NIH funds biomedical research infrastructure networks

Bethesda, MD—The National Institutes of Health (NIH) announced today that it has awarded 24 grants, totaling approximately $45 million, to biomedical research institutions located in states that have not fully participated in NIH grant funding in the past. The awards, funded through the Institutional Development Award (IDeA) Program, enhance biomedical research capacity among academic institutions and research institutions within the 23 states* and Puerto Rico that are eligible to participate.

The National Center for Research Resources (NCRR), the NIH component that administers the IDeA Program, has awarded the grants to the following institutions, each representing a Biomedical Research Infrastructure Network (BRIN):

University of Alaska, Fairbanks
University of Arkansas for Medical Sciences, Little Rock
University of Delaware, Newark
University of Hawaii at Manoa
University of Idaho, Moscow
University of Kansas Medical Center, Kansas City
University of Louisville, Kentucky
Louisiana State University and A&M College, Baton Rouge
Mount Desert Island Biological Laboratory, Salisbury Cove, Maine
University of Southern Mississippi, Hattiesburg
Montana State University, Bozeman
University of Nebraska Medical Center, Omaha
University of Nevada, Reno
University of New Hampshire, Durham
New Mexico State University, Las Cruces
University of North Dakota, Grand Forks
University of Oklahoma Health Sciences Center, Oklahoma City
University of Rhode Island, Kingston
University of South Carolina, Columbia
University of South Dakota, Vermillion
University of Vermont, Burlington
Marshall University, Huntington, West Virginia
University of Wyoming, Laramie
University of Puerto Rico Rio Piedras

The grants will enable each of these institutions to establish a BRIN, a subcomponent of the IDeA Program. Through BRIN, the grantee institutions will develop areas of potential research through staff development and access to research resources. Specifically, the program provides funding to:

• Bring together institutions within a state to establish the network;
• Make institutional alterations and renovations;
• Improve laboratory equipment; and
• Assist in the recruitment of new faculty

While each BRIN will have unique characteristics depending on a state's infrastructure needs, the ultimate purpose of a network is to build an effective research base that will eventually lead to competitive research applications from multidisciplinary research teams.

"BRIN offers a unique opportunity for institutions within each eligible state to work together to increase that state's capacity to support and conduct important biomedical research," said Dr. Ruth Kirschstein, NIH Acting Director.

States eligible to apply for grants funded through the IDeA Program are those that received less than $70 million in NIH funding on average from 1995 to 1999 or had an NIH grant award success rate of less than 20 percent over that period. In 1998, investigators from the 23 eligible IDeA states and Puerto Rico accounted for only 8 percent of the total number of research grant applications received by NIH.

*Current IDeA-eligible states: Alaska, Arkansas, Delaware, Hawaii, Idaho, Kansas, Kentucky, Louisiana, Maine, Mississippi, Montana, Nebraska, Nevada, New Hampshire, New Mexico, North Dakota, Oklahoma, Rhode Island, South Carolina, South Dakota, Vermont, West Virginia, and Wyoming. Puerto Rico also is eligible to participate in IDeA.

NCRR is this nation's leading Federal sponsor of resources that enable advances in many areas of biomedical research. NCRR support provides the scientific research community with access to a diverse array of biomedical research technologies, instrumentation, specialized basic and clinical research facilities, animal models (mammalian and nonmammalian), genetic stocks, and such biomaterials as cell lines, tissues, and organs.