Faculty Facilitator

Faculty Facilitator

Latest — Jul 14, 2025

Establishing Feasibility in NIH Grants

Rigor and Feasibility are one of the 3 key factors NIH grants are scored on under the new evaluation framework. Feasibility is most commonly established within the Approach section of the Research Strategy, however other components of the grant can also be used to establish feasibility. Research Strategy: Approach The

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Lab Hours

“When do I need to be here?” said the graduate student. “Whenever you need to be to make sufficient progress.” replied the PI. This response gives many well-meaning graduate students just enough rope to hang themselves. What if you can't make progress no matter how many hours you

Leaving with an Unpublished Paper

Grad students and postdocs often leave a lab with unpublished data. Often, when the work is eventually published the author list is not what was anticipated. This can cause hurt feelings and if someone was really counting on those first author publications coming through, career progression. At the same time

Sick Days

If you are sick, you should take a sick day. When you are sick, you don’t have the attention, patience, or clarity of thought you have when you are well. Consequently, your interactions with people suffer, the work you produce will be subpar, and you expose everyone around you

Formatting Grants

Properly formatting your grant is essential for ensuring its comprehensibility to reviewers, which facilitates their ability to understand and promote your work. It can also help ensure that your documents are fully compliant with sponsor guidelines. Labeling sections and subsections All grants have required sections and subsections. These need to

Preliminary Data

Preliminary Data serve two purposes in a grant application. The first is to establish feasibility at the conceptual level. The second is to establish feasibility at the technical level. Each goes in a different location in an R01 application. In Approach, before Aims For most grant applications there is some

The Importance of Department Seminars

Many trainees underestimate the importance of attending department seminars. It is very easy to get wrapped up in doing experiments, and there are lab meetings, meetings with faculty, and other events that all demand time. The topics presented can seem at best tangentially related to your project, research interests and

NIH Roles and Responsibilities

While many scientists use terms such as "Collaborator" and "Co-investigator" interchangeably, the NIH has specific definitions for these terms as well as other terms used to define roles and responsibilities for individuals associated with grants. It's important that the correct term is used to

Picking a Good Project

Being the primary on a good project is essential for your career. A good project is fundable, will yield multiple publications, instigate new areas of research, and give you something interesting to talk about both personally and professionally. A good project has two key features: funding and interest. Funding Without

How to apply to graduate school in the United States

In the United States, you apply to a PhD program, not to an individual PI as is common in many other countries. Most graduate school applications are due in late fall or early winter. Applications are reviewed by a committee of faculty who then invite a subset of applicants for