On March 5th, the National Institutes of Health (NIH) made available on its website additional information and announcements about grant opportunities created by the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act of 2009 (ARRA). The announcements and background information are posted on the NIH ARRA website.
Month: March 2009
FY09 Omnibus Delayed
The Senate was unable to pass the FY’09 Omnibus bill last night and now plans to approve a short-term continuing resolution (CR) sometime today. The current CR expires midnight tonight (March 6). The new CR is expected to run through midnight Tuesday, by which time Democratic leaders hope to clear the nine-bill, $410 billion spending package. Republican leaders say they are trying to whittle down their amendments to 10 or 12, and Reid said votes on amendments are expected to resume Monday evening. A series of Republican amendments this week to cut the bill’s spending and eliminate or reduce earmarks were all rejected, and Republicans are now focusing on policy amendments intended to force Democrats to take politically difficult votes.
Meanwhile, House Leadership on Thursday reiterated that the House would not accept any amendments from the Senate. No amendments have yet been approved in the Senate, and Senate Democrats have been vigorously opposing all amendments. House Leadership also vowed to work with President Obama to examine and improve the congressional earmarking process.
House and Senate Judiciary Committees Introduce Patent Reform Legislation
On March 3rd, the House and Senate judiciary committees introduced bipartisan patent reform legislation. The legislation has been considered by the previous two Congresses with little result to date. The Patent Reform Act of 2009 was introduced by Senators Patrick Leahy (D-VT) and Orrin Hatch (R-UT), and by Representatives John Conyers (D-MI) and Lamar Smith (R-TX).
The Senate Judiciary Committee will hold a hearing on the measure on March 10; no House Judiciary Committee hearing has been scheduled to date by Chairman Conyers.
Some initial observations from the Association of American Universities include:
- The damages language appears to be placeholder language. It is the language from S. 1145, the bill approved last session by the Senate Judiciary Committee, which had little prospect of broad acceptance.
- Inequitable conduct language has been omitted, although Senator Hatch is expected to seek to reinstate language modifying current inequitable conduct provisions.
- The new bill eliminates the requirement that all applications be published 18 months after their effective filing date, a provision recommended by the National Academies and supported by the higher education associations.
- On the issue of post-grant “second window,” the bill adopts the treatment contained in H.R. 1908, the patent reform bill approved by the House last session. Instead of a post-grant second window, the new bill includes the improved inter partes re-examination procedure of H.R. 1908, which was endorsed by the higher education associations.
- The applicant quality submissions provision, which required mandatory submission by patent applicants of prior art and other material relevant to patentability, has been omitted. This provision was opposed by virtually all sectors of the patent community.
Federal Agencies Create Websites for Recovery Act Funds
Several federal agencies have created websites that will be utilized to provide guidelines/ updates on American Recovery and Reinvestment Act of 2009 funding. See below for access.
Federal Government Recovery Act Overview
National Institutes of Health
Challenge Grants in Health and Science Research
Overview Information
Review Criteria and Processes for Recovery Act Funds
NIH Announces ARRA Challenge Grant RFA
Introducing the NIH Challenge Grant RFA OD-09-003
NIH has received new funds for Fiscal Years 2009 and 2010 as part of the American Recovery & Reinvestment Act (ARRA) of 2009 (Recovery Act). The NIH has designated at least $200 million in FYs 2009 – 2010 for a new initiative called the NIH Challenge Grants in Health and Science Research.
This new program will support research on topic areas that address specific scientific and health research challenges in biomedical and behavioral research that would benefit from significant 2-year jumpstart funds.
The NIH has identified a range of Challenge Areas that focus on specific knowledge gaps, scientific opportunities, new technologies, data generation, or research methods that would benefit from an influx of funds to quickly advance the area in significant ways. Each NIH Institute, Center, and Office has selected specific Challenge Topics within the broad Challenge Areas related to its mission. The research in these Challenge Areas should have a high impact in biomedical or behavioral science and/or public health.
NIH anticipates funding 200 or more grants, each of up to $1 million in total costs, pending the number and quality of applications and availability of funds. In addition, Recovery Act funds allocated to NIH specifically for comparative effectiveness research (CER) may be available to support additional grants. Projects receiving these funds will need to meet this definition of CER: “a rigorous evaluation of the impact of different options that are available for treating a given medical condition for a particular set of patients. Such a study may compare similar treatments, such as competing drugs, or it may analyze very different approaches, such as surgery and drug therapy.” Such research may include the development and use of clinical registries, clinical data networks, and other forms of electronic health data that can be used to generate or obtain outcomes data as they apply to CER.