Department of Health
and Human Services (HHS)
and Human Services (HHS)
EXPIRED
National Institutes of Health (NIH)
National Institute of Diabetes and Digestive and Kidney Diseases (NIDDK)
U01 Research Project Cooperative Agreements
Reissue of RFA-DK-18-015 - Human Pancreas Analysis Program (HPAP) (U01 Clinical Trial Not Allowed)
June 5, 2024 - This RFA has been reissued as RFA-DK-25-012
August 26, 2020 - Notice of Correction to Eligibility in NIH Funding Opportunity Announcements. See Notice NOT-OD-20-171.
Only one application per institution is allowed, as defined in Section III. 3. Additional Information on Eligibility.
This Funding Opportunity Announcement (FOA) invites a single cooperative agreement application to continue the mission of the existing Human Pancreas Analysis Program (HPAP). This FOA will support one team of investigators with combined expertise in human pancreas physiology and pathophysiology; collection, processing and multimodal analysis of human pancreatic tissues; and biological database building, curation and management, that will be tasked to: 1) identify, collect and intensively characterize primary pancreatic tissues from patients with type 1 diabetes (T1D) or at risk of developing the disease, as well as age-matched controls; and 2) analyze, organize and share the data resulting from the study of these tissues through the existing PANC DB open-access resource database. HPAP is a component of the Human Islet Research Network or HIRN. HIRN was created in 2014 to support innovative and collaborative translational research to understand how human beta cells are lost in T1D, and to find innovative strategies to protect and replace functional human beta cell mass.
October 10, 2020
November 10, 2020, by 5:00 PM local time of applicant organization. All types of non-AIDS applications allowed for this funding opportunity announcement are due on thisdate.
All applications are due by 5:00 PM local time of applicant organization. All types of non-AIDS applications allowed for this funding opportunity announcement are due on the listed date(s).
Applicants are encouraged to apply early to allow adequate time to make any corrections to errors found in the application during the submission process by the due date.
Not applicable.
February/March, 2021
July, 2021
Not Applicable
It is critical that applicants follow the instructions in the Research (R) Instructions in the SF424 (R&R) Application Guide,except where instructed to do otherwise (in this FOA or in a Notice from NIH Guide for Grants and Contracts ).
Conformance to all requirements (both in the Application Guide and the FOA) is required and strictly enforced. Applicants must read and follow all application instructions in the Application Guide as well as any program-specific instructions noted in Section IV. When the program-specific instructions deviate from those in the Application Guide, follow the program-specific instructions.
Applications that do not comply with these instructions may be delayed or not accepted for review.
Background
Much remains to be learned about the causes and triggers of Type 1 Diabetes (T1D) in humans. A detailed description of the series of events that leads to beta cell dysfunction and loss in human pancreatic tissues, particularly during the asymptomatic phase of human T1D, could help identify biomarkers highly specific for early T1D, and design therapeutic strategies to delay or stop the progression towards clinically overt T1D by slowing or preventing the development of beta cell-specific autoimmunity.
While it is now possible to identify individuals at highest risk for developing T1D prior to clinical manifestations, it remains a difficult disease to investigate given our inability to access the target organ in living individuals. In recent years, several tissue procurement programs have facilitated access to pancreatic tissues or human islets from cadaver donors. The NIDDK-supported Integrated Islet Distribution Program or IIDP (https://iidp.coh.org/Overview) provides dissociated human islets to investigators, although it does not currently distribute dissociated islets from T1D donors. The JDRF-supported Network for Pancreatic Donors with Diabetes or nPOD (https://www.jdrfnpod.org/) is procuring pancreata and related tissues from organ donors with type 1 diabetes as well as those who are islet autoantibody positive. While these tissue-procurement programs have contributed significantly to increase our understanding of T1D initiation and progression, the amount of high-resolution data generated from human pancreatic tissues that the scientific community can access and use to formulate and test new hypotheses remains limited. The reasons for the paucity of cellular and molecular information related to the human pancreatic tissue environment include the following:
A systematic, comprehensive, unbiased and standardized deep phenotyping (molecular, anatomical and functional) of human pancreata at various stages of disease development, from the early signs of autoimmunity to the overt clinical disease, would provide a thorough understanding of the mechanisms contributing to disease development and progression throughout the natural history of disease and would greatly facilitate our understanding of the origins and diversity of human T1D . To complement the body of knowledge resulting from investigator-initiated studies and facilitated by existing tissue-distribution programs, NIDDK created in 2016 the Human Pancreas Analysis Program (HPAP) as a resource-generation and data-analysis component of the Human Islet Research Network or HIRN (RFA-DK-15-027). The mission of the HPAP (https://hirnetwork.org/consortium/hpap) is to systematically apply a suite of standardized technologies with single-cell resolution to fixed pancreatic tissues and live cells, and to combine these measurements with a series of functional assays to obtain a high-resolution and extensive phenotyping of the human endocrine pancreas and its interaction with the immune system for each and all tissue specimens being analyzed. The high-value datasets resulting from this phenotyping effort are shared with the research community as soon as generated and quality-controlled through a searchable database called PANC DB (https://hpap.pmacs.upenn.edu/ ). It is expected that HPAP datasets will be mined and analyzed in creative ways by the research community to generate hypotheses with regard to disease pathogenesis that can then be tested on human cells and tissues made available by distribution programs such as nPOD or the IIDP, or through clinical studies. HPAP is currently supported by the Special Statutory Funding Program for Type 1 Diabetes Research (Special Diabetes Program) for an initial phase of 4.5 years. A companion effort called HPAP-T2D has recently been launched by NIDDK (via RFA-DK-18-016, https://grants.nih.gov/grants/guide/rfa-files/rfa-dk-18-016.html), with the mission of expanding the operational scope of the HPAP to the study of pancreata recovered from tissue donors with Type 2 Diabetes (T2D) and related metabolic disorders. HPAP-T2D is also part of the HIRN effort, uses most of the HPAP-T1D technology suite for data-generation, and shares the resulting datasets with the scientific community through PANC DB.
