NIH has issued guidance on the resumption of extramural activities following the recent lapse in appropriations (NOT-OD-14-003).
eRA Systems Availability
- eRA systems will be available for use by the applicant/grantee/reviewer community on Monday, October 21.
Rescheduling October Application Due Dates
- All October grant application due dates have been rescheduled. Follow this link for the revised deadlines. November grant application due dates will not change (with the exception of the loan repayment program).
Processing of Applications Submitted During the Shutdown
- Applications submitted since October 1 have been held at Grants.gov and will be processed by NIH’s eRA systems on Monday October 21st, once NIH makes eRA systems available.
- Please proactively check the Commons late on Monday or on Tuesday for the status of any application submission. The timing of system notifications may not be quite right during the first few days of processing. Note it may take a number of hours to process the queue of applications in Grants.gov, so please be patient!
Replacing an Application that was Submitted for an October Due Date
- Since October application due dates are moving to November, NIH is giving applicants who have already submitted an application for an October due date the opportunity to replace the submission with a “refreshed” application. Follow this link to the guidance if you choose to submit a replacement application.
Rescheduling Peer Review Meetings
- The shutdown required that NIH cancel over 200 peer review meetings, impacting the review of over 11,000 applications. The volume of missed meetings complicates NIH efforts to catch up.
- Applications that were reviewed before the shutdown will go to January council as originally planned. Review meetings for most small business, AIDS and fellowship applications will continue as planned and those applications will be considered at January councils as well.
- Many review meetings for research grants (R01, R03, R21, R15, etc) and career development applications that were missed or will be missed due to the shutdown will be rescheduled for February/March and these applications will be reassigned to the May council round.
Opportunity to “Refresh” Applications that are Reassigned to May 2014 Council
- Applicants whose review meetings are rescheduled and whose applications are reassigned to the May 2014 Council and will be notified via email to the principal investigator and the signing official listed on the grant application. In addition, meeting dates listed in the eRA Commons for these applications for will be changed to 09/09/9999 so they can be identified.
- Applications will proceed to the February/March 2014 review without any action from the applicant. However, NIH is giving applicants the option of withdrawing and submitting a refreshed application. If you choose to replace your application, follow the steps detailed in NOT-OD-14-003 carefully-
Early Stage Investigator Eligibility
- NIH will automatically adjust the Early Stage Investigator (ESI) status for applicants whose status has changed during the period of delay caused by the shutdown.
K99/R00 Eligibility
- Information updating timelines for the K99/R00 NIH Pathway to Independence Award program will be issued separately.
Payment Management System
- Payments through the Payment Management System (PMS) should be processing as usual. If grantees received a communication during the shutdown that a drawdown request was on hold, please contact PMS directly to determine the status of that pending request.
Award Actions
- NIH anticipates beginning to release awards sometime after November 1.
Financial Operations under a Continuing Resolution
- NIH soon will publish a Notice on our financial operations under a continuing resolution.
