical Sketch and Current and Pending (Other) Support. It contains updates and reminders for successful creation and submission of the Common Forms.

Effective Date

The current leniency period previously communicated in NOT-OD-26-033 will end on May 7, 2026, the final AIDS standard receipt date for Cycle 1. Use of the Common Forms for Biographical Sketch, Current and Pending (Other) Support, and NIH Biographical Sketch Supplement will be required for all application due dates and Just-In-Time (JIT), Research Performance Progress Report (RPPR), and Prior Approval submissions on or after May 8, 2026.

During the remainder of the leniency period, NIH will continue to provide system warnings and will not withdraw applications containing the NIH Biosketch and NIH Other Support format pages, or non-compliant Common Forms. On May 8, 2026, system warnings will change to errors that will stop any submission not using compliant Common Forms. This timing will also provide applicants with additional time to address errors before the May 25, 2026 standard receipt date for Cycle 2.

Important Updates and Reminders

Updates regarding entry of zero effort on Current and Pending (Other) Support:

On April 22, 2026, Science Experts Network Curriculum Vitae (SciENcv) and eRA will deploy system updates to allow entry of zero person months effort for Proposals/Active Projects and In-Kind Contributions on the Current and Pending (Other) Support Form. Any documents created using this new version (2026-1) or older documents updated to the new version will allow individuals to indicate zero effort for sources of support when applicable. Note that the prior version of the Current and Pending Other Support (2025-1) generated from SciENcv that does not support zero person months effort will continue to function for submission to eRA systems.

Updates regarding Research Security Training Certification:

On April 22, 2026, SciENcv will add the Research Security Training (RST) Certification back to the Common Forms to provide individuals time to comply with the requirement for applications submitted for due dates on or after May 25, 2026 (NOT-OD-26-017).

If you certified your Common Forms prior to the addition of this text on April 22, 2026, and:

• Have not yet submitted your application for a due date on or after May 25, 2026, you should regenerate your Common Form PDF(s) prior to submission.
• Have submitted your application for a due date on or after May 25, 2026, you do not need to resubmit your application with regenerated Common Forms. NIH staff will collect updated documents to meet the RST certification requirement at JIT for applications selected for possible funding.

For applications that include Common Forms with the RST Certification, but are submitted for due dates on or before May 24, 2026, NIH will not hold individuals accountable for the portion of the certification statement related to the research security training that complies with the CHIPS and Science Act due to the training requirement being effective for due dates on or after May 25, 2026.

Updates Regarding the NIH Grants Policy Statement (GPS):

The NIH Grants Policy Statement was updated on March 25, 2026. Due to the timing of its release, we were unable to fully incorporate the requirements for the use of Common Forms for NIH as outlined in NOT-OD-26-017, NOT-OD-26-018, and NOT-OD-26-033. NIH will fully incorporate these requirements into the next update of the GPS.

Reminders for Linking Your ORCID to your SciENcv and eRA Commons Accounts:

All individuals submitting Common Forms to NIH must use SciENcv to produce digitally certified PDF(s). Please take the following steps to ensure documents have been completed successfully to pass NIH system validation requirements:

• Obtain an Open Researcher and Contributor Identifier (ORCID iD)
• Link the ORCID iD to your eRA Commons account in your Personal Profile (PPF).  See the ORCID iD topic in the eRA Commons online help.
  • NOTE: The ORCID iD can be linked to only one Commons account. If you get an error from eRA Commons when trying to link your ORCID iD, or need to remove an existing ORCID iD from a Commons Account, contact the eRA Service Desk.
• Confirm your ORCID iD is displayed in the Persistent Identifier (PID) section of the Common Forms. To populate your ORCID iD in the PID field, you can either link your ORCID iD to your existing SciENcv account through the Account Settings page, or sign in using ORCID if this is your first time logging in to SciENcv. Alternatively, you can manually enter your ORCID iD into the required PID field in the "Identifying Information, Organization and Location" section of the Common Forms. For help on this topic, see Linking an ORCiD account to a My NCBI/SciENcv account - NCBI Insights and Fixing an incorrect Persistent Identifier (ORCID) in a SciENcv Document - NCBI Insights.
• Confirm the personal profile associated with the eRA Commons username entered in the Credential field of the application includes the same ORCID iD displayed in the PID field of the Common Form being submitted.

Reminder for RPPR, JIT and Prior Approval Modules:

The RPPR, JIT, and Prior Approval (PA) eRA modules were updated to allow Common Form attachments at an individual person-level (i.e., you no longer have to compile forms of multiple individuals into a single flattened PDF document). Please see Completing Section D: Participants of the RPPR for a video tutorial of the updates.

Resources

• Biographical Sketch Common Form and NIH Biographical Sketch Supplement – instructions, FAQs, and other resources
• Current and Pending (Other) Support Common Form – instructions, FAQs, and other resources

Inquiries

For policy related questions, please direct inquiries to:

NIH Office of Policy for Extramural Research Administration (OPERA)

Division of Grant Systems Integration (DGSI)

Systems Policy Branch

[email protected] 

For technical questions related to the use of SciENcv, please direct inquiries to:

SciENcv Helpdesk

[email protected]

For technical questions related to the use of eRA, please direct inquiries to:

eRA Service Desk

Online Help: https://www.era.nih.gov/need-help 

Note: All aspects outlined within this Guide Notice apply to all participating agencies. Please direct all inquiries to the respective partner agency contacts.

Please direct all AHRQ inquiries to:

Christina Chacon, MHA

Advisor, Office of the Director

Agency for Healthcare Research and Quality

[email protected] 

Please direct all CDC inquiries to:

L.C. Browning

Grants Management Specialist

Centers for Disease Control and Prevention

Email: [email protected] 

Jon Messick

Grants Management Specialist

Center for Disease Control and Prevention

Email: [email protected] 

Please direct all VA inquiries to:

U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs

Email: [email protected]