Research Goals and Objectives
The goal of this initiative is to build upon the progress made by the HPAP during its first funding cycle, and to continue to improve, develop and implement strategies for:
For this second phase of HPAP activities, investigators are asked to complete the following tasks:
1) Continue to assemble and phenotype a representative collection of human pancreata:
The HPAP team should describe its current and future strategy for identifying and collecting human pancreatic specimens from donors with stage 1 and stage 2 T1D, recently-diagnosed T1D, established T1D or other physiological conditions affecting pancreatic beta cell mass or function, as well as from age-matched healthy donors. HPAP investigators should describe their criteria for inclusion/exclusion of tissues into the HPAP collection with the goal of generating datasets that reveal unique aspects of pancreatic function/dysfunction associated with the development of T1D, interactions between various pancreatic tissue compartments and the immune system, or the capacity of the human endocrine pancreas to regenerate a functional beta cell mass. At a minimum, HPAP activities should include the following:
2) Further develop and populate PANC DB:
HPAP will continue to be responsible for organizing and integrating all functional, anatomical and molecular data and metadata generated from the HPAP tissue analyses into the comprehensive and searchable community database PANC DB. The further development of PANC DB should involve a stellar computational group with demonstrated expertise in building and applying state-of-the-art analytical tools for the integration and visualization of datasets generated using different experimental modalities such as image-generating and multiple omics technologies. Whenever possible, the HPAP computational analysis team should leverage strategies and tools that are being developed or used for the multimodal phenotyping of other complex tissues rather than reinventing tools and approaches specific to the pancreatic tissue. Ideally, the information accessible through PANC DB will represent an extensive cellular and molecular analysis of all cell types present in the human pancreas to include exocrine and endocrine cell subtypes, intra- and inter-islet vascular and neuronal networks, pancreatic ducts and immune cells. As a resource, PANC DB should enable the scientific community to explore important aspects of pancreatic function and dysfunction, and should facilitate exploration of the 3D structural and functional relationships at the cellular and organ-wide level, generating mechanistic hypotheses related to T1D pathogenesis, or identifying novel biomarkers or drug targets. In order to achieve these goals, the HPAP computational team should (continue to) focus on the following functions:
3) Improve on the existing HPAP workflow and deliverables:
Applicants are encouraged to draw lessons from the initial funding phase and to propose changes to HPAP’s mode of operations if deemed desirable to increase the quality and/or value of HPAP’s resources. Changes could include (but are not limited to):
When considering changes to existing HPAP protocols, experiments, analyses or resource-generation, investigators should carefully consider the value of the data generated during the first phase and the importance of producing a consistent and homogenous set of data over time. Strong rationale should be given for dropping-off experimental protocols that were part of the original HPAP workflow. If new assays are proposed to complement the current workflow, investigators should indicate whether the new assays can and will be run retroactively on residual HPAP samples collected during the first funding period.
4) Forge partnerships with relevant investigator communities and research programs:
HPAP will be responsible for leveraging the activities of relevant programs through the formation of strategic partnerships with existing efforts that are related to its mission and to the type of data that it is generating. Such partners should include at least the following:
Other Special Performance Requirements
The HPAP investigators may be asked to identify fixed and variable costs and establish procedures for negotiation of third party agreements or selection of subcontractors and develop processes to efficiently administer and manage throughout the project.
See Section VIII. Other Information for award authorities and regulations.
Cooperative Agreement: A support mechanism used when there will be substantial Federal scientific or programmatic involvement. Substantial involvement means that, after award, NIH scientific or program staff will assist, guide, coordinate, or participate in project activities. See Section VI.2 for additional information about the substantial involvement for this FOA.
Resubmission application from RFA-DK-18-015
The OER Glossary and the SF424 (R&R) Application Guide provide details on these application types. Only those application types listed here are allowed for this FOA.
Need help determining whether you are doing a clinical trial?
The application budget is limited to $4.5 million in direct costs per year [excluding subcontract Facilities and Administrative (F&A)costs].
The maximum project period is 4 years.
NIH grants policies as described in the NIH Grants Policy Statement will apply to the applications submitted and awards made from this FOA.
