Purpose

The Intramural Grants Program (IGP) is for all Augusta University investigators and is designed to assist and encourage faculty to develop research programs that can successfully compete for extramural funding, encourage collaborations, and to bridge funds when applicable. The major objective of this program is to provide funding to initiate or refine a project and acquire the necessary preliminary data for submission of a major extramural grant application to a federal agency, national foundation, or other external funding entity.

This program will include the following types of applications:

  • Pilot projects – funding for all disciplines to assist faculty with initiating research projects or producing pilot data for extramural grant applications.  Priority will be given to applications designed to produce pilot data for extramural grant applications that target Federal programs (e.g., NIH, NSF, NEH, DARPA, DOE, DOED, DOD or equivalent).
  • Bridge projects – funds that will allow faculty who have lost, or anticipate a loss of peer-reviewed extramural funding and have significant potential for future extramural funding. The primary goal is to enable faculty to continue their research, during competing renewal submissions, by keeping teams together and maintain lab productivity as they seek to restore their funding. Priority will be given to faculty with an NIH, NSF, NEH, DARPA, DOE, DOED, DOD or equivalent.
  • Translational/Interdisciplinary/Collaborative projects – the development of multidisciplinary, translational and interdisciplinary research teams from diverse disciplines to address important areas of investigation identified by the NIH or other Federal or State roadmap. 

Contact Us

Intramural Grants Program

pilotgrants@augusta.edu

FAQ's

What happens if my application is submitted late?

Late applications are not accepted; applicants would have to resubmit an updated application on the next cycle.

Are resubmissions allowed?

Unsuccessful IGP applications may be resubmitted one time after substantial revisions, and must include an introduction detailing any changes made. Applications that are substantially similar to proposals that were unsuccessful after two rounds of intramural review will be administratively withdrawn.

 

Eligibility

All full-time Augusta University (AU) faculty are eligible to apply. Faculty with voluntary (“clinical” or “adjunct”) appointments are not eligible. Applicants may only hold one active Intramural Grants Program award at a time as the sole principal investigator. A faculty member with a current intramural award may participate as one of the Multi-PIs (MPI) on a collaborative project.

Faculty who are receiving intramural funding from any other institutional source must demonstrate that there is no scientific or budgetary overlap with this application.

Applicants with start-up and residual funds in excess of $50,000 are not eligible. An exception to this rule may be made in the case of Translational, Interdisciplinary and/or Collaborative projects, where the applicants (i.e., several collaborators) have definitive plans to submit a program project grant application, or a large multi-PI application (i.e., larger than the normal modular budget) on an NIH or an equivalent grant. Research Incentive Account balances will not impact eligibility for funding.

Awards

Awards are made for a one-year period.

The types of projects which may be submitted include:

  • Bridge requests - applicants including a summary statement from an unfunded competing renewal application related to an ongoing extramural award may request up to $75,000. Extramural awards that cannot be renewed (e.g. NIH R21 grants) are not eligible for bridge funds.
  • All other applicants may request up to $30,000.

 

The required outcome from the grant award will be: 1) Preparation of a proposal to obtain external funding from a federal agency or national foundation; and 2) Final progress report and annual updates of publications and extramural submissions/awards, and any other relevant project outcomes. Importantly, the expected outcomes need to be explicitly described.

Application Deadline

Applications will be accepted three times a year: March 15, July 15 and November 15. When the deadline falls on a holiday or weekend, applications will be accepted on the next business day.

Resubmission

Unsuccessful IGP applications may be resubmitted one time after substantial revisions, and must include an introduction detailing any changes made. Applications that are substantially similar to proposals that were unsuccessful after two rounds of intramural review will be administratively withdrawn.

Applicant Submission

Applications must be submitted using the InfoReady Portal, augusta.infoready4.com. If an applicant has multiple documents to upload for a single section, please combine all documents into a single PDF before upload.  Use an Arial typeface and 11-point font size. (A Symbol font may be used to insert Greek letters or special characters; the font size requirement still applies.) Type density, including characters and spaces, must be no more than 15 characters per inch. Type may be no more than six lines per inch. Use black ink that can be clearly copied.                              

