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1 | Name | Email Address | Name of Organization | City and State | Community interest in an emeritus award that allows a senior investigator to transition out of a role or position that relies on funding from NIH research grants | Ideas for how one would utilize an emeritus award (e.g., to facilitate laboratory closure; to promote partnership between a senior and junior investigator; to provide opportunities for acquiring skills needed for transitioning to a new role) | Suggestions for the specific characteristics for an emeritus award (e.g., number of years of support; definition of a junior faculty partner) | Ways in which NIH could incentivize the use of an emeritus award, from the perspectives of both senior investigators and institutions | Impediments to the participation in such an award program, from the perspectives of both senior investigators and institutions | Any additional comments you would like to offer to NIH on this topic |
2 | As the experts in nursing research age there is tremendous potential for younger researchers to benefit from their knowledge and experience | RFAs that require a senior and junior scientists as Co-PIs and explains the transition of the laboratory from the senior to the junior investigator. This RFA would involve a training component and a proposal for innovation the junior scientist will take the laboratory | 3-5 years. Junior faculty have not received R-series funding and are no more than 8 years post their terminal degree or postdoctoral experience. | |||||||
3 | Boston University Medical Center | Boston, MA | Having recently stepped down as Chairman of [] after [ ] years, finding a meaningful role for accomplished researchers, who have contributed significantly to science, has been one of the most difficult decisions I faced. Those who have suggested the universities should contribute are naive, and haven't experienced the attitude of most schools toward life long funded investigators once they lose federal funding. Full disclosure, I am 66 yo, still have federal and private research funding. So it is not for my own interests that I would support this initiative; nor would I support it for investigators who are no longer competitive, or have "lost a foot on their fastball." I would base the award on current potential to contribute and expand expertise of mid career scientists. Examples might be to help train mid-level in new areas that adds to their research project (eg, genetics, imaging, etc | I would oppose funds being used to close a lab. I would recommend that the primary objectives of the award are 1) select a senior level investigator who has a strong history record of high impact research, skilled in a partiicular skill (eg, neuroimaging, genetics, complex statistics, clinical trial design, etc) 2) has a strong record of training success and teaching success. These are different attributes. We all know investigators who produced outstanding researchers, but ran the lab in an autocratic manner, thus losing theses trainees as soon as they got independent funding. Teaching skills are more difficult to quantify than post-doc production, but it critical to success of the field, and will attract the best and brightest to science. I oppose using the funds for transition--that just allows the university to skirt their obligations to retiring faculty. They seem to have that skill down to an art. NIH should use its power to require institutions to have a NIH approved policy for these faculty. | 1) strong track record of competitive NIH funding. A totol of 20 years total, the last award within past 3 years 2) an area of science that the candidate is recognized as a leader and innovator 3) partnership with an outstandin junior or mid-level scientist 4) demonstration the benefits that the mentor will bring to junior investigator 5) clear definition of deliverables 6) potential for mentor to work with more than one junior investigator, but strong justification, and emphasis on enhanced results (as opposed to diluting mentor's influence) | 1) hard to imagine in short dollar days that institutions would oppose funding of a scientist who has lost funding. However since many medical instututions no longer have tenure, nor honor it for the purpose originally intended, IDC rates and restriction of other activities (lecturing undergrads, etc) could discourage some centers 2) by offering a competitive application process will make it attractive to senior investigators 3) YOU NEED HELP WITH MARKETING THIS IDEA!!!! Right now the criticism on the blog from investigators stem from the presentation. It sounds a little like pork to send out senior investigators out to stud. 4) The award should be determined by ability of mentor to train mid and early investigators. Some examples based on grants I have recently reviewed: training research psychologists in pharmacology, neuroinflammatory process;, psychologists training medical researchers on mechanisms of behavioral change and behavioral treatment platforms, etc | It must be considered a prestigious award, perhaps each named for a pioneer in the field of that IC. It has to funded adequately so mentor is not pressures to perform other duties for the institution. It would be helpful if award came with admintrative support for both individuals. Don't use T 32 criteria, requiring lists of all the trainees one has mentored. That is unreliable. In some large labs trainees rarely work with PI. Try to develop meaningful criteria for teaching talents. Consider a reverse site visit | |||
4 | Duke University | Durham, NC | Funding has been tight for ten years. Emeritus award does not make sense to me at all. More funding should be spend on young and middle age investigators. If a senior investigator has funding, there is not need to add another award to transition out. If a senior investigator does not have funding, why NIH would want to waste fund for the investigator to transition out? Funding young and middle age investigators is the way to sustain the biomedical workforce. | Such award is at the expense of supporting young scientists. It is a waste. | It will be much more fair, reliable, and productive to let the NIH study sections to pick the junior faculty than let a senior faculty to choose a junior faculty. | |||||
5 | Broad Institute of Harvard and MIT | Cambridge | Faculty already produce inordinate numbers of postdocs who can obtain faculty positions to carry on their work. If the interesting parts of the research have not been adopted based on the inherent promise of the science, then NIH should not expend funds to artificially sustain those lines of research. | |||||||
6 | Howard University | Washington, DC | Only interesting to the extent that it provides a soft landing to those involved in the senior investigator's (SI) lab and encourages institution to continue salary line after retirement of SI | As a condition of accepting the award the institution must guarantee that the position will be filled when the SI retires at the end of the award period (note this does not stop the SI from continuing to do research as a senior research associate, many in my field are doing this). | The Final Award for Research and Teaching should not fund any of the senior investigator's salary (support is available from such sources as Social Security/403b etc) or new post-docs or graduate students. | |||||
7 | this is a terrible idea. why give money to senior investigators, there needs to be more money for junior investigators. senior PIs already get the lions share of grant money | huh? no. | do not incentivize an emertus award! ugh. | you're going to have a lot of resentful young scientists on your hands if you do this | I think this initiative is misguided and you need to focus resources on young scientists | |||||
8 | UMass Medical School | Worcester | I think it is a bad idea to earmark resources for senior faculty. Many faculty that would qualify for this support are already eligible for retirement and could shut down their labs with relatively little lost personally and in terms of long term research output. By contrast, each early or mid stage investigator that has to shut down his or her lab is now looking at career change, at a time when they are trying to start their own families or support them at home. The cost both personally and to their long term productivity is enormous. It just doesn't make sense. The fundamental problem is that too many good proposals are overlooked because there is simply not enough resources to cover all excellent research. In such a situation, bad luck and uneven review can impact the likelihood of success as much as the quality of the research. I would rather spend time, effort, and resources on ensuring the fairness of competition than on ensuring the unfairness of competition. | If such an award were to exist, the only way it would be tenable would be to facilitate lab closure... Meaning no new students and no new personnel to be hired, and no more proposals accepted. | 3 years max, finish already vetted projects, no new personnel. Honestly I think the program is a bad idea. | |||||
9 | University of New Mexico | Albuquerque, New Mexico | Most, including myself, that I"ve spoken to are not interested funding a new mechanism that diverts precious and declining resources away from funding basic science to another award that deals with career development issues. Also, the word "emeritus" elicits feelings that those who would be eligible are already past the time of their full scientific contribution and is not appropriate to use for such an award. It can still be a "transition" award, much as a postdoc to first faculty, but now from senior faculty to out. | I don't believe providing funding for acquiring new skills for senior faculty is an appropriate way to spend NIH funds, which should focus on funding the best science. Providing mechanisms to facilitate the exit of senior faculty is worthwhile. I think this will help in freeing up resources for younger faculty as well as providing a more smooth transition for senior faculty and their research programs. I see potential problems with encouraging transition to a junior faculty member. First, for many senior investigators, the mode of transition will be to a scientist within their own group (for example, a senior postdoc), who is not often a tenure track faculty member. So this would not facilitate continuation of an independent research program. Second, tenure track junior faculty usually need to develop their own research program rather than continue the work of another faculty member, so encouraging transition of most research awards such as the R01 mechanism should not happen. For larger programmatic efforts, I don't think the NIH needs to be involved. Most universities and PIs of such efforts always consider for transition so this would not require a new award or mechanism. | The most efficient way to facilitate lab closure would be to allow senior investigators greater flexibility in spending their research dollars they've already been awarded. For example, if a senior faculty member is in their 3rd year of an R01 research grant, and wants to retire in 5 years, allow them to apply for an administrative change to spend the remaining funds (on the order of $500,000) over 5-6 years rather than 2 (or max 3 with a NCE). This allows for a slower decline in projects, completion of projects, trainees to finish. This would facilitate laboratory closure without need for additional funds. Another idea is to allow for a supplement application (similar to the minority supplement) that could be given administratively to allow for smaller amounts of money (such as 1 year trainee support, or 1 year lab support) to finish projects. The criteria would be if you apply for either a slowdown, or a supplement for lab closure, you would be ineligible for future research grant applications. Then this cannot be used as a rainy-day fund or a mechanism to just keep funds going until you want to apply for another grant. | I don't think it makes sense to provide money incentives to encourage senior faculty to leave. Most of the senior faculty I know are offended by the notion that they are being "pushed out" in such a mechanism. Plus, most universities have such incentive programs (retirement related), eliminating the need for the NIH to jump into the fray. Instead, facilitate the process for those who are already considering retirement to do so smoothly. | Perceptions. 1. This is a new way to spend money that takes away from research dollars. 2. This will force senior faculty out. 3. This will give money to senior faculty who are less productive. | I have heard that the comments on Sally Rockey's blog will not be considered official responses. While I agree that many are not productive, the tenor and tone of the responses should be taken into consideration by the NIH as they decide whether and how to move forward. | ||
