Interdisciplinary Health Research Training: Behavior, Environment, and Biology.

This request for applications (RFA) is developed as an NIH Roadmap initiative (described at http://nihroadmap.nih.gov/). All NIH institutes and centers participate in Roadmap initiatives. This RFA will be administered by the National institute of Mental Health (NIMH) on behalf of the NIH.

The institutes, centers, and offices of the NIH invite applications for Interdisciplinary Health Research Training: Behavior, Environment, and Biology. This institutional, postdoctoral National Research Service Award (NRSA) will support the establishment of programs that provide formal coursework and research training in a new interdisciplinary field to individuals holding advanced degrees in a different discipline. These training programs are required to include a behavioral or social science discipline, and we are especially interested in programs that integrate the behavioral and/or social sciences with the more traditional biomedical sciences. We encourage the development of programs that accept postdoctoral trainees with varied research backgrounds and provide multiple tracks of research training that enhance each trainee's development of new, interdisciplinary knowledge and skills, while supporting opportunities for trainee interaction and research integration across the research tracks.

The overall goal of NRSA training programs is to ensure that highly trained scientists will be available in adequate numbers and in appropriate scientific areas to carry out the biomedical and behavioral health research agenda of the United States. Many of our most pressing health problems involve disease processes that are influenced by biological, behavioral, and social environment factors. The purpose of this NRSA program is to help ensure the development of a cadre of scientists with the requisite skills and knowledge to integrate multiple scientific approaches and to work in interdisciplinary research teams to solve these complex health problems.

The NIH is engaged in a series of activities collectively known as the "NIH Roadmap" whose goal--in keeping with the NIH mission of uncovering new knowledge about the prevention, detection, diagnosis, and treatment of disease and disability--is to accelerate both the pace of discovery in these key areas and the translation of therapies from bench to bedside. In the course of developing the NIH Roadmap, it has become clear that increasingly, scientific advances are being made at the interfaces of traditional disciplines, and that approaches to science are becoming more integrative.

This requires a cooperative effort, typically in the form of investigators from diverse research backgrounds working collectively across traditional disciplinary boundaries to answer scientific questions and achieve specific end points. This also requires a workforce capable of crossing disciplinary boundaries and leading and participating in integrative and team approaches to complex health problems. Building research teams for the future has therefore emerged as one of the major themes in Roadmap implementation.

The NIH is particularly interested in developing a new interdisciplinary research workforce. An interdisciplinary approach is distinguished from a multidisciplinary approach in that a multidisciplinary approach brings experts from diverse disciplines to address collectively a common complex problem, each from his or her unique perspective. By contrast, an interdisciplinary approach is what results from the melding of two or more disciplines to create a new (interdisciplinary) science. Biophysics, biostatistics, bioinformatics, bioengineering, social neuroscience, biodemography, behavioral economics, and psychoneuroimmunology are just some of the examples of existing interdisciplinary sciences. The NIH recognizes the value and enormous contributions that existing interdisciplinary approaches have made and continue to make to our understanding of health, disease, and disability. However, the Roadmap is focused on developing new interdisciplinary approaches and therefore the necessary interdisciplinary worldforce.

The NIH is proposing a series of initiatives that aim to provide investigators with the training to effectively lead and engage in integrative and team approaches to complex biomedical problems. These initiatives fall into three categories: 1) programs for long-term interdisciplinary research training, 2) short-term courses and research experiences, and 3) curriculum development. Collectively, the initiatives provide opportunities for integration of disciplines at all stages of investigators' careers, facilitate communication among the disciplines, and ensure the development of necessary infrastructure to accomplish the building of the workforce for the research teams of the future. Common features of the proposed initiatives include having comprehensive integrative approaches to solving complex health problems; developing and implementing new curricula that integrate disparate disciplines; incorporating activities that promote cohesiveness among training program participants at all levels (faculty--student, student--student, and faculty--faculty); training in the personal and professional skills necessary to lead and participate in multidlsciplinary teams; outreach to the underrepresented minority community to ensure their participation; monitoring of student progress and outcome; and self-evaluation of the training program.

The NIH recognizes that multidisciplinary approaches may be a necessary step in the evolution of interdisciplinary research training. As such, the NIH currently offers many opportunities and mechanisms to support multidisciplinary research training. Thus, for the purposes of the Roadmap's interdisciplinary research training RFAs (including this announcement), activities that facilitate communication among different disciplines, promote but perhaps do not completely achieve integration of different disciplines in the proposed project period, or propose training in multidisclplinary approaches as a precursor to interdisciplinary research training are acceptable if they include a detailed plan with appropriate milestones for achieving the Roadmap goal of developing interdisciplinary research training.

Numerous reports from the NIH and the National Academies have concluded that in order to successfully advance our understanding of health and disease, researchers will need to integrate multiple disciplinary perspectives, methodologies, and levels of analysis. Common to these reports is a recommendation to increase interdisciplinary research training.

Interdisciplinary research and training are not new concepts. There are many instances of the integration of disciplines in trying to meet scientific challenges, and of programs that provide interdisciplinary research training. However, what each of the recent reports indicates is currently lacking is research training that integrates three primary areas of science--biology, behavior, and the social environment. Examples of research areas that might benefit from such an interdisciplinary approach include, but are not limited to, the following: 1) the mechanisms by which interactions between genetics and the environment influence molecular, cellular, and organismal function, thus impacting physiology and health; 2) elucidation of the biological mechanisms by which racial, ethnic, socioeconomic, and gender inequality all affect physiology (at all levels) and thus, health outcomes; 3) the study of mental disorders by approaches that integrate neuroscience, genetics, behavioral science, computational science/modeling, and clinical sciences, using both animal models of these disorders and human populations to understand the confluence of genetic, biological, behavioral, and environmental factors involved in the etiology, treatment, and prevention of these disorders; 4) the regulation of energy balance, as determined by genetics, neural and endocrine function, and behavioral, societal, and cultural factors; and 5) the influence of social interactions on health and disease.

