The American Recovery and Reinvestment Act of 2009
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Science Funding in American Recovery and Reinvestment Act

On February 17th, President Obama signed into law The American Recovery and Reinvestment Act of 2009 (HR.1). The final bill includes significant investments in science. Since then, there has been a flurry of RFPS released by the federal funding agencies. Each agency has set up a recovery website to provide up-to-date information on implementation of ARRA. All the agencies’ websites can be accessed from www.recovery.gov.

A summary of funding in the Recovery Act for the National Institutes of Health, the National Science Foundation, and the Department of Energy Office of Sciences is provided here.

National Institutes of Health

The National Institutes of Health (NIH) plan to spend as much of their $8.2 billion allocation for research in FY 2009 as possible in order to stimulate the economy and create or retain jobs. The agency is asking that grantees plan to spend the money within two years of receiving the funds for the same reasons. Thus, the agency has been very quick in releasing Requests for Proposals (RFPS).

In making research awards, the NIH will fund projects that will stimulate the economy, but also that have the potential for making scientific progress in 2 years. To do this, they will select recently peer reviewed highly meritorious research grant applications (R01s and others), that can be accomplished in 2 years or less, fund new research applications, accelerate ongoing scientific research through targeted supplements to current grants, and support a new program, the NIH Challenge Grant program. The Challenge Grant Program is a trans-NIH program that focuses 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. Within each broad Challenge Area the NIH Institutes, Centers, and Offices have specified particular Challenge topics that address their missions. There is extensive information about the Challenge Grants available on the NIH’s recovery website, grants.nih.gov/recovery. This site allows users to see all the funding opportunities related to ARRA, NIH-wide announcements, and Institute-specific opportunities and guidance.

The ARRA also provides $1 billion to the National Center for Research Resources (NCRR) to support extramural construction, repairs, and alterations in support of all NIH funded research institutions and $300 million for shared instrumentation and other capital equipment to support all NIH activities.

National Science Foundation

The National Science Foundation received $3 billion from the ARRA to supplement the agency’s FY09 Budget. In a statement released March 18th, the NSF director, Arden Bement, indicated that since the NSF currently has many highly rated proposals that it has not been able to fund, the agency is planning to use the majority of the $2 billion available in Research and Related Activities for proposals that are already in house and will be reviewed and/or awarded prior to September 30, 2009. Funding of new Principal Investigators and high-risk, high-return research will be top priorities in grants issued with Recovery Funds. Unlike at NIH, grants issued with Recovery Act funds will be standard grants with durations of up to 5 years. In addition, NSF will also consider high quality proposals declined on or after October 1, 2008 due to a lack of available funding when the original decision was made. The program officer will contact the institution when a reversal is being considered by NSF.

The NSF also expects to quickly award funds as specified in the Recovery Act for the Math and Science Partnership program, the Robert Noyce Teacher Scholarship Program, the Major Research Equipment and Facilities Construction Account; the Academic Research Infrastructure (ARI) program, and the Science Masters program. Solicitations for the latter two programs will be posted this spring, as will a solicitation for the Major Research Instrumentation Program (MRI) in order to make a sufficient number of awards to utilize the $300 million provided in the legislation.

According to the statement, the NSF anticipates that no other solicitations will be posted that are solely in response to the Recovery Act.

The NSF Recovery website is http://www.nsf.gov/recovery.

Department of Energy Office of Science

On March 23rd, Secretary of Energy Steven Chu announced that the Department of Energy Office of Science would receive $1.2 billion of the $1.6 billion provided in the economic recovery act. In his announcement he said, “Leadership in science remains vital to America’s economic prosperity, energy security, and global competitiveness”. Some of the funds will be used to support both existing and new research projects performed at the ten National Laboratories. In addition to national laboratory-based researchers receiving funding, the Office of Science will support university laboratory-based researchers who have been awarded grants and conducting research on our nation’s highest priority issues. Recipients are required to be transparent and responsible with the stimulus funding. $371 million remains to be released and will be available upon approval of the plan. As required by the law, DOE will update their site, http://www.energy.gov/recovery/, on actions taken with stimulus funds.

Summary of ARRA

National Institutes of Health	$10.4 billion $7.4 billion for NIH Institutes and centers for research projects (R01s and similar grants) $800 million to the Office of the Director “for short term grants that focus on specific scientific challenges, new research that expands the scope of ongoing projects, and research on public and international health priorities” $1 billion to NCRR for "shared instrumentation and other capital equipment and competitive grants" $1 billion for competitive grants for construction and renovation of extramural research facilities $300 million "shared instrumentation and other capital equipment $500 million for intramural buildings and facilities of NIH $400 million of for Agency for Healthcare Research and Quality allocated funds are to be sent to the Secretary of Health and Human Services for comparative research of clinical effectiveness of health care treatments and strategies
National Science Foundation	$3.0 billion $2.5 billion for Research and related activities $300 million for Major Research Instrumentation Program $200 million for academic research facilities modernization $400 million for Major Research equipment and facilities construction only for approved projects $100 million education instruction $400 million for Major Research equipment and facilities construction only for approved projects $100 million education instruction $60 million for Robert Noyce Teacher Scholarship Program $25 million for Mathematics And Science Education Partnership Programs $15 million for Professional Science
Department of Energy Office of Science	$2 billion – extramural basic research, DOE laboratory research, facilities upgrades and construction $400 million for Advanced Research Projects Agency – Energy under the America COMPETES Act $1.6 billion for “ Science”

For up-to-date information directly from the House and Senate, please visit: http://appropriations.house.gov/ and http://appropriations.senate.gov/