10 | Wayne State University | Detroit, Michigan | This is an excellent idea, often there is a need to integrate ongoing laboratory plans in a way that do not rely solely on the driving force of a single senior investigator. This could be in the form of the pioneer award for example. | The main area I see for this is to help bring the next generation of investigators in line with the insight of the senior investigator. This might actually be in the form of investigating as yet new ideas that the senior investigator has not yet had an opportunity to follow through on. For example, in our lab the senior investigator probably has two dozen major ideas that have not yet been started, ideas that could change the face of imaging in some cases. How can these ideas be passed down to the next generation? Partly by example, partly by mentoring, and also by perhaps some preliminary investigations over a five year retirement or step down period where the junior investigators step and take charge more and more over the five years. | I recommend five years support for a major effort involving at least one but perhaps as many as 3 or 4 junior faculty. | Not sure this is necessary, but one way would be to ensure that junior investigators could buy out some of their teaching time by having sufficient support during this period. | This could be quite an attractive means by which to probe quite novel ideas. Again like the pioneering awards but these are very competitive and often given to younger people. Also they do not allow good ideas that continue on the current track of even a senior investigator. So the difference here would be good science but no restriction on whether it follows your past expertise and in fact should promote your past history, skills and expertise. | These proposals could range anywhere from the usual R01 funding to extraordinary cases of powerful groups where many ideas may be needed allowing up to at least $500,000 a year in funding for five years. | ||
11 | University of Maryland School of Medicine | Baltimore, MD | This award appears to be a complete waste of effort. Investigators spontaneously cycle out of their careers at some point. THis is money chasing a bad idea. | |||||||
12 | State University of New York | Stony Brook, New York | Forty to fifty years ago, there was a large influx of biomedical research personnel. This group is now retiring and finding it difficult to do so. Yes, there would be considerable interest in finding a way to transition out instead of suddenly going from a career funded researcher to someone administration would like to retire asap. | It would require some salary support to protect the investigator. The investigator could then continue to do collaborative research and teach the use of technologies that have made his research career successful. | Five years should be sufficient, though some would probably request fewer. One or more younger faculty members should be part of the program, insofar as they have an interest in learning new technologies and inheriting the equipment needed for these technologies. These need not be beginning iinvestigators who need mentoring. They could be established investigators who want to expand their capabililties. | Universities and medical schools have come to rely on research funding to their faculty to provide a significant amount of money to run the institution. As long as these awards include the usual overhead and salary offset, the institution will be happy to accept them and faculty will be protected. | This would depend on the specific nature of the program. I am cynical about university administration. If there were no resources for the university, I doubt administration would be very supportive. The investigator would need an office and some small lab space, which would have to be approved by administration. | I think it is a wonderful idea. Retirement is a difficult transition, particularly when it is abrupt. One would love to leave a legacy that work he has done to be successful will continue to be done. | ||
13 | Duke University | Durham, NC | While I understand the intent of such an award and certainly do not want to offer disrespect to senior scientists, I feel that the MIRA awards already encompass this demographic of the scientific population. Most senior PIs that I know already have 2+ R01s. This certainly true for my department. My sense is that the current NIH initiatives already favor junior and senior PIs, and many of those in the middle (in science for 10-20 years) are being shut out of funding. It's a tough problem, I know, but please don't make it even harder for people to run research programs if they are solid scientists, yet aren't young superstars or well-established long-standing titans. | |||||||
14 | Oakland University | Rochester, Michigan | I would have been interested in a way to continue the development of my [ ] hypothesis after formally retiring. I know a number of young investigators that might be willing to carry on the work and would be eager to get suggestions and guidance from me as to what needs to be accomplished to pursue the hypothesis and test it. There are also a number of important experiments that I could have completed if I would have had funds to support collaborative arrangements with specific investigators that have the needed equipment and facilities. For specific example I had lined up a collaborator with AFM experience, but without money I could not continue to impose on her time and facilities. | A small amount of funding that would pay for collaboration with young investigators who have specific skills and an interest in carrying on the work. I have a colleague who is a young theoretician who was willing to collaborate and another who has an AFM suited for aqueous samples. Both projects could have continued my work on the [ ]. Both stopped when I had to close my own lab due to loss of funding in the sequester. | I would envision relatively small awards with funding for travel to the junior faculty's institution and sufficient support to defray the costs of a specific well defined project. These days junior can mean anyone who has at least 15 years of potential productivity ahead of them. | They should be based on senior faculty who have made a substantial contribution that is still a viable area for more investigation. They should be conditional on the institution receiving the award cooperating in providing administrative support and office space. The junior investigator would need to be acknowledged as C0-investigator and benefit in terms of getting credited with a grant. | Speaking for my self and my institution, there is little incentive for the institution to grant research privileges to a recently retired (or unfunded) senior investigator. This makes it difficult for productive seniors to keep contributing by mentoring and collaborating. | |||
15 | California Institute of Technology | Pasadena | I think focusing on the positive is crucial, specifically building partnerships with junior investigators i.e. tenure track faculty at the junior level. I have held NIH grants going back to 1974 until fairly recently and am still very actively engaged in research and teaching. I have extensive interactions with my junior colleagues. I would be delighted to see NIH develop an emeritus program to facilitate these interactions. | I would recommend limiting this program to active professorial faculty (both junior and senior). I would suggest some minimum period for which the senior faculty would have held NIH grants, say 25 years. I would suggest somewhat smaller grant sizes, say 200K per year with 3 to 5 years support. | I have observed at my institution some spectacularly successful interactions between senior and relatively junior investigators. There is an inherent complementarity between the wisdom and focus that a senior investigator brings to the research activity and the zeal and mastery of new techniques that the junior investigator brings. | One of the rewards of successful aging is a willingness to explore new ideas, new collaborations, etc.. This should be encouraged! | Exellent idea! Best to emphasize the positive - encouraging colleborations between junior and senior faculty. | |||
16 | University of Maryland Sch of Med | Baltimore, MD | The end of NIH funding can be quite abrupt and senior investigators may not have time to plan for the next stage of their careers. Academic institutions may be similarly unprepared to support such investigators. Thus, investigators who have made major contributions to science may suddenly face harsh consequences, such as salary cuts and unwelcome assignments. I think that an emeritus award is a terrific idea to soften a neglected career transition phase. | All of the above plus: Perhaps a direct role in NIH activities? Many study sections are now conducted remotely. Perhaps experienced investigators could benefit other intra- and extramural NIH functions while keeping their appointments at their primary institutions. | I suspect that the bar would have to be quite high. Twenty years or more of sustained funding would seem a minimum. One link might be to a junior investigator award recipient in the same field or lab. | I don't think an incentive would be required. Merely providing salary support to an accomplished senior investigator would be quite helpful. | None noted | With increased attention paid to junior investigators, I think this is a terrific initiative. | ||