In order to work collaboratively to tackle these complex health-related problems, researchers will need training in the conceptual models and methods of disciplines that address these different areas of influence. Moreover, progress in integrating these scientific fields requires quantitative capabilities to link across multiple levels of analysis (molecular, genetic, cellular, physiological, cultural, social, community, population) and improved modeling to allow for prediction of outcomes, both multidirectionally and among all intermediate steps between the molecular and population levels.

For this NRSA we envision programs that will provide formal coursework and research training in a new discipline for individuals holding advanced degrees in a first field. The postdoctoral fellows and the program faculty are expected to represent multiple disciplines so that the trainees' benefits will accrue not simply from instruction in another field, but from a rich, integrative research environment created by established investigators working collaboratively in an interdisciplinary fashion. One of the program disciplines must be in the behavioral or social sciences, and we are especially interested in programs that integrate the behavioral and/or social sciences with more traditional biomedical disciplines (genetics, molecular biology, cell biology, physiology, immunology, biochemistry, neuroscience, genomics, etc.). A definition of behavioral and social sciences research for the NIH can be found at http://obssr.od.nih.gov/funding/definition.html.

For example, a program centered on gene--social environment interactions could be designed to accept trainees with genetics, cell and molecular biology, social psychology, and computational science backgrounds. Individuals would receive training in fields different from their own, and the program as a whole would provide opportunities for all trainees to engage in integrative research seminars and broad discussion of gene--environment interactions and health. These individuals would emerge from such a program poised to work collaboratively to model the influence of the social environment on gene expression, cellular function, and, ultimately, physiology and health. As another example, a program focused on the health effects of stress might provide training in the neural and endocrine regulation of the stress response, the interactions between stress and the immune system, and the impact of the social environment on stress and immune system function. Trainees emerging from such a program will therefore be competent to lead an interdisciplinary research team working on the mechanisms by which psychosocial interventions prevent the immunosuppression that often results from chronic stress.

This RFA will use the Ruth L. Kirschstein NRSA Institutional Research Training Grants (T32) mechanism. This award will support only postdoctoral trainees. The earliest anticipated start date for award of grants under this RFA is 30 September 2004.

Applications that are not funded in the competition described in this RFA may be resubmitted as new investigator-initiated applications using the standard receipt dates for new applications described in the instructions to the PHS 398 application. This RFA uses just-in-time concepts. This program does not require cost sharing as defined in the current NIH Grants Policy Statement at http://grants.nih.gov/grants/policy/nihgps_2001/part_i_1.htm.

The NIH intends to commit approximately $2.1 million in fiscal year 2004 to fund approximately 6-8 training programs with 4-5 training slots/program in response to this RFA. The total project period for an application submitted in response to this RFA may not exceed 5 years. Because the nature and scope of proposed program may vary, it is anticipated that the size of each award will vary.

Awards pursuant to this RFA are contingent upon the availability of funds and the receipt of a sufficient number of applications of outstanding scientific and technical merit. Furthermore, the duration of the award and the number of funded training positions may be less than the levels recommended by the peer review group, based upon programmatic and budgetary considerations. Funds for continuation beyond the initial year are determined by the success as described in the annual progress report, the timely submission of all required forms, and the availability of funds.

Because training program applications in response to this RFA have special eligibility requirements, application formats, and review criteria, it is critical that prospective applicants consult with the program staff listed in the Inquiries section of the full announcement of this program, which is located at http://grants.nih.gov/grants/guide/rfa-files/RFA-MH-04_007.html, and that they review this announcement carefully before preparing their application. Prospective applicants should also consult the NRSA Guidelines (available at http://grants.nih.gov/grants/policy/nihgps_2001/part_iib_3.htm) and the omnibus NIH NRSA Institutional Research Training Grants Program announcement (available at http://grants.n/h.gov/grants/guide/pa-files/PA-02-109.html).

Applications may be submitted by domestic nonprofit organizations, public and private, such as universities, colleges, and medical schools, or from comparable institutions of higher education that have strong, well-established research and training programs. Foreign institutions are not eligible for NRSA institutional research training grants. The applicant institution must have adequate numbers of highly trained faculty researchers in the biomedical, behavioral, social, and/or computational sciences. The environment must stimulate and allow for interactions among the involved disciplines and support cross-disciplinary research opportunities. Proposals from multiple institutions working collaboratively are encouraged.

The deadline for receipt of letters of intent is 11 February 2004, with 11 March 2004 the deadline for receipt of applications. Although a letter of intent is not required, is not binding, and does not enter into the review of a subsequent application, the information that it contains allows NIH program staff-to estimate the potential review workload and plan the review.

Applications must be prepared using the PHS 398 research grant application instructions and forms (rev. 5/2001). Applications must have a Dun & Bradstreet Data Universal Numbering System (DUNS) number as the universal identifier when applying for federal grants or cooperative agreements. The DUNS number can be obtained by calling 1-866-705-5711 or visiting http://www.dunandbradstreet.com/. The DUNS number should be entered on line 11 of the face page of the PHS 398 form. The PHS 398 is available at http://grants.nih.gov/grants/funding/phs398/phs398.html in an interactive format.

Contact: Nancy L Desmond, Division of Neuroscience & Basic Behavioral Science, NIMH, 6001 Executive Blvd, Rm 7197, MSC 9645, Bethesda, MD 20892-9645 USA, 301-443-3563, fax: [phone], e-mail: [e-mail]. Reference: RFA No. RFA-MH-04-007