Higher Education Institutions
The following types of Higher Education Institutions are always encouraged to apply for NIH support as Public or Private Institutions of Higher Education:
Nonprofits Other Than Institutions of Higher Education
For-Profit Organizations
Local Governments
Federal Governments
Other
Non-domestic (non-U.S.) Entities (Foreign Institutions) are not eligible to apply.
Non-domestic (non-U.S.) components of U.S. Organizations are not eligible to apply.
Foreign components, as defined in the NIH Grants Policy Statement, are allowed.
Applicant organizations
Applicant organizations must complete and maintain the following registrations as described in the SF 424 (R&R) Application Guide to be eligible to apply for or receive an award. All registrations must be completed prior to the application being submitted. Registration can take 6 weeks or more, so applicants should begin the registration process as soon as possible. The NIH Policy on Late Submission of Grant Applications states that failure to complete registrations in advance of a due date is not a valid reason for a late submission.
Program Directors/Principal Investigators (PD(s)/PI(s))
All PD(s)/PI(s) must have an eRA Commons account. PD(s)/PI(s) should work with their organizational officials to either create a new account or to affiliate their existing account with the applicant organization in eRA Commons. If the PD/PI is also the organizational Signing Official, they must have two distinct eRA Commons accounts, one for each role. Obtaining an eRA Commons account can take up to 2 weeks.
Any individual(s) with the skills, knowledge, and resources necessary to carry out the proposed research as the Program Director(s)/Principal Investigator(s) (PD(s)/PI(s)) is invited to work with his/her organization to develop an application for support. Individuals from underrepresented racial and ethnic groups as well as individuals with disabilities are always encouraged to apply for NIH support.
For institutions/organizations proposing multiple PDs/PIs, visit the Multiple Program Director/Principal Investigator Policy and submission details in the Senior/Key Person Profile (Expanded) Component of the SF424 (R&R) Application Guide.
This FOA does not require cost sharing as defined in the NIH Grants Policy Statement.
Only one application per institution (normally identified by having a unique DUNS number or NIH IPF number) is allowed.
The NIH will not accept duplicate or highly overlapping applications under review at the same time. This means that the NIH will not accept:
The application forms package specific to this opportunity must be accessed through ASSIST, Grants.gov Workspace or an institutional system-to-system solution. Links to apply using ASSIST or Grants.gov Workspace are available in Part 1 of this FOA. See your administrative office for instructions if you plan to use an institutional system-to-system solution.
Letter of Intent
Although a letter of intent is not required, is not binding, and does not enter into the review of a subsequent application, the information that it contains allows IC staff to estimate the potential review workload and plan the review.
By the date listed in Part 1. Overview Information, prospective applicants are asked to submit a letter of intent that includes the following information:
The letter of intent should be sent to:
John Connaughton, Ph.D.
Chief, Scientific Review Branch
National Institute of Diabetes and Digestive and Kidney Diseases (NIDDK)
Telephone: 301-594-7797
Email: [email protected]
All page limitations described in the SF424 Application Guide and the Table of Page Limits must be followed.
For this specific FOA, the Research Strategy section is limited to 30 pages.
The following section supplements the instructions found in the SF424 (R&R) Application Guide and should be used for preparing an application to this FOA.
All instructions in the SF424 (R&R) Application Guide must be followed.
All instructions in the SF424 (R&R) Application Guide must be followed.
All instructions in the SF424 (R&R) Application Guide must be followed.
All instructions in the SF424 (R&R) Application Guide must be followed.
All instructions in the SF424 (R&R) Application Guide must be followed.
All instructions in the SF424 (R&R) Application Guide must be followed.
All instructions in the SF424 (R&R) Application Guide must be followed.
All instructions in the SF424 (R&R) Application Guide must be followed, with the following additional instructions:
Research Strategy:
HPAP applicants should include in their Research Strategy:
Given the need for a multidisciplinary approach to HPAP's mission, applicants should structure their application as a multi-investigator (multi-PI) project, with a clear description of each investigator's contribution and a detailed Leadership Plan.
Letters of Support: HPAP applications should identify the tissue source sites and provide supporting letters from these sites to demonstrate capacity and commitment to deliver the types and numbers of human pancreatic specimens described in the grant application, as well as their willingness to assist with the collection of medical information about tissue donors.
Resource Sharing Plan: Individuals are required to comply with the instructions for the Resource Sharing Plans as provided in the SF424 (R&R) Application Guide.
The following modifications also apply:
Upon completion or termination of the HPAP project, the awardee is responsible for making all HPAP data collections and tools broadly available (e.g., putting into the public domain) or making them accessible to the research community according to the NIH-approved plan submitted for each project, for making data and materials available to the scientific community and the NIH for the conduct of research, as appropriate. The data sharing plan should include a sustainability strategy to ensure access to HPAP data by the community once the project period expires.