17 | University of washington | Seattle, WA | From my reading of the blog there is intense community interest in this RFI with almost all responses being (predictably) negative. All except a few seem to see what they imagine this might be as a threat to their piece of the pie. | In my mind this format might be most appropriate for special cases where it can promote an obvious partnership between senior and junior investigators. It should not be yet another way to transition a grant from a retiring investigator to a younger one as many of the bloggers fear. This can already be done and it is not an effective use of grant money. There are situations, which admittedly are somewhat rare and perhaps more common in medical schools where Fellows with clinical duties stay on as faculty. Sometimes they continue research relationships with their mentors. They are usually the best and the brightest in their cohorts. I think there are situations where the two minds working together are better than the sum of the parts. | How about a usual 5-year grant with the ability of the junior investigator to compete for a renewal in the R01 format? | Of course administrators would much rather see the senior investigator continue to garner their full grant support and tack on new grants from the junior investigator. I am not sure what to do abut this, but I have tended to ignore such issues thought my career so I am not a good resource here. If the collaboration is real then junior and senior investigators don't need any additional incentive. It would be nice if such a grant did not exclude the junior investigator from the "new investigator" designation. | I think this is an interesting idea. I would do it in a minute with my bright rising-star junior colleague instead of writing my next solo competing renewal. I am sure this program will not be in place in time for us. So I write without conflict | |||
18 | University of michigan | Ann Arbor Michigan | I think the best plan is to leave it up to study sections to fund the most competitive R01 proposals. I do not think it is realistic to think about 'passing along' research programs to younger investigators. The key to successful R01 research is autonomy and independence. Each young investigator who has managed to obtain a tenure-track position has their own vision for their laboratory. This autonomy is one of the greatest features of the NIH system. It is not possible to pass along your vision to a younger colleague, it must be their own. I agree with many of the criticisms of the Emeritis Grant concept expressed on Sally Rock's web site, and I hope those comments will be taken into consideration. | |||||||
19 | University of Maryland School of Medicine | Baltimore, MD | I would not be interested in an emeritus award only for transitioning out of a research role. An award that recognizes a successful history of mentoring junior faculty would be of great interest, if the award was targeted at preserving the mentoring role (through salary support) even as research support is declining. Rather than link two disparate faculty activities, unlink them and recognize other types of skills. | Several factors bear on the same question. Such an award should be tied to the federal research finding base at each institution, with the number of positions proportional to total support. Faculty applying for the award must be nominated by each University. Outside review is a plus/minus decision either endorsing or rejecting the University nominee. Salary support would be co-funded by University and NIH (50:50) and faculty receiving such an award would reduce their time available for NIH grants by the amount of the award. Award funding creates protected time for mentoring targeted to junior faculty and performance is reviewed annually and contingent on funding success of mentees. This award has no implications for research funding of the same faculty member except for reducing available time. | An emeritus award would be for 3 years with a possible 2 year renewal depending on performance as a faculty mentor. It would be an honorary award co-funded by the University, and would be included in the signature line of recipients. Faculty mentoring would match the awardee with junior faculty in the same general area of expertise but close matches are not necessary. | As stated, the award should be honorific and co-funded. Universities are the main guilty parties here. They benefit much from senior faculty but provide little recognition for mentoring efforts. Beginning in 1997, I create the Post-Tenure Review System for faculty at the University of Wisconsin, Madison Department of Pathology. This plan was very successful and adopted in other departments and schools. We brought dignity to the process of winding down careers and matched end-of-career faculty with important activities that benefited the department and the school. | Risk is the main impediment. You can engineer this out of the system by unlinking this award and regular research funding. These two issue are very distinct. Funding of senior faculty creates jobs and under good circumstances, provides training for success. It is rarely an obstacle to funding for junior faculty. | I was surprised and offended by many comments from junior faculty in response to this proposal. Many people are not competitive and no amount of incentive, payline relief, special study instructions or other things will change that. Indeed, it is difficult for early stage investigators but dilution of the applicant pool must be considered somewhere as contributing to the problem. The rising tide floats all boats and a respectful, functional and productive approach to end of career decisions will impact everyone. If Universities can learn to be more respectful of senior faculty value, we may see substantial changes in the willingness to transition into mentoring roles sooner rather than later. | ||
20 | University at Buffalo | It does not seem a good use of scarce NIH funds. Senior researchers can easily transition out of an active research role. It is younger investigators who need the support. | The funding should go to junior investigators (perhaps in the way that a Diversity Supplement goes through a funded PI but is used to fund a junior scientist). | This seems like a bad idea to me - senior researchers looking to get out of the grant business do not need funding, it is people seeking to get in or stay in who do. | ||||||
21 | CWRU School of medicine | Cleveland, OH | This is creating a solution for a problem that doesn't exist. The system already evaluates grants from these investigator's upon competitive renewal and most senior investigators are savvy enough to wind down their labs appropriately when they feel it is time. | I don't think this award should exist. | I don't think this award should exist. | I don't think this award should exist. | I don't think this award should exist. | |||
22 | University of Nevada School of Medicine | Reno, NV | This is a terrific idea and one that I think can accelerate the rate of scientific discovery and transition of expertise to a new generation of scientists. | The faculty member that initiates the proposal requests funding for him/herself and a new hire of the replacement faculty member as a new position at the institution occupying the PIs space. The institution guarantees that the PI commits to stepping down as an investigator and transferring resources to the junior hire at the end of five years. Both the PI and the replacement new hire are committed to a research plan that is funded by the grant and uses a multi-PI transition plan. Part of the funding has to be an institutional match as if it were a startup package for the new hire, but can benefit both senior and junior investigators. At the end of the five year period, the new investigator has to have been mentored and ready for tenure consideration. | Support: 5 years Senior PI: 40% support Junior PI: 75% Support Junior PI characteristics: No previous R01 funding. Must be new hire at the institution into a tenure-track or equivalent position. Not an existing faculty member. Institutional Match required. Specific research plan funding shared between junior and senior investigators. Institution guarantees that the senior PI is stepping down from research after 5 years and the lab space is transferred to the junior PI at that time. | Institutional Perspective: 1) guaranteed succession planning. 2) maintains project and expertise. 3) assures success for junior PI. 4) Allows small schools and institutions to continue to compete with institutions with resources they cannot begin to match. Senior PI perspective: 1) Planning retirement or role change with funding support for salary and project. 2) Able to choose successor and invest in the future of the work. 3) Able to capsulize and transmit impact on science to another young scientist. 4) Transitioning with dignity for years of service and impact on science. | This would be a win-win for all. Matching might be seen as a negative but some investment by the institution assures that this is a real effort to benefit science at the institution and really hire a new person to continue the work. | I think this is a great idea. I would want to take advantage of it myself. | ||
23 | Broad Institute of Harvard and MIT | Cambridge | It seems redundant with the already available option of changing the PI on an existing grant. | Such a program should be assessed for its effects on NIH PI diversity. Those eligible for such an award are presumably predominantly white men. Any grant mechanism that specifically targets a non-diverse population should already be disfavored unless there is a clear and strong benefit to the community overall. But, it should also be studied who these senior PIs are likely to choose to carry on their legacy. Would senior PIs choose junior PIs that are at least as diverse as the existing NIH PI pool? Or would they be biased towards choosing a protege that is similar to themselves (in ethnicity and gender)? Studies indicate the latter would be the case and thus this program would benefit a non-diverse population of junior researchers - in essence, older white male scientists handing over the reins to younger white male scientists. Has Dr Hannah Valentine signed off on this idea? | ||||||
24 | Yerkes National Primate Research Center of Emory University | Atlanta GA | I have strong interest in this. It is an excellent idea. | I have closed my research lab and now have a number of opportunities and tasks that benefit the scientific community. These tasks include, generally, committee work, teaching and writing, particularly in the area of drug abuse which has been my focus. I can provide details that support the value of my activities. Without research grants, I am in need to monetary support for a short time until I transition into retirement. Is this mechanism suitable for me? | For transitioning to retirement, perhaps 3 to 5 year awards would be workable. | Impediments could include the need for research space and researchers, lack of additional funds for emeritus awardees. | ||||
