The National Institute on Aging (NIA) announces the availability of dissertation awards (R36) in all areas of research within the Institute's mandate to increase the diversity of the research workforce on aging. These awards are available to qualified predoctoral students in accredited research doctoral programs in the United States (including Puerto Rico and other U.S. territories or possessions).

Application Submission Dates: March 15, 2006; November 15, 2006; March 15, 2007; November 15, 2007; March 15, 2008.

Numerous National Institutes of Health (NIH) Institutes and Centers (ICs) as well as Agency for Health Care Research and Quality (AHRQ) have funded centers focusing on minority health research or health disparities research. This initiative would support complementary and alternative medicine (CAM) research at these same institutions encouraging investigators with broad understandings of issues in minority health or health disparities to undertake research on CAM. By utilizing the existing infrastructure of ongoing Centers and capitalizing on the research expertise of the investigators at such institutions, the investments of other NIH ICs can be enhanced by expanding the range of projects to include CAM.

This funding opportunity will use the Mentored Research Scientist Development (K01) award mechanism(s). As an applicant, you will be solely responsible for planning, directing, and executing the proposed project. This funding opportunity uses just-in-time concepts. It also uses the non-modular budget format described in the PHS 398 application instructions It is anticipated that the size and duration of each award will also vary. Salary up to $85,000 per year plus related fringe benefits will be provided. A research allowance of up to $50,000 per year will be provided. The project period may be 3, 4, or 5 years and will depend upon the number of years of prior research experience, and the need for additional experiences to achieve independence. Awards are not renewable.

The ultimate goal of this RFA is to support intervention research on health disparities that is jointly conducted by communities and researchers. This RFA will utilize the NIH resource-related research projects (R24) grant award mechanism. The total amount to be awarded is $4.5 million. The anticipated number of awards is 5-10. Eligible organizations include not-for-profit and for-profit, public or private organizations, units of state and local governments, eligible agencies of the Federal Government, domestic institutions/organizations, faith-based or community-based organizations, and Native American tribal organizations. Eligible principal investigators are any individuals with the skills, knowledge, and resources necessary to carry out the proposed research.

http://communityhealth.cdpublications.com/ (username: chf password: grants) Research Supplements to Promote Diversity in Health-Related Research A letter of intent is not required and applications can be received anytime. NIH anticipates allocating more than 1,000 supplements ranging from less than $5,000 to more than $75,000.

New NHLBI Contact Information for Research Supplements for Underrepresented Minorities (PA-01-079), and Individuals with Disabilities (PA-01-080) (NOT-HL-05-101) National Heart, Lung, and Blood Institute

Notice: NOT-OD-04-007 With this notice, the National Institutes of Health (NIH) modifies its policy on mentored career development awards (K Awards) to allow award recipients to hold concurrent support from their career award and a competing research grant when recognized as a Principal Investigator or subproject Director. Thus mentored career award recipients in the last two years of their support period will be permitted to reduce the level of effort required for the career award and replace that effort with an NIH research grant or subproject provided they remain in a mentored situation. This policy will permit those candidates who are ready to apply for and receive NIH research support to continue to benefit from the period of protected time offered by the career development award.

The National Institute of Arthritis and Musculoskeletal and Skin Diseases (NIAMS) is seeking small grant (R03) applications to stimulate and facilitate the entry of promising new investigators into areas of research of interest to the NIAMS. This solicitation will provide suport for pilot research that is likely to lead to a subsequent individual research project grant (R01)

The National Institute on Aging (NIA) is soliciting applications that use proteomic approaches to study age-related changes in protein structure and fuction. Proteomics research is expected to provide significant insights into the cellular and molecular mechanisms of aging and age-associated disease processes. This Request for Applications (RFA) encourages projects that advance research to identify and quantitate protein expression patterns, post-translational modification of proteins, and protein-protein interactions which may change in cells or tissues as a a direct result of the aging process or age-related pathology.

The Minority Group Self-Determination Fund is established by the United Methodist Church for the empowerment of racial and ethnic minority people within and outside the church. Instituted in 1970 by the General Conference of the United Methodist Church, the Fund has been affirmed by subsquent General Conferences and will be supported in the 1997-2000 quadrennium at approximately one million dollars each year of the quadrennium. The fund is administered by the General Commission on Religion and Race on behalf of the United Methodist Church, guided by the principle of self-determination. Projects rather than organizations are funded. Grants are available for suporting programs initiated, developed, controlled and administered by Asian, Black, Hispanic, Native American and Pacific-Islander groups The Minority Group Self-Determination Fund is committed to generating funds and/or supplemental funding.