When involving human subjects research, clinical research, and/or NIH-definedclinical trials (and when applicable, clinical trials research experience) follow all instructions for the PHS Human Subjects and Clinical Trials Information form in the SF424 (R&R) Application Guide, with the following additional instructions:
If you answered Yes to the question Are Human Subjects Involved? on the R&R Other Project Information form, you must include at least one human subjects study record using the Study Record: PHS Human Subjects and Clinical Trials Information form or Delayed Onset Study record.
Study Record: PHS Human Subjects and Clinical Trials Information
All instructions in the SF424 (R&R) Application Guide must be followed.
Note: Delayed onset does NOT apply to a study that can be described but will not start immediately (i.e., delayed start).All instructions in the SF424 (R&R) Application Guide must be followed.
All instructions in the SF424 (R&R) Application Guide must be followed.
See Part 1. Section III.1 for information regarding the requirement for obtaining a unique entity identifier and for completing and maintaining active registrations in System for Award Management (SAM), NATO Commercial and Government Entity (NCAGE) Code (if applicable), eRA Commons, and Grants.gov
Part I. Overview Information contains information about Key Dates and times. Applicants are encouraged to submit applications before the due date to ensure they have time to make any application corrections that might be necessary for successful submission. When a submission date falls on a weekend or Federal holiday, the application deadline is automatically extended to the next business day.
Organizations must submit applications to Grants.gov (the online portal to find and apply for grants across all Federal agencies). Applicants must then complete the submission process by tracking the status of the application in the eRA Commons, NIH’s electronic system for grants administration. NIH and Grants.gov systems check the application against many of the application instructions upon submission. Errors must be corrected and a changed/corrected application must be submitted to Grants.gov on or before the application due date and time. If a Changed/Corrected application is submitted after the deadline, the application will be considered late. Applications that miss the due date and time are subjected to the NIH Policy on Late Application Submission.
Applicants are responsible for viewing their application before the due date in the eRA Commons to ensure accurate and successful submission.
Information on the submission process and a definition of on-time submission are provided in the SF424 (R&R) Application Guide.
This initiative is not subject to intergovernmental review.
All NIH awards are subject to the terms and conditions, cost principles, and other considerations described in the NIH Grants Policy Statement.
Pre-award costs are allowable only as described in the NIH Grants Policy Statement.
Applications must be submitted electronically following the instructions described in the SF424 (R&R) Application Guide. Paper applications will not be accepted.
Applicants must complete all required registrations before the application due date. Section III. Eligibility Information contains information about registration.
For assistance with your electronic application or for more information on the electronic submission process, visit How to Apply Application Guide. If you encounter a system issue beyond your control that threatens your ability to complete the submission process on-time, you must follow the Dealing with System Issues guidance. For assistance with application submission, contact the Application Submission Contacts in Section VII.
Important reminders:
All PD(s)/PI(s) must include their eRA Commons ID in the Credential field of the Senior/Key Person Profile Component of the SF424(R&R) Application Package. Failure to register in the Commons and to include a valid PD/PI Commons ID in the credential field will prevent the successful submission of an electronic application to NIH. See Section III of this FOA for information on registration requirements.
The applicant organization must ensure that the DUNS number it provides on the application is the same number used in the organization’s profile in the eRA Commons and for the System for Award Management. Additional information may be found in the SF424 (R&R) Application Guide.
See more tips for avoiding common errors.
Use of Common Data Elements in NIH-funded Research
Many NIH ICs encourage the use of common data elements (CDEs) in basic, clinical, and applied research, patient registries, and other human subject research to facilitate broader and more effective use of data and advance research across studies. CDEs are data elements that have been identified and defined for use in multiple data sets across different studies. Use of CDEs can facilitate data sharing and standardization to improve data quality and enable data integration from multiple studies and sources, including electronic health records. NIH ICs have identified CDEs for many clinical domains (e.g., neurological disease), types of studies (e.g. genome-wide association studies (GWAS)), types of outcomes (e.g., patient-reported outcomes), and patient registries (e.g., the Global Rare Diseases Patient Registry and Data Repository). NIH has established a Common Data Element (CDE) Resource Portal" (http://cde.nih.gov/) to assist investigators in identifying NIH-supported CDEs when developing protocols, case report forms, and other instruments for data collection. The Portal provides guidance about and access to NIH-supported CDE initiatives and other tools and resources for the appropriate use of CDEs and data standards in NIH-funded research. Investigators are encouraged to consult the Portal and describe in their applications any use they will make of NIH-supported CDEs in their projects.
Upon receipt, applications will be evaluated for completeness and compliance with application instructions by the Center for Scientific Review and responsiveness bycomponents of participating organizations, NIH. Applications that are incomplete, non-compliant and/or nonresponsive will not be reviewed.
Applicants are required to follow the instructions for post-submission materials, as described in the policy. Any instructions provided here are in addition to the instructions in the policy.
Only the review criteria described below will be considered in the review process. Applications submitted to the NIH in support of the NIH mission are evaluated for scientific and technical merit through the NIH peer review system.
Reviewers will provide an overall impact score to reflect their assessment of the likelihood for the project to exert a sustained, powerful influence on the research field(s) involved, in consideration of the following review criteria and additional review criteria (as applicable for the project proposed).
