2005 NIH Director's Pioneer Award Program Opens
The National Institutes of Health announces the 2005 NIH Director's
Pioneer Award, a key component of the NIH Roadmap for Medical Research.
"The Pioneer Award supports scientists of exceptional creativity
who take innovative approaches to major challenges in biomedical
research," said NIH Director Elias A. Zerhouni, M.D. "We
look forward to adding a new cohort of visionary thinkers to the
outstanding group of scientists chosen in the first year of this
program."
Unlike other NIH grants, which support research projects, the
Pioneer Award supports individual scientists. The award gives recipients
the intellectual freedom to pursue new research directions and
highly innovative ideas that have the potential for unusually great
impact.
The program is open to scientists at all career levels. The scientists
may currently be engaged in any field of research provided they
are interested in exploring biomedically relevant topics and willing
to commit the major portion of their effort to Pioneer Award research.
Awardees must be U.S. citizens, non-citizen nationals, or permanent
residents.
In September 2005, NIH expects to make five to ten new Pioneer
Awards of up to $500,000 in direct costs per year for five years.
The first nine Pioneer Awards were made in September 2004 and support
scientists working on a variety of challenging scientific problems.
The self-nomination process includes a three- to five-page essay,
a biographical sketch, a list of current research support and the
names of three references. Nominations may be submitted between
March 1 and April 1, 2005, on the Pioneer Award Web site, http://nihroadmap.nih.gov/pioneer.
"To maximize the diversity of those considered for Pioneer
Awards, we encourage nominations from women, members of groups
that are underrepresented in biomedical research, individuals in
the early to middle stages of their careers, and scientists working
in fields that have not traditionally been supported by NIH," said
Jeremy M. Berg, Ph.D., director of the National Institute of General
Medical Sciences. Dr. Berg and Nora D. Volkow, M.D., director of
the National Institute on Drug Abuse, are co-chairs of the NIH
committee that oversees the Pioneer Award program.
The complete Pioneer Award announcement is posted at http://grants1.nih.gov/grants/guide/notice-files/NOT-OD-05-021.html.
The NIH, a part of the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services,
is the primary Federal agency for conducting and supporting medical
research. More information about the NIH can be found on its Web
site: http://www.nih.gov.
The NIH Roadmap is a series of far-reaching initiatives designed
to transform the nation's medical research capabilities and speed
the movement of research discoveries from the bench to the bedside.
It provides a framework of the priorities the NIH must address
in order to optimize its entire research portfolio and lays out
a vision for a more efficient and productive system of medical
research. For more information about the NIH Roadmap, please visit
the Web site at: http://www.nihroadmap.nih.gov.
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