25 | University of California Davis | Davis, CA | I am a [ ] year old NIH PI currently on a "recall" appointment after retiring from my University position. Like many (!) of my age peers I am working on bringing junior collaborators with established research programs into our project with the hope that they will pick up the research theme, so important to me, combine with their own programs, and carry on. A formal NIH bridging mechanism to accomplish this would be extremely useful. Junior collaborators are just as focused on their research themes and do not want to "take over" a lab/grant under the direction of a senior colleague. | The senior and junior investigators should have a common interest growing out of an existing collaboration that can be specifically funded. The junior investigator should not be supporting a high salary, low production senior and the senior colleague should not be adding prestige to a proposal irrelevant to their area of accomplishment. Both of these situations currently exist within my experience. Personally I think labs need to be closed because space is so precious. It is often difficult for the university to accomplish this because everybody loves their lab and wants to keep it open. A formal plan to close a lab with NIH goals in mind and some minimal financial support is an excellent solution. | Perhaps the junior partner does not need to be at the same institution or even be faculty or very junior. Even a 5 year difference in career stage may be appropriate. It will be difficult for the award to have a defined endpoint that contributes to biomedical research but this is important as an NIH awards always have to be based in science. One-two years should be adequate for a concerted effort. The junior faculty partner should be taking a lead role in a scientific proposal that utilizes the intellectual, technical and networking expertise of the senior partner. This should be an exciting, innovative scientific proposal conceived by the junior partner. After the award is in place ambitious junior investigators will be looking around for adding this opportunity to their arsenal of potential funding sources. | Putting the NIH stamp on the formal conclusion of an NIH investigators career will be extremely incentivizing to the senior investigator. I think many institutions that still have formal ladder faculty structures for their NIH grants will like the idea. However researchers are now so loosely and temporarily tied to institutions, the home institution may not even be aware of the conclusion of ta senior investigators career. Other institutions (in warmer climates) may try to attract seniors to bring an emeritus award to a less prestigious institution. This needs to be carefully considered as far as the value to NIH. | Institutions will not want to be constrained by a detailed plan for the physical break-up of a laboratory, (reassignment of space and equipment). They might not even want to maintain office space for emeriti. Unless the awards are large the indirect costs will not be useful for the expensive process of laboratory break-up which is sometimes already in a long term renovation/relocation plan. Many senior investigators never want to have a formal conclusion to their research, continuing on at a 5% or 10% appointment and keeping an ever less productive hand in. If there needs to be formal, time specified closing of the lab or research program this may be an impediment. | good idea to work on this topic. please get the award in place before I turn 80. | ||
26 | Oregon National Primate Research Center | Beaverton, OR | A mechanism to smoothly transition senior investigators out of their roles is VERY important and NIH definitely needs to play a role in helping this take part. Senior investigators who regularly & successfully win grants have every incentive to continue applying for additional grant funding. Institutions want to keep these kinds of investigators as long as possible because they bring in brings money & prestige. Both the institution and the investigator want to have their project(s) continue on as long as possible. However, it's not unusual for an individual to carry the load longer than he/she really should as a result of these pressures. NIH should always encourage the best possible research: not worrying over money & prestige of any particular institution or individual. However, prestigious research frequently is the result of solid funding to long time senior researchers. So it's in NIH's best interest to keep funding a fruitful research program even if the senior researcher who built it no longer heads it. | I'm supportive of the ideas listed for using an emeritus award could include: facilitating lab closure, promoting a partnership between junior & senior investigators, and skill development. However, I'd like to add some new specifics: 1) Facilitating physical lab improvements. It is not unusual that a senior researcher will have been operating in the same physical space for several years. Such a space may not be suitable for long term continuation of the research that took place there. And after moving, the abandoned space may not be suitable for anyone else to readily move in. An emeritus award should include provision of certain renovations in a space the senior investigator has occupied for great lengths of time. For example, a senior researcher perhaps has used the same fume hoods and flammables cabinets for 30 years which have not been updated to keep up with modern standards. In this case, the lab space can't readily be occupied by a different researcher despite serving the emeritus researcher just fine. 2) Facilitating physical lab transfer. A junior researcher taking over from a senior researcher may reasonably want to setup in a fresh laboratory space. Some part of the emeritus grant should include money to provide specialized improvements to a lab space if the junior researcher intends to move the lab out of its older space. 3) (Skill) Development. Skill development needs to include not just junior researchers learning how to fill the shoes of the outgoing researcher. Emeritus faculty also need to have some development too. While some emeritus faculty may intend to leave immediately after a transfer/closure is completed, others may not be as eager to leave. Surely their participation as committee members on review panels or IACUC boards should not end simply because they no longer lead a research team. Maybe a definite plan for what the emeritus researcher will do afterwards should be a condition of the award. 4) Technology Upgrade. Emeritus faculty generally are very resourceful and have accumulated an important collection of equipment, some of which is highly customized and also ancient. Junior researchers would benefit if certain key pieces of equipment were identified and upgraded during a transition period. | The award should be made to a junior faculty partner who has been working with the senior researcher for some length of time prior to the grant submission: minimum 2 years, preferably longer. They don't necessarily need to be working at the same institution: though that would make the transition easier in a lot of ways. If longer distances (>20 miles) were allowed, there might need to be a longer allowable time frame. The grant should run for at least 6 months, but shouldn't run more than 2 years--after all they already have a history of working together. | Institutions will be happy as long as they get money. Whatever overhead they can charge the grant will probably be sufficient motivation for an emeritus award. If grants are given with an inter-institution movement option, then they may be more resistant to the idea and need greater incentive. On the other hand, this option could be presented as an opportunity for institutions to compete for junior investigators who will have a relatively more stable position as a result of the senior investigator's previous work. This might serve to motivate institutions to make themselves more attractive and the potential loss of senior investigators would be offset by the potential gains: securing a younger, promising investigator continuing a well-established, successful program. Emeritus faculty are more complex. It largely depends on why they might want to leave in the first place. Targeting a specific audience seems necessary: eg, senior investigators want to retire altogether might be motivated by the idea of a designated successor getting funded more reliably. Or, targeting a senior investigator not wanting to leave his/her field immediately after stepping down as PI might be motivated by a continued connection to the field with a wholly different, lighter set of responsibilities. | As implied above, many senior investigators keep going because it is what they know, what they are good at and maintains their prestige within the community. Senior investigators may resent newer technologies and techniques in their field. This natural distrust can be critical to successfully developing newer, better methods during a transition period, but may not be readily welcomed. Additionally, some investigators feel "pushed" out by their institution or have problems winding down without pressure. This kind of award may increase unwelcome pressure to step aside for the next generation. Institutions want to keep prestige and money within their own institution. So they may resist if they perceive a loss of prestige, greater funding instability as a result of junior investigators taking over, or if a grant funds an inter-institution transfer. | Some effort should be made to maintain the engagement of senior investigator while directing them gently off center stage. Senior researchers are a valuable resource: NIH and institutions should spend some time trying to figure out ways to relieve senior researchers of their PI duties while keeping them constructively involved. | ||
27 | University of Virginia | Charlottesville | The way one transitions out of a role or position that relies on funding from NIH grants is to stop writing them and retire. No extra funding needed. Besides, junior and mid-career faculty already face "transition" when we can't get NIH grants. Why should pre-retirement faculty get extra consideration? | Senior faculty should be helping junior faculty every day of their careers, not just saving it for their final years. | Zero (0) years of support for the senior faculty member. All the support should go to the junior faculty member. | I'm sure there will be plenty of outcry from the scientific community on this one, and that should be impediment enough. | This is the worst funding idea I have ever heard from NIH. It's absolutely shameful that NIH would consider diverting their limited funding from active scientists to support those who are at the ends of their careers. | |||
28 | University at Albany | Albany, NY | Please, NO. Labs headed by early/mid-stage investigators (especially those just past NIA status) are closing all across the country for lack of funding. These are the places where innovative, thoughtful science is being done, and now being lost. An award for 'closeout' is blatantly not needed: lack of funding achieves that, and should be the preferred approach. Almost as bad, funding that targets transition to a specificed junior colleague will promote nepotism and politics over science. This is a horrible idea. | |||||||