Reviewers will consider each of the review criteria below in the determination of scientific merit, and give a separate score for each. An application does not need to be strong in all categories to be judged likely to have major scientific impact. For example, a project that by its nature is not innovative may be essential to advance a field.
Does the project address an important problem or a critical barrier to progress in the field? Is the prior research that serves as the key support for the proposed project rigorous? If the aims of the project are achieved, how will scientific knowledge, technical capability, and/or clinical practice be improved? How will successful completion of the aims change the concepts, methods, technologies, treatments, services, or preventative interventions that drive this field?
Specific to this FOA: Has progress during the first period of funding been significant? Is the data available in PANC-DB being used by the research community? Have the existing datasets already led to significantly new biological knowledge? Can we expect this program, including the proposed set of technologies and the number of tissues to be analyzed, to contribute significantly to a greater understanding of human T1D pathogenesis?
Are the PD(s)/PI(s), collaborators, and other researchers well suited to the project? If Early Stage Investigators or those in the early stages of independent careers, do they have appropriate experience and training? If established, have they demonstrated an ongoing record of accomplishments that have advanced their field(s)? If the project is collaborative or multi-PD/PI, do the investigators have complementary and integrated expertise; are their leadership approach, governance and organizational structure appropriate for the project?
Specific to this FOA: Has the team developed a convincing track record of accessing and processing human pancreatic tissues, including experience in skilled and expedited autopsy, sample acquisition and processing, preservation, as well as collection and completion of proper documents, including consents? Do PD(s)/PI(s) provide evidence of experience with running the suite of phenotypic assays proposed in this resubmission? Does the computational team have a convincing track record of collecting, curating, analyzing and sharing large and complex datasets through community portals or databases? Do PD(s)/PI(s) provide evidence that they have been working efficiently and productively together? If investigators are being added to the original HPAP team, is their addition well justified by the expertise that they will bring to the program?
Does the application challenge and seek to shift current research or clinical practice paradigms by utilizing novel theoretical concepts, approaches or methodologies, instrumentation, or interventions? Are the concepts, approaches or methodologies, instrumentation, or interventions novel to one field of research or novel in a broad sense? Is a refinement, improvement, or new application of theoretical concepts, approaches or methodologies, instrumentation, or interventions proposed?
Specific to this FOA: Have the applicants demonstrated that their approach of systematic and multimodal phenotyping of human pancreatic tissues is different enough from past efforts to yield new biological knowledge that cannot be gathered in any other way? What is the level of innovation of the tissue-phenotyping technologies? Of the computational strategies for the integrated analysis and visualization of HPAP datasets?
Are the overall strategy, methodology, and analyses well-reasoned and appropriate to accomplish the specific aims of the project? Have the investigators included plans to address weaknesses in the rigor of prior research that serves as the key support for the proposed project? Have the investigators presented strategies to ensure a robust and unbiased approach, as appropriate for the work proposed? Are potential problems, alternative strategies, and benchmarks for success presented? If the project is in the early stages of development, will the strategy establish feasibility and will particularly risky aspects be managed? Have the investigators presented adequate plans to address relevant biological variables, such as sex, for studies in vertebrate animals or human subjects?
Specific to this FOA: Is the proposed plan for efficient collection, processing and documentation of cadaveric donor tissues appropriate and feasible? Are the suite of phenotypic assays on human pancreatic cells and tissues proposed by the investigators, as required by this initiative, cutting edge and mature, including experiments in histology, islet cell sequencing (RNAseq, ATACseq and whole genome bisulfite sequencing), islet physiology (calcium imaging, electrophysiology, oxygen consumption, perifusion studies for insulin and glucagon) and mass cytometry analysis (flow cytometry and imaging mass cytometry)? Are the estimated number and types of human pancreatic tissues to be processed and analyzed during the funding period adequate and justified? Is the plan for data sharing with the community and management of collaborations with non-HPAP investigators satisfactory?
If the project involves human subjects and/or NIH-defined clinical research, are the plans to address 1) the protection of human subjects from research risks, and 2) inclusion (or exclusion) of individuals on the basis of sex/gender, race, and ethnicity, as well as the inclusion or exclusion of individuals of all ages (including children and older adults), justified in terms of the scientific goals and research strategy proposed?
Will the scientific environment in which the work will be done contribute to the probability of success? Are the institutional support, equipment and other physical resources available to the investigators adequate for the project proposed? Will the project benefit from unique features of the scientific environment, subject populations, or collaborative arrangements?
Specific to this FOA: Is the proposed scientific environment conducive to the seamless processing and analysis of human pancreatic cells and tissues in a timely fashion, so as to minimize delays between tissue processing and collection of meaningful biological data? Can we expect smooth interactions and efficient teamwork between the various components of the proposed program, including tissue procurement, tissue processing, data generation, data analysis and data sharing?
As applicable for the project proposed, reviewers will evaluate the following additional items while determining scientific and technical merit, and in providing an overall impact score, but will not give separate scores for these items.