Proposal Section:
  1. Research Description Abstract – Two hundred fifty (250) words maximum.  Where possible, use language appropriate to the non-specialist scientific reader in the abstract. Remember that not all members of review committees and funding councils will be specialists in your particular field.

 

Upload section includes:
  1. InfoEd Routing – A completed and electronically signed Intramural routing sheet is required. InfoEd is AU’s electronic routing system and preferred method for routing proposals. To submit your proposal for review, log in to InfoEd and complete all required fields. System will generate emails to the appropriate financial and administrative leaders for approval. 
  2. Faculty Track Record Form – For Multi-PI proposals, each PI is required to submit their own Faculty Track Record Form.  Successful grant funding following prior IGP support should be highlighted. 
  3. Letter of Support from the Department Chair or Center/Institute Director - Include a letter from the department chair or center/institute director outlining their support for your protected time for this project as well as support for the space, equipment, and other facilities required to conduct this project.  For Multi-PI proposals, each PI is required to submit their own Letter of Support from the respective department chair or center/ institute director if the faculty reside in different departments.
  4. Detailed budget and budget justification - On a separate page, provide an itemized justification including the percent effort for all individuals to be devoted to the project, including the use of AU Core Labs. Budgets that are not clearly justified run the risk of being administratively reduced. Facility and Administration costs are not permitted.

 

The following categories are the only costs allowed for this program:

  • Non-faculty Personnel (Postdoctoral fellows, graduate students, technician salaries, etc.)
  • Supplies
  • Consultants
  • Core Facilities
  • Animal care related expenditures

Faculty salaries are not allowed. Travel, subawards, publication costs, and equipment expenses are not allowed. Refer to Guidance for subawards versus contractor determination. Equipment is defined as any individual item costing $5,000 or more.

  1. Copy of reviewer comments (summary statement), if applicable and available.

Introduction to Application (for Intramural Grants Program resubmissions only) (~2 pages) - In response to a previous unfunded Intramural Grants Program review, summarize the substantial additions, deletions, and changes to the application and outline responses to the issues and criticism raised.

  1. Research Plan - The overall length of the research plan, A-C, should not exceed 5 pages, and should follow the general guidelines set forth in sections A-C below.
    1. Goals and Specific Aims - (~1 page) Include a clearly stated hypothesis, and describe how your experiments will test this hypothesis.
    2. Innovation and Significance - (~1 page) Include a brief literature review, focusing on the significance of the problem and the gaps in existing knowledge. Provide a concise statement of the relevance of the research to human disease.
    3. Research Design and Methods – (3 pages) Describe the proposed experiments, including appropriate Where alternative approaches exist, justify the choice of methods and state which are new to the investigator. For new methods, include the plans for putting these techniques in place. Consider potential pitfalls for key experiments.
    4. Plan for Extramural funding – Cite specific program announcements, areas of desired portfolio growth within NIH institutes or centers, or Roadmap, or other national funding agencies that the proposed research addresses. Include web links if available. If this application is for bridge funding and a recent summary statement is available from the external funding agency, describe the plan for responding to the most notable concerns.
    5. References Cited

 

  1. NIH or NSF Biosketch (preferred) or Curriculum Vitae (CV) – for the Principal Investigator and all faculty participations.
  2. Other financial support - List all currently active and pending support, including any institutional intramural funding for all Key Personnel. List the specific aims of current and pending support and whether there is any scientific overlap with the proposed Intramural Grants Program work.

 

Applications will be accepted prior to approval by the IRB, IACUC, Radiation Safety, Institutional Biosafety, and Institutional Chemical Committees, as well as Wellstar Medical College of Georgia Hospital (WMCGH) approval. However, no funds will be provided or expended until all applicable regulatory approvals are in place.