29 | University of Michigan Medical School | Ann Arbor, MI | In my opinion, it is a major mistake to keep coming up with different award mechanisms that further decrease the pool of money that can go to R21 or R01 awards. If you are concerned with trying to balance the different ranks of investigators in the workforce, review applications from assistant professors as a group, associate professors as a group and full professors as a group (as you already do for predoc and postdoc fellows). You will always be able to make sure you are supporting a balanced workforce, and if senior professors choose not to retire, their pool will get more and more competitive - a natural incentive for moving their talents in a different direction. This system still maintains the focus on the most meritorious grants, but compares merit between investigators of reasonably equivalent experience. If you are concerned that people will not move up in rank to stay in the junior pools, you can change it to time from the start of faculty position, or something like that. | I think it is an egregious use of the taxpayers' money to give awards to full professors to facilitate laboratory closure, acquisition of new skills, etc. This is really the job of the University that employs them. NIH should not be paying for this, and if it does so, will just exacerbate the current problem of academic addiction to NIH funds to cover lots of things that the Universities themselves should be paying for.. Senior/junior faculty partnerships are perfectly possible with current mechanisms. | None. There should not be such an award. | Don't incentivize it. Incentivize universities to depend less on NIH money by limiting the total amount of salary that investigators can put on grants to 50%. | I know these ideas are brought forth with the best of intentions on your part. Please consider in future getting the response of the academic community before final decisions are made (i.e., new biosketch format, etc), and seriously take into account the responses you hear. Sadly, bureaucracy has already largely taken over the practice of science. We need to decrease the numbers of arcane requirements and awards, not increase them. Thank you in advance for taking seriously the feedback of your PIs. | |||
30 | University of Michigan | Ann Arbor MI | Professors at univeristies fullfill the academic mission through teaching, doing research and performing service. The tripartite role/responsibility is expected from junior, midcareer and senior professors. If professors are to "move into" other roles, that is the responsibility of the University and its schools, colleges and departments to enable. This is not the mission of the NIH. The NIH should fund meritorius peer-reviewed grants. | Professors do in fact mentor junior colleagues extensively. Professors do collaborate with junior collagues and 'bring them into' new fields. Professors are responsible for reasonable and timely lab closing. Is it really the responsibility of the NIH to provide opportunities for moving into a 'new role' that is not research-intensive? The suggested ideas, in parentheses above, are not the responsibility of the NIH. | Just the thought that this would need to be "incentivize(d)' makes one question the overall merit of the proposed award. | What is the underlying objective? Perhaps it is to get more senior people to stop applying for grants. The rationale for the award in the Request for Information is not clear, and ranges from ideas about continuation of research programs, to senior people moving into other roles, to dismantling programs. | ||||
31 | This is an interesting idea that may work in very few instances of still very productive senior investigators. By the time they retire into emeritus status, most of them are prepared to transition due to changes in research priorities or a simple burnout from the PI status.My concern is that the funding environment is so tight and so many talented younger investigators get lost from the pipeline due to the lack of funding that developing essentially an infrastructure grant will deprive many more with fresher and more modern views, skills, and ideas. | Partnership and mentorship roles would be most helpful. | 2-4 years depending on the circumstance. Junior partner should be senior enough to take over the laboratory and apply for independent grants within the timeframe. | make the use of it flexible for salary support of the faculty member or a junior partner, or the projects. | The Definitions of the emeritus and the pressures for the departments to have very few emeriti on recall or needing additional support. | |||||
32 | Techshot, Inc. | Greenville, Indiana | There is community interest. Thank you Sally (I love your blog)! You have introduced an opportunity for which I have been waiting for some years – emeritus awards for continued research. I have been distributing this idea informally for a couple of decades and may have suggested it to some NSF officials, themselves in a similar age category. I have been using the term “Late Academic Service Transition” awards to be created by all U.S. agencies that fund research. (There may be a better acronym in your message: Emeritus Award for Senior Investigator Transition (EASIT)). Here are some thoughts on content: • Applicants write and submit proposals of activity(ies) • The bar should be fairly high • Stipends should go directly to individuals • Non-competitive renewals up to four times, dependent on acceptable annual report of activity • Activity consistent with the proposal • Not to exceed $20K/year • Should include supplies, services, travel, etc. costs, including up to $10K/y for fully unemployed • Application process should minimize paperwork burden Caveats: There are now several PI’s over 80. This should continue and they should continue to apply through standard routes: R01, etc. Age discrimination should be avoided. For those with discontinued affiliations the picture is different. Most emeritus types have retirement-related income, which is not necessarily an incentive to continue tutoring, mentoring or performing research functions, keeping in mind that there are emeriti from all three: academia, industry and government. One purpose, at least applicable in my case, is the publication of unfinished original scientific work. I may be an extreme example, but I have at least 100 manuscripts either unwritten, unsubmitted or unpublished. My estimate of the AVERAGE cost of producing a scientific paper of just about any type (averaged over research articles, research notes, letters, reviews all in the mix) is about $50,000, probably more, due to recent rampant inflation of the U. S. dollar. I insert that the range is from $5,000 to $5,000,000. Roughly this means that funding the writing and submission of 100 papers averts wasting at least $5 million, most of them from taxpayers. Publishing 4 papers/year, for example, would be $5K/paper – a 90% recovery of average cost. The term “Transition” has at least two potential meanings: transition FROM a terminating professional appointment (beginning) and transition INTO discontinued productivity (end). My Take: I am 78 years old and still failing retirement. I do not necessarily consider myself a recipient, but I understand the circumstances fairly well. If this existed 15 years ago I would have retained a university relationship and continued in university life as a mentor, occasional teacher, adviser, etc. | Here is an example: One purpose, at least applicable in my case, is the publication of unfinished original scientific work. I may be an extreme example, but I have at least 100 manuscripts either unwritten, unsubmitted or unpublished. My estimate of the AVERAGE cost of producing a scientific paper of just about any type (averaged over research articles, research notes, letters, reviews all in the mix) is about $50,000, probably more, due to recent rampant inflation of the U. S. dollar. I insert that the range is from $5,000 to $5,000,000. Roughly this means that funding the writing and submission of 100 papers averts wasting at least $5 million, most of them from taxpayers. Publishing 4 papers/year, for example, would be $5K/paper – a 90% recovery of average cost. The term “Transition” has at least two potential meanings: transition FROM a terminating professional appointment (beginning) and transition TOWARD discontinued productivity (end). | I have been using the term “Late Academic Service Transition” awards to be created by all U.S. agencies that fund research. (There may be a better acronym in your message: Emeritus Award for Senior Investigator Transition (EASIT)). Here are some thoughts on content: • Applicants write and submit proposals of activity(ies) • The bar should be fairly high • Stipends should go directly to individuals • Non-competitive annual renewals up to four times, dependent on acceptable annual report of activity • Activity consistent with the proposal • Not to exceed $20K/year • Should include supplies, services, travel, etc. costs, including up to $10K/y for fully unemployed • Application process should minimize paperwork burden Caveats: There are now several PI’s over 80. This should continue and they should continue to apply through standard routes: R01, etc. Age discrimination should be avoided. For those with discontinued affiliations the picture is different. Most emeritus types have retirement-related income, which is not necessarily an incentive to continue tutoring, mentoring or performing research functions, keeping in mind that there are emeriti from all three: academia, industry and government. | There are now several PI’s over 80. This should continue and they should continue to apply through standard routes: R01, etc. Age discrimination should be avoided. For those with discontinued affiliations the picture is different. Most emeritus types have retirement-related income, which is not necessarily an incentive to continue tutoring, mentoring or performing research functions, keeping in mind that there are emeriti from all three: academia, industry and government. Stipends should go directly to individuals. • Non-competitive renewals up to four times, dependent on acceptable annual report of activity • Activity consistent with the proposal • Not to exceed $20K/year • Should include supplies, services, travel, etc. costs, including up to $10K/y for fully unemployed • Application process should minimize paperwork burden . If this existed 15 years ago I would have retained a university relationship and continued in university life as a mentor, occasional teacher, adviser, etc. | Most senior investigators love to do the work. They do not love to fill out government forms: applications, reports, certifications, etc. Someone at the agencies will need to create a very different paradigm for paperwork management. Annual reapplications should be non-competitive and require only a brief, unformatted progress report up to four times. Beyond that they should be competitive again, but submitted in a user-friendly way that is more like this form than like Grants.gov. As mentioned above, genuine senior investigators wishing to retain their institutional affiliations should apply through normal institutional channels. An emeritus affiliation, unsalaried, should, nevertheless make a senior investigator eligible for a direct emeritus award. | My Take: I am [ ] years old and still failing retirement. I do not necessarily consider myself a recipient, but I understand the circumstances fairly well. If this existed 15 years ago I would have retained a university relationship and continued in university life as a mentor, occasional teacher, adviser, etc. | ||