For research that involves human subjects but does not involve one of thecategories of research that are exempt under 45 CFR Part 46, the committee will evaluate the justification for involvement of human subjects and the proposed protections from research risk relating to their participation according to the following five review criteria: 1) risk to subjects, 2) adequacy of protection against risks, 3) potential benefits to the subjects and others, 4) importance of the knowledge to be gained, and 5) data and safety monitoring for clinical trials.
For research that involves human subjects and meets the criteria for one or more of the categories of research that are exempt under 45 CFR Part 46, the committee will evaluate: 1) the justification for the exemption, 2) human subjects involvement and characteristics, and 3) sources of materials. For additional information on review of the Human Subjects section, please refer to the Guidelines for the Review of Human Subjects.
When the proposed project involves human subjects and/or NIH-defined clinical research, the committee will evaluate the proposed plans for the inclusion (or exclusion) of individuals on the basis of sex/gender, race, and ethnicity, as well as the inclusion (or exclusion) of individuals of all ages (including children and older adults) to determine if it is justified in terms of the scientific goals and research strategy proposed. For additional information on review of the Inclusion section, please refer to the Guidelines for the Review of Inclusion in Clinical Research.
The committee will evaluate the involvement of live vertebrate animals as part of the scientific assessment according to the following criteria: (1) description of proposed procedures involving animals, including species, strains, ages, sex, and total number to be used; (2) justifications for the use of animals versus alternative models and for the appropriateness of the species proposed; (3) interventions to minimize discomfort, distress, pain and injury; and (4) justification for euthanasia method if NOT consistent with the AVMA Guidelines for the Euthanasia of Animals. Reviewers will assess the use of chimpanzees as they would any other application proposing the use of vertebrate animals. For additional information on review of the Vertebrate Animals section, please refer to the Worksheet for Review of the Vertebrate Animal Section.
Reviewers will assess whether materials or procedures proposed are potentially hazardous to research personnel and/or the environment, and if needed, determine whether adequate protection is proposed.
For Resubmissions, the committee will evaluate the application as now presented, taking into consideration the responses to comments from the previous scientific review group and changes made to the project.
Not applicable
Not applicable
As applicable for the project proposed, reviewers will consider each of the following items, but will not give scores for these items, and should not consider them in providing an overall impact score.
Not applicable
Reviewers will assess the information provided in this section of the application, including 1) the Select Agent(s) to be used in the proposed research, 2) the registration status of all entities where Select Agent(s) will be used, 3) the procedures that will be used to monitor possession use and transfer of Select Agent(s), and 4) plans for appropriate biosafety, biocontainment, and security of the Select Agent(s).
Reviewers will comment on whether the following Resource Sharing Plans, or the rationale for not sharing the following types of resources, are reasonable: (1) Data Sharing Plan; (2) Sharing Model Organisms; and (3) Genomic Data Sharing Plan (GDS).
For projects involving key biological and/or chemical resources, reviewers will comment on the brief plans proposed for identifying and ensuring the validity of those resources.
Reviewers will consider whether the budget and the requested period of support are fully justified and reasonable in relation to the proposed research.
Applications will be evaluated for scientific and technical merit by (an) appropriate Scientific Review Group(s) convened by the NIDDK, in accordance with NIH peer review policy and procedures, using the stated review criteria. Assignment to a Scientific Review Group will be shown in the eRA Commons.
As part of the scientific peer review, all applications will receive a written critique.
Applications may undergo a selection process in which only those applications deemed to have the highest scientific and technical merit (generally the top half of applications under review) will be discussed and assigned an overall impact score.
Applications will be assigned to the appropriate NIH Institute or Center. Applications will compete for available funds with all other recommended applications submitted in response to this FOA. Following initial peer review, recommended applications will receive a second level of review by the National Diabetes and Digestive and Kidney Diseases Advisory Council (NDDKAC). The following will be considered in making funding decisions:
Information regarding the disposition of applications is available in the NIH Grants Policy Statement.
A formal notification in the form of a Notice of Award (NoA) will be provided to the applicant organization for successful applications. The NoA signed by the grants management officer is the authorizing document and will be sent via email to the grantee’s business official.
Awardees must comply with any funding restrictions described in Section IV.5. Funding Restrictions. Selection of an application for award is not an authorization to begin performance. Any costs incurred before receipt of the NoA are at the recipient's risk. These costs may be reimbursed only to the extent considered allowable pre-award costs.
Any application awarded in response to this FOA will be subject to terms and conditions found on the Award Conditions and Information for NIH Grants website. This includes any recent legislation and policy applicable to awards that is highlighted on this website.
Individual awards are based on the application submitted to, and as approved by, the NIH and are subject to the IC-specific terms and conditions identified in the NoA.
All NIH grant and cooperative agreement awards include the NIH Grants Policy Statement as part of the NoA. For these terms of award, see the NIH Grants Policy Statement Part II: Terms and Conditions of NIH Grant Awards, Subpart A: General and Part II: Terms and Conditions of NIH Grant Awards, Subpart B: Terms and Conditions for Specific Types of Grants, Grantees, and Activities. More information is provided at Award Conditions and Information for NIH Grants.