The purpose of this initiative is to stimulate and expand research in the health of minority men. Specifically, this initiative is intended to: 1) enhance our understanding of the numerous factors (e.g., sociodemographic, community, societal, personal) influencing the health promoting behaviors of racial and ethnic minority males and their subpopulations across the life cycle, and 2) solicit applications focusing on the development and testing of culturally and linguistically appropriate health-promoting interventions designed to reduce health disparities among racially and ethnically diverse males and their subpopulations age 21 and older.

The purpose of this program is to increase the capacity of institutions and their faculty to conduct rigorous maternal and child health (MCH) applied research addressing issues relating to health disparities. The intent of the research infrastructure program is to strengthen the research environments of institutions through grant support to develop and/or expand existing capacities for conducting research in all areas of MCH care and services, which shows promise of substantial contribution to the advancement of current knowledge pool, and when used in States and communities should result in health and health services improvements.

PA -03-054: The National Instutite of Arthritis and Musculoskeletal and Skin Diseases (NIAMS) invites applications for research to promote the design, development and testing of hypothesis-driven innovative approaches to eliminating health, disparities in rheumatic, musculoskeletal, and skin diseases.

The Comprehensive Minority Biomedical Branch (CMBB), Officeof Centers, Training and Resources (OCTR), Office of the Deputy Director for Extramural Sciences (ODDES), National Cancer Institute (NCI), announces the availability of the Mentored Patient-Oriented Research for Underrepresented Minorities award for career development of underrepresented minorities in clinical oncology. This award provides specialized study for individuals with a health professional doctoral degree who are committed to a career in patient-oriented cancer research. Individuals with a Ph.D. or other doctoral degrees in clinical disciplines such as clinical psychology, nursing, clinical genetics, speech-language pathology, audiology and rehabilitation are also eligible.

The goals of this PA are to stimulate clinical research to advance knowledge about long-term care populations and to encourage testing of interventions to improve quality of life, health, and functional status of long-term care esidents. Another important goal of this PA is to encourage studies of interventions that can be translated into practice in current LTC environments.

The purpose of the Fiscal Year (FY) 2002 Health Disparities In Minority Health Grant Program is to support the elimination of health disparities among racial and ethnic populations (see definition of Minority Populations) through local small-scale projects which address a demonstrated health problem or health issue. This program is intended to demonstrate the merit of using local organizations to develop, implement, and conduct small-scale community-based projects which address health problems and issues related to health disparities in local minority communities.

The intent of the research infrastructure program is to strengthen the research environments of minority institutions through grant support to develop and/or expand existing capacities for conducting research in all areas of health services. Minority students will benefit from participation in projects as research assistants and will be encouraged to pursue careers in fields related to health services research.

The Agency for Healthcare Research and Quality (AHRQ) has awarded nearly $3 million for nine new research initiatives designed to build and strengthen the Nation's research infrastructure.

The National Institute of Diabetes and Digestive and Kidney Disease (NIDDK) recognizes the need to increase the racial and ethnic diversity of the pool of scientists in research areas important to the NIDDK. This program is aimed primarily at recently trained M.D. and/or Ph.D. investigators. The program will enable the applicant to accept a tenure-earning position, gain additional research experience while transitioning to independence, and obtain preliminary data on which to base a subsequent research grant application in an area of diabetes, endocrinology, metabolism, digestive diseases, hepatology, obesity, nutrition, kidney, urology, or hematology research.

The PhRMA Foundation recognizes the critical need for such well-trained scientific investigators. Accordingly, it wishes to encourage more qualified graduates to obtain postdoctoral research training in pharmaceutics. The Foundation seeks to achieve this goal by providing fellowships each year to qualified applicants who have the opportunity to become involved with mentors, facilities and programs that, collectively, can be expected to provide an excellent environment for the fellow. Applications will be accepted for postdoctoral research training extending over a minimum of one year and a maximum of two years. Each fellowship carries an annual stipend of $40,000 which can be supplemented by the sponsor and/or his/her institution.

Previous work by the Commonwealth Fund shows that minorities experience difficulties communicating with their health care providers. Patient Communication and Quality of Care is a new initiative within the Fund's Quaity of Care for Underserved populations program. The initiative is designed to identify causes and consequences of poor communication in medical settings and to evaluate methods to address communication barriers for underserved patients. As many as five grants of up to $125,000 each will be awarded under this initiative.