Planning Your Application

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Begin planning early. Follow the steps on this page and refer to our NIAID R01 Application to Award Timeline for timing.

1. Assess your field. Find out the opportunities for collaborating with a known laboratory or more experienced grantee.
2. Look at the competition. See which other projects in your field are being funded. Search the NIH CRISP database and Community of Science.
3. Check the literature to make sure the work you are considering has not been done before or to see if it has been done and its methods were judged to be inadequate. Go to MEDLINE and NLM Databases and Electronic Resources.
4. Evaluate yourself. How do your strengths match up with the topics you uncovered in step 1? Can you capitalize on your expertise and fill in gaps with mentors, collaborators, or consultants?
5. Figure out resources and support your organization has and what additional support you'll need.
6. Brainstorm ideas with colleagues and mentors.
7. Find opportunities. See if your idea matches any of NIAID's high-priority areas in our initiatives and concepts. See the Application Approach: What Are Your Choices? section of NIH Grant Cycle: Application to Renewal. Also go to the NIH Funding Opportunities Relevant to NIAID and our List of Foundations and Other Funding Sources.
8. Call an NIAID program officer for an opinion of your idea. The NIAID program officer in charge of your area of science can give you valuable advice and instructions. Read more at When to Contact an NIAID Program Officer. Other NIAID staff can help too -- go to Contact Staff for Help.
9. Write a one-sentence hypothesis for your proposal.
10. Give yourself plenty of time to write the application, probably three to six months.
11. Know your organization's contacts and internal procedures, particularly for electronic application. Go to Plan Ahead for Electronic Application.
12. Start thinking about your next application. As long as the topics are different you can apply simultaneously for as many grants as you like. Or use the same application to apply to a non-Public Health Service organization (find PHS entities at Agencies and Programs).

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