Recipients of federal financial assistance (FFA) from HHS must administer their programs in compliance with federal civil rights laws that prohibit discrimination on the basis of race, color, national origin, disability, age and, in some circumstances, religion, conscience, and sex. This includes ensuring programs are accessible to persons with limited English proficiency. The HHS Office for Civil Rights provides guidance on complying with civil rights laws enforced by HHS. Please see https://www.hhs.gov/civil-rights/for-providers/provider-obligations/index.html and http://www.hhs.gov/ocr/civilrights/understanding/section1557/index.html.
HHS recognizes that research projects are often limited in scope for many reasons that are nondiscriminatory, such as the principal investigator’s scientific interest, funding limitations, recruitment requirements, and other considerations. Thus, criteria in research protocols that target or exclude certain populations are warranted where nondiscriminatory justifications establish that such criteria are appropriate with respect to the health or safety of the subjects, the scientific study design, or the purpose of the research. For additional guidance regarding how the provisions apply to NIH grant programs, please contact the Scientific/Research Contact that is identified in Section VII under Agency Contacts of this FOA.
Please contact the HHS Office for Civil Rights for more information about obligations and prohibitions under federal civil rights laws at https://www.hhs.gov/ocr/about-us/contact-us/index.html or call 1-800-368-1019 or TDD 1-800-537-7697.
In accordance with the statutory provisions contained in Section 872 of the Duncan Hunter National Defense Authorization Act of Fiscal Year 2009 (Public Law 110-417), NIH awards will be subject to the Federal Awardee Performance and Integrity Information System (FAPIIS) requirements. FAPIIS requires Federal award making officials to review and consider information about an applicant in the designated integrity and performance system (currently FAPIIS) prior to making an award. An applicant, at its option, may review information in the designated integrity and performance systems accessible through FAPIIS and comment on any information about itself that a Federal agency previously entered and is currently in FAPIIS. The Federal awarding agency will consider any comments by the applicant, in addition to other information in FAPIIS, in making a judgement about the applicant’s integrity, business ethics, and record of performance under Federal awards when completing the review of risk posed by applicants as described in 45 CFR Part 75.205 Federal awarding agency review of risk posed by applicants. This provision will apply to all NIH grants and cooperative agreements except fellowships.
The following special terms of award are in addition to, and not in lieu of, otherwise applicable OMB administrative guidelines, HHS grant administration regulations at 45 CFR Part 75, and other HHS PHS, and NIH grant administration policies.
The administrative and funding instrument used for this program will be the cooperative agreement U01, an "assistance" mechanism (rather than an "acquisition" mechanism), in which substantial NIH programmatic involvement with the awardees is anticipated during the performance of the activities. Under the cooperative agreement, the NIH purpose is to support and stimulate the recipients' activities by involvement in and otherwise working jointly with the award recipients in a partnership role; it is not to assume direction, prime responsibility, or a dominant role in the activities. Consistent with this concept, the dominant role and prime responsibility resides with the awardees for the project as a whole, although specific tasks and activities may be shared among the awardees and the NIH as defined below.
The PD(s)/PI(s) will have the primary responsibility for:
NIH staff have substantial programmatic involvement that is above and beyond the normal stewardship role in awards, as described below:
Areas of Joint Responsibility include:
Through the Awardee and NIH staff, HPAP will determine criteria and processes for quality control of information and data to be posted for the research community, consistent with NIH policies and achieving the goals of the program as described in the Funding Opportunity Announcement. There will be an annual face-to-face meeting of HPAP and at least one other HPAP meeting (teleconference or face-to-face meeting) annually. These meetings could be combined with the annual meetings of the HPAC. The HPAP PD/PI, the HPAP Project Scientist, the HPAP Program Official and the Chair of the HPAP Expert Scientific Panel are expected to attend these meetings.
Steering Committee
The HPAP Awardee agrees to the governance of the HPAP through a Steering Committee of the HPAC.
HIRN Trans-Network Committee (HIRN-TNC)
The HIRN-TNC will consist of: the PD/PI of the HIREC and the Steering Committee Chairs and Project Scientists of the HIRN scientific consortia (CHIB, CTAR, CMAI, CBDS and HPAC); the TNC is not a governing body and does not cast votes.
The TNC will facilitate communication and foster collaboration across the different consortia.
The TNC will be responsible for organizing the yearly HIRN Scientific Investigator’s Retreat.
The TNC will meet by teleconference at least twice a year and will be organized by the HIREC. Subcommittees of HIRN, as well as working groups for scientific planning may be established and require participation by HPAC members through in-person, electronic, or teleconference meetings, as appropriate. The HIREC is responsible for providing and maintaining a record of minutes of all TNC meetings, which will be approved by the TNC.
