What Happens to Your Grant Application: A Primer for New Applicants
Your application is assigned to a review group and an NIH Institute or Center
One or more CSR Referral Officers examine your application and determine the most appropriate Integrated Review Group (IRG) to assess its scientific and technical merit. Your application is then assigned to one of the IRG’s study sections. A study section typically includes 20 or more scientists from the community of productive researchers. Your application also will be assigned to the NIH Institute or Center (IC) best suited to fund your application should it have sufficient merit. (More than one IC may be assigned if appropriate.)
Referral Officers follow established guidelines that define the review boundaries of each study section. These boundaries frequently overlap, and more than one study section may have the expertise to review your application. You may request in a cover letter with your application that it be assigned to a particular study section or IC. The CSR referral office seriously considers such requests.
The combined expertise of the scientists in a study section is intended to span the breadth and diversity of the science it covers. CSR may recruit temporary reviewers or secure mail reviews from outside consultants.
Checking the status of your application
As soon as your application is received and assigned to a study section, information is posted to your online NIH Commons account. Information on the Commons and how to register is available on the Commons Web site. You may question either your study section or IC assignment by contacting the Scientific Review Officer (SRO) named in your notification or the CSR referral office (301-435-0715). It usually takes weeks to refer the thousands of applications submitted each round. If inforamtion is not posted in your Commons account within 2 weeks of the submission date, contact the referral office.
Reviewers are identified
Your SRO will analyze the content of your application, check for completeness and compliance with policies, and decide which reviewers can best evaluate it. Reviewers have access to your application approximately 6 weeks before their meeting. Each application is assigned to three or more reviewers, and at least two of them provide written critiques. These assigned reviewers lead the discussions at the meeting.
Make sure your application is complete and correct when you submit it because there are significant limits on the kinds of post-submission information you may submit. Contact your SRO if you have questions about what is possible.
Before the study section meets, reviewers confidentially submit to CSR preliminary critiques. Reviewers also assign preliminary scores for each review criterion and for the overall impact of the application. Reviewers also assign preliminary scores for each review criterion and for the overall impact of the application. The SRO then uses the preliminary overall impact scores to order the reviews. Applications in the lower half are not typically discussed. This does not mean they are disapproved. Applicants may resubmit a better application after considering the critiques they receive.
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The review meeting is convened
Study sections convene for 1 to 2 days. One member serves as chair and conducts the meeting with the SRO. Relevant NIH program staff is encouraged to attend, but they do not participate in the evaluation. Assigned reviewers present their evaluations and outside opinions are read. After a general discussion, reviewers privately submit priority scores to CSR.
The results are released to you
Within a few days after the meeting, your priority score and percentile ranking are available to you online via the NIH Commons. Within a month, your summary statement will be available via your NIH Commons account. It will include (1) the written critiques produced by the assigned reviewers, (2) SRO’s summary of the study section’s discussion, (3) preliminary scores for each review criterion, (4) study section recommendations, and (4) administrative notes of special consideration. For new investigators submitting R01 applications, their summary statements are posted within 10 days after the meeting. If your application was not discussed, you will receive the reviewer critiques and preliminary scores for each review criterion.
The assigned NIH Institute or Center takes charge
After the review, an IC Program Officer will be your main point of contact. He or she may help interpret your review results or answer questions about the further consideration of your application. In a second level of peer review, IC Advisory Councils may consider the study section’s recommendations and determine the relevance of your proposed research to IC priorities and public health needs.
Download a handout of this Web page
Get More Information on Peer Review at CSR
NIH Peer Review Revealed Video
How Scientists Are Selected for Study Section Service
Guidelines Given to Reviewers
Resources for Applicants
Get General Grant Information
The NIH Office of Extramural Research Grants (OER) Web page provides a wealth of information on funding opportunities, grant application forms, instructions, and policies. It also operates the NIH GrantsInfo service, which can be contacted via e-mail (grantsinfo@nih.gov) or phone (301 435-0714). In addition, the OER Web site provides information on the peer review policies and procedures pertaining to all NIH components that conduct peer reviews.