33 | Harvard Medical School | Boston, MA | This is an excellent idea | I think there shouldn't be a specific version of this award. Rather, the investigator should propose what they want to do. There are many possibilities besides what is contemplated. Besides finishing off some experiments in the lab or helping a junior partner, here are some other ideas. 1) Writing review articles; 2) Serving on study sections; 3) Larger-scale reviewing of papers; 4) annotating data in ways useful for the field; 4) Extensive teaching beyond the usual expectations in the department; 5) organizing research activities in the institution. I'm sure there are many other possibilities. I think the grant should be submitted with the ideas of the individual and then judged. There shouldn't be biases on what such a grant should look like | Number of years of support should depend on what is being proposed. I don't think there should be fixed number And, the grant can be renewed if the proposed activities are worth it. I imagine the level of award will be roughly equivalent to a summer salary or equivalent (20-25% of normal salary), but it would depend on what is being proposed. I don't think the junior faculty member should be a requirement, nor should there be some specific definition. There is no reason to restrict what an emeritus scientist should do. Just judge the proposal on its merit | By advertising the award, particularly the open-ended nature of it (see previous comments), I think that will incentivize the individuals who are appropriate | Psychological. It is a big deal to transition from running a research lab to being an emeritus scientist doing something very different | Please be open-minded about how this could work. NIH has a tendency to be very restrictive about new ideas, which is very self-defeating and often a waste of money | ||
34 | Emeritus professors and those over the age of 65 continue to outcompete all other age groups for federal funding. I refer you to your own publication http://nexus.od.nih.gov/all/2012/02/13/age-distribution-of-nih-principal-investigators-and-medical-school-faculty/ At some point you have to ask how many more advantages you would like senior and emeritus faculty to have. If you want to judge the community interest, I refer you to the comments on Rock Talk. Even the emeritus faculty writing there generally thing this is too much of a money grab. | Most senior and emeritus faculty who would apply for this mechanism would undoubtedly retain any additional funding for their own use to continue work for which R01 funding had not been received. | It should not be introduced. | It should not be used. | I am sure that senior faculty would be delighted with the program, as would the institutions taking indirects. | I recognize that the NIH is run by people who will be greatly personally benefitted by this award, which is why I am certain that it will be created. However, at some point the NIH will have to look at the ways in which it is damaging the future of American biomedical research and ask if it is worth it to allow the continued personal enrichment of senior faculty. | ||||
35 | University of Florida | Gainesville, FL | I think you will find a good deal of interest in such a program. I would certainly consider it, when the time is right. I am certain that administrations could see the benefit of transitioning an expensive laboratory from a senior investigator to a more junior investigator. The cost of start-up for a newly hired junior investigator could be reduced, and the mentored junior investigator could be more immediately productive by not having to set up a new lab from scratch. This would of course require a cooperative hiring process between the junior and senior investigators. | The most appealing use of such an award would involve an active senior investigator transitioning to either another role (e.g. administrative or retirement), phasing out his or her PI duties, while passing along the lines of research and infrastructure to a junior faculty member. | I suggest a 3 year award at 50% FTE to transition a lab and infrastructure to a junior faculty member. I think the K99 type of relationship is similar, though I think this award could broaden the definition of "junior" to include early career, perhaps initially funded researchers. University administrators might find it too much of a gamble to bet on too junior a faculty member. | Funding is the primary incentive for both Junior and Senior investigators. For Universities, the indirect rate equivalent to an R01 is an additional incentive. | The biggest impediment for what I have suggested above, is probably the identification and recruitment of a suitable junior faculty member who has appropriate credentials for the Junior-Senior partnership. I think it should be a joint proposal between these individuals, not a proposal by the senior investigator only. Support agreements from University Administrators would also be required, specifying the arrangements. | |||
36 | BIDMC-Harvard Medical School | Boston, MA | First: Under no circumstances do I think a senior investigator should be penalized for age, nor do I agree that the 7% of PI who are over 65 are anything but an asset. For the most part these are people like me who take pride in fostering new investigators.At the same time I do not think any special advantage should be given to this group when it comes to peer review. As far as peer review is concerned age should not be a consideration. Please keep it as much as possible on a basis of meritocracy. My personal perspective: I would love to have someone to take over the program i have developed. Currently this consists of a T32, a T35, and two R01 grants. It would be a shame to lose this for all parties, me personally, my institution, my specialty, surgeon clinician-scientists, and NIH. If I quit tomorrow it is very likely this productive public investment would all be lost. Thus, to me there is some value in paying some attention as to how to maintain continuity. I stress I am speaking from a personal situation. | The one item that occurs to me is to have some ability to recruit one or two people who could carry this enterprise forward.Closing a productive laboratory and research training center is expensive and counterproductive to the interests of all parties and the NIH mission. | I do not suggest funds for myself. Rather I would like to have some funds available under my jurisdiction to recruit a successor. This is especially true when trying to recruit a clinician-scientist. There are many factors that come into play as that person has to fit into the clinical picture as well as the research side. | I have no easy answer. One possibility is an award to fund a clinician scientist where the funds would be allocated only under control of the PI so if the clinician leader wanted to participate the PI would be in a position to enforce adequate research time and resources for the recruit. Perhaps a matching package from the department or institution so the recruit would have funds for admin support and laboratory assistance. Space and equipment would not be a significant issue other than an office in the laboratory area. In any case the PI would have to be in a position to withdraw support if the clinical department did not maintain its commitments. I | Accommodation by the clinical mission is the problem. The value of clinical work far exceeds that of laboratory investigation, so a clinician investigator needs some added value to maintaining a research commitment. The hospital is a clinical enterprise so the pressure on clinical chiefs is to maximize clinical productivity. Most clinical chiefs would welcome a force to justify research in the department. As is stands this does not exist. Another thought that may be related in a global sense: The hospital consumes overhead with no internal monitoring of how it is spent. Can you give investigators some mechanism to attest to appropriate support of research activities.All most chiefs hear is " your dollar density (a contrived number) is not adequate". This is far second to " your clinical volume is down". Think of ways you can make sure your money is well spent in this complex milieu. | Dr. Rock: Great work in opening up communication with your extramural investigators.Sorry to not write more but I am happy to further discuss anytime. | ||
37 | Columbia University College of Physicians and Surgeons | New York NY | There should be high interest in such a program because there is a gap between senior investigators like myself - still funded and very active at age [ ] yrs and the next level - most of us work with Asst Professors in their late 30 or early 40s who are struggling for independent funding. A transition of knowledge with mentoring would be terrific for that group. | I think that there should be a separate funding mechanism - a "senior K24" type grant that would allow, over a 5 yr period, a gradual reduction in effort. It would be for scientists over 65 or maybe over 70 who still have grants that would be ending and rather than attempting to continue funding via that grant, they would choose this pathway. But it would likely need to be linked to an R01 for the junior person who would take up the work of the senior investigator. Obviously, the junior person would have to be funded at the same time and there could possibly be some 'bonus' given to the young person if the senior investigator moved off the grant but applied successfully for the transition-mentoring award. I do not think that there should be a category of grants that allow senior investigators to shut down their lab over several years - either they are still productive or not. However, there could be a one or two year extension, without a chance for renewal, of the present grant with some modest level of funds to buffer the staff and the investigator. | I think I put all of that in #2 | see above | I don't see any downside to my suggestions - the senior person gets to mentor over 5 yrs, with diminishing support - maybe 50% first year and 20% last year - and the junior person picks up a successful line of work in which they have ben Co-I and now they get their chance to be independent. | no | ||