Expert Scientific Panel (ESP)
An independent panel of 2-3 External Experts will be appointed by the NIDDK and meet by teleconference with the HPAC Project Scientist and the HPAC Project Officer at least once a year. The HPAC-ESP will be updated on progress and give feedback to NIH on adjustments and future directions for the HPAC research projects (including HPAP). On an annual basis, and following input from the ESP members, NIDDK staff will appoint an ESP Chair who will be required to attend the annual HIRN Investigator Scientific Retreat, to participate to the HPAC Steering Committee meetings as ex-officio, and to serve as the HPAC-ESP representative to the larger HIRN-ESP that will also meet once a year. The HPAC ESP Chair will be tasked with relaying the HPAC Steering Committee recommendations for new Opportunity Funds Initiatives to the HIRN-ESP. All HPAC-ESP members will also be invited to listen as ex-officio to HPAC Steering Committee meetings. Members of the HPAC-ESP may be asked, on an ad hoc basis, in the peer review of applications for new research applications that request opportunity pool funds. The HIREC will support costs for teleconferences between the ESP and the HPAC Steering Committee, will arrange the HPAC-ESP and HIRN-ESP teleconferences, maintain a record of minutes, and support costs for the HPAC-ESP chair to participate in the annual HIRN Investigator Scientific Retreat.
Dispute Resolution
Disagreements that may arise in scientific/technical matter or programmatic matters (within the scope of the award) between award recipients and the NIH may be brought to arbitration after first attempting to resolve the issue through the Steering Committee or its subcommittees, as appropriate. An Arbitration Panel composed of three members will be convened. It will have three members: a designee of the Steering Committee chosen without NIH staff voting, one NIH designee, and a third designee with expertise in the relevant area who is chosen by the other two; in the case of individual disagreement, the first member may be chosen by the individual awardee. This special dispute resolution procedures in no way affect the awardee's right to appeal an adverse action in accordance with PHS regulations at 42 CFR Part 50, Subpart D, and HHS regulations at 45 CFR Part 16.
A final RPPR, invention statement, and the expenditure data portion of the Federal Financial Report are required for closeout of an award, as described in the NIH Grants Policy Statement.
The Federal Funding Accountability and Transparency Act of 2006 (Transparency Act), includes a requirement for awardees of Federal grants to report information about first-tier subawards and executive compensation under Federal assistance awards issued in FY2011 or later. All awardees of applicable NIH grants and cooperative agreementsare required to report to the Federal Subaward Reporting System (FSRS) available at www.fsrs.gov on all subawards over $25,000. See the NIH Grants Policy Statement for additional information on this reporting requirement.
In accordance with the regulatory requirements provided at 45 CFR 75.113 and Appendix XII to 45 CFR Part 75, recipients that have currently active Federal grants, cooperative agreements, and procurement contracts from all Federal awarding agencies with a cumulative total value greater than $10,000,000 for any period of time during the period of performance of a Federal award, must report and maintain the currency of information reported in the System for Award Management (SAM)about civil, criminal, and administrative proceedings in connection with the award or performance of a Federal award that reached final disposition within the most recent five-year period. The recipient must also make semiannual disclosures regarding such proceedings.Proceedings information will be made publicly available in the designated integrity and performance system (currently FAPIIS). This is a statutory requirement under section 872 of Public Law 110-417, as amended (41 U.S.C. 2313). As required by section 3010 of Public Law 111-212, all information posted in the designated integrity and performance system on or after April 15, 2011, except past performance reviews required for Federal procurement contracts, will be publicly available. Full reporting requirements and procedures are found in Appendix XII to 45 CFR Part 75 Award Term and Conditions for Recipient Integrity and Performance Matters.
We encourage inquiries concerning this funding opportunity and welcome the opportunity to answer questions from potential applicants.
eRA Service Desk (Questions regarding ASSIST, eRA Commons, application errors and warnings, documenting system problems that threatensubmission by the due date, and post-submission issues)
Finding Help Online:http://grants.nih.gov/support/(preferred method of contact)
Telephone: 301-402-7469 or 866-504-9552 (Toll Free)
General Grants Information (Questions regarding application instructions, application processes, and NIH grant resources)
Email:[email protected](preferred method of contact)
Telephone: 301-945-7573
Grants.gov Customer Support(Questions regarding Grants.gov registration and Workspace)
Contact Center Telephone: 800-518-4726
Email:[email protected]
Xujing Wang
National Institute of Diabetes and Digestive and Kidney Diseases (NIDDK)
Telephone: 301-451-2862
Email: [email protected]
Najma Begum, Ph.D.
National Institute of Diabetes and Digestive and Kidney Diseases (NIDDK)
Telephone: 301-594-8894
Email: [email protected]
Craig Bagdon
National Institute of Diabetes and Digestive and Kidney Diseases (NIDDK)
Telephone: 301-594-2115
Email: [email protected]
Recently issued trans-NIH policy notices may affect your application submission. A full list of policy notices published by NIH is provided in the NIH Guide for Grants and Contracts. All awards are subject to the terms and conditions, cost principles, and other considerations described in the NIH Grants Policy Statement.
Awards are made under the authorization of Sections 301 and 405 of the Public Health Service Act as amended (42 USC 241 and 284) and under Federal Regulations 42 CFR Part 52 and 45 CFR Part 75.
This FOA is supported under the authority of P.L. 116-136, Coronavirus Aid, Relief, and Economic Security (CARES) Act; Section 3832. Diabetes Programs.