Application Review and Criteria for Funding

A Research Advisory Committee composed of faculty from Augusta University will review and rank the proposals and submit recommendations to the Senior Vice President for Research. The Funding Council (consisting of the Senior Vice President for Research and the Research AVPs) will consider both programmatic needs as well as scientific merit from the recommendations and determine final awards based on the following priority criteria:

  • The merit and quality of the application. 
  • Likelihood of achieving significant extramural funding.
  • The productivity of investigators, which includes the number of recent extramural applications submitted (as appropriate for the investigator’s discipline and stage of his/her career)
  • Type of project [i.e., pilot, bridge, collaborative, and interdisciplinary projects (e.g., across departments and colleges)].
  • The level of support by the applicant’s home department.
  • Evaluation of other available institutional funds.
  • Submissions for which extramural reviews (e.g. NIH Summary Statements) are shared, and for which the PI's IGP submission addresses requested modifications, will be given preferential consideration in borderline funding decisions.
  • Multi-PI submissions will be given preferential consideration in borderline funding decisions.

 

The recommendations from the review committee on issues of scientific merit or institutional priority are not subject to appeal and should be addressed in a revised application. Administrative appeals based on conflict of interest or other issues of procedure will be considered by the Senior Vice President for Research. Available critiques will be transmitted to the applicant after the meeting of the Funding Council.

Conditions of Award

Funded proposals are awarded for one year and typically “no cost extensions” are not allowed.

If you answered yes on your routing sheet that Wellstar Medical College of Georgia Hospital (WMCGH) resources (which includes patients, facilities, equipment, personnel, and medical records) will be involved, then your proposal must be submitted to the Clinical & Translational Sciences Research Development Services (CTSRDS@augusta.edu) for review and to obtain WMCGH approval, if necessary. Approvals must also be obtained from other AU oversight entities as appropriate for the project, such as IRB, IACUC, Biosafety, etc.

The Principal Investigator along with their Department Manager will be informed via e-mail of the account number and the project period.

Unexpended funds will not be carried over beyond the project period. The award date will be established after all required approvals are in place. All institutional approvals must be in place within three months of receiving notification of the award or the award will be revoked.

Funded proposals should adhere to the budget as approved. Re-budgeting requires written approval of Sponsored Program Administration. Unauthorized charges (any expenses charged to the account that do not specifically relate to the project and are not included in the reviewed budget and justification) must be removed within five business days of notification.

Final Reports

A final report is due at the end of every award, and yearly updates will be requested. A final report template will be e-mailed to the Principal Investigator at closeout. The final report should describe progress towards the original goals of the project, including any abstract submissions to national/ international scientific meetings, peer reviewed journal articles (submitted, in press, published), and extramural applications submitted, students or trainees that participated in the conduct of the project, and awards received that were assisted by the Intramural Grants Program award. These reports will also be used to assess the Intramural Grants program return on investment. Publications should credit the support of the Augusta University Intramural Grants Program.

AU’s Intramural Grants Program Administrative Contact: PILOTGRANTS@AUGUSTA.EDU

Applicant Submission and Preparation

Applications must be submitted using the InfoReady Portal. If an applicant has multiple documents to upload for a single section, please combine all documents into a single PDF before upload. View this demonstration video.

Links ( link icon ) and downloadable content ( file-download icon ) are indicated by the icons below.

1. InfoEd Routing

A completed and signed Intramural routing sheet in AU's electronic routing system eSproute is required. To submit your proposal for review, log in to eSProute and complete all required fields. The system will generate emails to the appropriate financial and administrative leaders for approval. Please note training and validation are required for use of eSProute.

2. Faculty Track Record Form

4. Detailed Budget and Budget Justification

Budgets that are not clearly justified run the risk of being administratively reduced. 

9. Other financial support

List all currently active and pending support, including any institutional intramural funding. List the specific aims of current and pending support and whether there is any scientific overlap with the proposed Intramural Grants Program work.

 

Applications will be accepted prior to required approvals, if applicable, by the IRB, IACUC, Radiation Safety, Institutional Biosafety, and Institutional Chemical Committees, as well as WMCGH approval. However no funds will be awarded until all applicable regulatory approvals are in place.

Guidelines are available on the Tools for Researchers webpage.