38 | University of Kentucky | Lexington, KY | This idea lacks merit. It is a wonderful idea to provide mentorship to junior faculty and support senior faculty with knowledge. But to do it through this kind of mechanism is a waste of precious research dollars. It is the job of a faculty member to give mentorship and the job of the institutions that employ them to provide this support. Furthermore, this seems to only really be necessary for those institutions that rely on hiring faculty only on soft money (i.e. private) and not those with hard money lines (e.g. public universities). I strongly oppose this emeritus award. | Paying someone to close a lab is ridiculous. If you must implement this kind of wasteful award, having someone work in the lab of a junior investigator might be an interesting alternative. Bridging productive senior faculty to new areas of research could be a useful way to use this money. | This award has a high probability of being wasted. Faculty on the way out of research are more apt to take the money and relax knowing the end is in sight. You need to guard against that by first, not awarding this kind of mechanism. Second, if you insist on wasting money this way, you need to make sure the awardees have the character to give back. Evidence of career long mentorship should be a must and letters of support from chairs and faculty previously mentored a requirement. | Really? You think people need to be incentivized to take your money? Many of us are struggling to keep our research programs afloat with the severe cuts to our grants and your trying to figure out ways for people to take your money? Please, keep this money in research and don't waste it with this kind of mechanism. Please. | Free money with no institutional commitment? What impediments could there possibly be? Who comes up with these questions? | Pretty please do not waste my tax dollars with this program. If you are looking for ways to invest in research, try helping the investigators that are just getting their first competitive renewals. They are currently the ones with the greatest need since they don't get the benefit of being new investigators anymore and have not the track record of the most senior faculty. This is the group with the greatest need, not people retiring from research. | ||
39 | University of Tennessee Health Science Center | Memphis, TN | I believe that there is very little interest in an emeritus award. In fact, I believe that there are pretty strong feelings against this idea. Most investigators believe that the transition of senior investigators to different roles should be the natural result of their own interests and their competitiveness for R01 funding. Why should there be a program to support senior investigators who might not be competitive any more, or to support a junior investigator who is only competitive because of the senior investigator? | I think that this is a bad idea. The transition should be the responsibility of the senior investigator and the institution. | None. | I don't think this should be incentivized. | Most investigators feel that NIH should concentrate on supporting investigator-initiated R01's rather than creating a mechanism that would either encourage a delay in the transition of a senior investigator or would prop up a junior investigator who is not competitive on their own. | |||
40 | Washington University in Saint Louis | Saint Louis, Missouri | I have no interest in seeing this award move forward. It is unclear to me how this is a substantial improvement on existing mechanisms for transitioning faculty out of active research. As a junior faculty member, I am a co-investigator on an R01 with my PhD advisor, who is in his mid 70s and still very productive. It is easy to see transitioning to a more active role in the research program in this context, or continuing collaborations in which I take an increasingly dominant role (some of which is happening already). The current mechanisms seem more than adequate. (Comments on the RockTalk blog from senior PIs who are having trouble getting funded at the 35th percentile only reinforce the point - we are ALL having trouble being funded at the 35th percentile!) | One important (though likely unintended) consequence of awards aimed at senior faculty is a decrease in diversity. Senior scientists are statistically much more likely to be white men; an award aimed at supporting senior scientists thus preferentially supports white men. Such an approach harms the overall diversity of the research workforce and countermands several calls for increasing diversity in NIH funded researchers. | ||||||
41 | Harvard Medcial School | Boston, MA | This sounds like a good idea to me. HHMI has something like this, and people use it. I've heard positive feedback from a couple of later career HHMI scientists about how it allowed them to rationally plan their late career. | I feel NIH grant money should be used to support research. My sense it this path would mainly be useful in allowing planning of a phased reduction in research activity. But the idea of support to work int he lab of a junior colleague is interesting. Well established labs often have amazing collections of samples, reagents and data. I think it might be useful to use this type of funding to make some of those collections accessible to the community. For example, to facilitate documentation of clones and transfer to a public repository. Or to facilitate digitization of micrographs or other types of research output. I wish more 16mm movies of cell behavior has been transferred to digital media, for example. Electron micrographs are another resource. That said, senior investigators may over-value their treasure troves, so some kind of affidavit of value to the community should be required. I like the idea of incentivizing older PIs to work in the groups of younger PIs and for younger PIs to welcome them and benefit. That could be a cost effective appproach, and would help build community and continuity. It would be important that progress made by the older PI could be credited to the progress reports of the younger PI. This could be achieved by linking the older PIs award to some award of the younger PI. So the younger PI effectively gets a boost in their funding. | I would look to the HHMI model since its been running for a while. I think number of years would have to be longer than a 4-year grant to make this attractive. Id imaging 3-5 years at current support level, then phased down over another 3-5 years. A concern might be that this award would primarily support retirement plan contributions of aging faculty on soft money, which would not be a good use of scarce resources. I would suggest an upper limit on PI salary, and perhaps an uppper limit on % of award going to PI salary. | From a senior faculty perspective, a longer duration award would be a significant incentive. We all fear competing renewals. A 8-10 year award would look attractive I think. However, it might be important to build in some sort of review to ensure continued productivity, esp given possibly declining health. Institutions would want to maximize extraction of faculty salary from NIH I suspect. HMS has quite a lot of senior investigators who are unfunded or under-funded, and their salary is a significant resource drain. Its supposed to be covered by endowment income, but there is never enough of that. The perspective of younger PIs who might host a senior collaborator in interesting. If the older PI paid there own way int he younger PI's lab, including on experimental expenses, they would be quite attractive I think. | Fairness is an issue. A major plus of the RO1 program has been an equal playing field for everyone, regardless of status and history. If there was a mechanisms to facilitate one PI working int he group of another, and linking progress on their (smaller) award to the progress of the host PI, I dont see why this should have to be restricted by seniority. I can imagine PIs using it to facilitate career transitions at any age. Faculty salary is an issue. Most institutions are now to some extent, or even largely, soft money with respect to faculty salaries. Our retirement plans are based largely on employee contributions. This creates a situation where faculty are incentivized to bring in salary from NIH for as long as possible. | I like the idea of incentivizing younger Pis to host senior PIs as collaborators and group members, and vice versa. Defined benefit pension plans together with cheaper, taxpayer subsidized healthcare, make rational late career planning much easier in Europe. | ||
42 | University of California Irvine | Irvine, Ca | There is strong evidence that the Community, both scientific and general community, are interested in maintaining and promoting the scientific value of the senior investigators and what they provide in terms of experience, and resources that they accumulated over the years including intellectual resources as well as other resources including biospecimens and mega data that can be built on by junior investigators. This can be the push to jump start the careers for many junior investigators and at the same time reduce research cost. i | Planning and implementing such a program nationwide is timely and vital in this climate of limited research dollars and very limited graduate students support which is leading to a significant reduction in scientific power to solve important current scientific/medical/health care problems. As an example; at this time I requested from the university to allocate partial FTEs o my department to hire 3 assistant professors where the research funding is supporting their other half FTEs and we formed a research cluster with the resources of data, biospecimens and populations understudy that I have as a senior investigator are now available to these junior faculty to get them started with publications, research applications and collaborations. This model can work if the funding is available from NIH in a much efficient way | An emeritus award should be at least for 3 years up to 5 years. There should be evidence for previous peer reviewed grants and contracts and evidence of availability of resources as well as evidence for institutional support for the application. A junior faculty can be either in a tenure or non-tenure track at the university at the assistant professor level where ther would be eligible for a K or R awards. | Perhaps a pre-award of $50,000-100,000 based on a short letter of intent to put together a cluster of a senior and 2-3 junior investigators and prepare documentation of the available resources and objectives of the research if fully funded,would be a good insentive for the design of such a program and would be a commitment that would help insentivise the institution and the senior investigator to make the next step forward. | From the point of view of the senior investigator, it is a serious and a big commitment of time and effort with the understanding that this is based on their commitment to mentoring, society and the advancement of science and medicine. for the institution, it is mainly cost. However the advantages certainly out way the cost issue. They will gain new successful faculty and more NIH standing and funding | Thank you for thinking of this potentially fantastic program and opportunity | ||
43 | The Ohio State University | Columbus, OH | Please find a way to support mid-career investigators (meaning those of us that are late associate/new full professors). We were the post-docs that provided the workforce for the emeritus faculty, and we are the workforce training the next generation. It is almost impossible to do this without sustainable funding. You are losing a critical component of your scientific workforce. | |||||||
44 | Indiana University | Indianapolis, IN | Currently, one has to have an R grant to have a competitive K award. It seems like this is simply a mechanism to allow someone with past R success to have a K award to mentor. Working with the existing award mechanisms seems like it would address the problem you are trying to solve. Emeritus in academics means retired - so best to pick a different word so we don't equate this award as being only for those in the 60's or 70's. | Best use of senior faculty is to help develop the junior faculty - if they could be supported by a K without having concurrent R grant funding, that would meet the need. I cannot imagine NIH supporting role transitions - there already isn't enough funding for the research and mentoring that needs to be done. | Use mentoring K criteria | Not sure why this is needed other than to support senior faculty to develop junior faculty | if this affects availability of research funding for junior faculty or trainees, that will be a big problem. | |||
45 | No, I do not favor such a mechanism. The concept of paying for a transition AWAY from health-related research does not serve the mission of the NIH. Senior investigators have achieved much in their careers, I appreciate that. I also appreciate that they have not gotten this far without developing a skill set that will allow a seamless transition without a new funding mechanism. | I am concerned that the junior partner will either lose some degree of independence and project control through such an arrangement, or that most of these partnerships will be supporting a senior PI and their postdoc. This relationship has already achieved the training and project "hand off." | If the award is serving a purpose, filling a need, that is the incentive. It should be inherent, no additional incentive needed. | I am very confused by this concept. Apparently, this is targeted to senior investigators who already have NIH funding ("a position that relies on funding from NIH"), but seeks to offer a new award, and even incentivize it. I can only imagine a few special cases where anything like this would be needed that isn't already available. The most likely is the case of a valuable research tool or reagent that needs to be passed on. Potentially a complex technique, a novel surgical model, or an array of useful cells. PubMed Central has become an outstanding repository for published information, maybe the NIH should consider a similar, publicly accessible physical clearinghouse for reagents in the same spirit as PMC is for knowledge. Still, the current RFI does not seek input about developing a tissue and cell archive. Nor does it ask about ideas to preserve challenging techniques, analogous to the Journal of Visual Experiments which could record the nuance of a specialized technique. I am opposed to this concept of providing a new funding mechanism, available only to the successful "senior" scientists. It excludes midcareer folks who may wish to transition, excluding the scientists who had to transition without help, and ignoring the historical unintentional biases that will mean the eligible investigators for this prize are more likely to pair with a junior investigator who shares certain cultural features (gender, ethnicity). Unspoken in the RFI is the concept that such a transition award could be considered to be in place of other NIH funding, the emeritus package instead of a renewed R01. That would explain the need to incentivize the award for the senior researcher and the institution. However, the more likely use is "in addition to" current funding. Money sticks to money and success begets success. This award will reward the well-funded PI with more resources. Follow the science instead, invest in R01 funding. Let study section members do their job to identify merit, and let academic departments ease the transition to retirement of their faculty. Raise the modular cap. Lower the salary cap (yes, lower); usecollective bargaining to reduce the annual growth of biomedical inflation (target large suppliers for unscrupulous shipping and handling fees, inflated disposable costs). | ||||||
46 | Virginia Commonwealth University | Richmond, VA | Excellent idea. A lot of talent and expertise is lost when early retirements and departures occur due to lack of funding. Established laboratory resources and equipment may wind up in surplus storage or discarded. A well though out transition plan could assure resources are strategically placed for maximum usage. | 1. Recruitment plans that provide resources for both the emeritus mentor and the young investigator to execute a transition plan over a fixed time period. 2. Laboratory closure awards that assure years of data (unpublished as well as published) are made available for future researchers and not discarded 3. Preservation of data, equipment, and information of unique or historical scientific significance. | 1. Awards of 2-3 years would optimize transition of information, techniques, and completion of unfinished projects and data analysis. 2. Perhaps have different award categories with different goals ( transition-transfer awards, completion-close out awards, mentoring-advising awards). 3. Transition-mentoring to individuals that are at time point in career that leaves sufficient years going forward to obtain return in investment (5-10 years before retirement). Include pay back clause. | 1. Senior investigators-emeritus awardees may be incentivized by: a. Ability to stay engaged or participate in research on a full time or part time bases b. Having an office and access to university resources c. Having control over a modest budget and avoiding out of pocket expenses d. Being able to make a difference in career of mentee | 1. Institutions may have regulations that limit an individual in emeritus status 2. Cost of health benefits and required compensation could be significant | This is a great idea. The loss of significant talent and expertise could be avoided by a well thought out program. | ||
47 | FredHutch Cancer Center | Seattle, WA | I personally believe that this is a very meritorious concept that should be seriously considered by the NIH. It would allow smooth transitions of senior and junior investigators to provide continuity of research trajectories and expertise of personnel and would damper “bottlenecks” in which meritorious research directions could otherwise become extinct. | My perception is that the strongest rationale would be to promote a partnership between a senior and junior investigator during which the junior investigator can hone the skill set to transition to a new role. It also might be used to help the junior investigator obtain a new faculty position that is more suited to continuing research. An example, might be the case in which meritorious research becomes unfashionable due to a current fad and the junior investigator could extend their career and the research progress by moving to a new institution. | It’s my perception that a window of three to four years would be appropriate. Given the new trend of hiring junior investigators as staff scientists rather than faculty track, it seems to me that the applicant pool should include any candidates from the level of staff scientist to assistant professor. My personal belief is that this award should be extended to staff scientists as well as faculty track investigators because the pool includes individuals such as women and minorities who are currently not appropriately represented in faculty positions even if their research is highly meritorious. This is the pool with the greatest potential loss to the research community without an Emeritus Award for the transition. | It’s my perception that both senior and junior investigators would be highly incentivized by the existence of the award as an opportunity for both. The senior investigator could transition out of an active research lab, which would be much more pleasant than closing it down. The junior investigator would get the funding need to transition the laboratory to the future. | The major impediment for both investigators could be the institution, which might not want to support the transition. This could be avoided if the investigator (especially the junior investigator) could move with the grant towards the middle to end of the funding period. | I am a senior investigator and I think this idea is great! I have heard some of my senior investigator colleagues argue that the NIH should just (somehow, miraculously) find more funds for junior investigators. This is (1) unrealistic and (2) not responsive to the need to assure continuity of research directions. I feel very strongly that the continuity of research directions should be encouraged by the NIH unless they are proven false or non-essential for the NIH mission. Entire lines of research can become extinct if fads hold sway in the peer review process. I’ve seen this in my career, and I’ve also witnessed this fad-driven research harm the NIH mission by reducing the diversity of the NIH research portfolio. It’s my perception that the Emeritus Award by preserving a diverse range of research through transition periods would serve the public health much better than the vast majority of huge initiatives concentrated in one small area. I have benefited from several great mentors and their ideas lived on through me; it would be a privilege for me to honor them by continuing that tradition. In summary, this is a great opportunity to improve diversity of research investigators across the NIH. | ||
48 | University of Colorado Anschutz Medical Campus | Aurora, CO | I have been advocating fo this type of fudning mechanism, or somethings similar, for a number of years. There is a serious paucity of those of us who are senior URM faculty AND with a track record of strong, continuous R01 funding. Yet, we've been pulled in so many directions during our career, to help our institutions, departments, and programs in the recruiting and retention, mentoring and advising, of other URM trainees and faculty. All of these efforts are unfunded, have no impact on promotion or subsequent R01 renewals, and take significant amount of time- time that majority faculty don't have lose, making it even more difficult for URM faculty to compete, on top of hidden biases. NIH should recognize the value of these senior, wise, expereinced faculty to the success of their current investment in URM trainees; and this type of award/support would be amazing and have clear impact. | 1. Require that the institutions provide "hard money" salary support contribution and provide some minimal level of admin support for scheduling etc. 2. Little help is rquired to close a alba, other than to secure salary fudning for the faculty, as the NIH % effort is lost. So if this award provides %efort, then that is the key. I suggest that it be handled like a Fogarty Sabbatical Award - the waward provides ~50% of FTE, with the insitution providing the other 50%; thw award should be for 5 years, renewable once for a total of 10 years max; clear plans for mentoring and nurtuing URm and women faculty should be required, with names and BIoSketches of those to be mentored being included; a mentoring plan should be detailed but NIH should not be proscriptive, and accept a varaiety of mentoring plans. | Listed above. | 1. Name the Award - the Henry B. Gonzales Award, the whatever award, give it cache 2. Make it clear that it is a true honor and "merit" award, for URM faculty who ahve had R01 fudning over "n" of years, and are now transitioning to mentoring efforts primarily in the latter stage of their career (set an age limit, eg 55 and older??) Or would it be allowed to hold BOTH R01 fudning and this Mentor award? This would help in the transition. 3. Use plenty of PR for the faculty selected, for NIH, and so that the institution gains PR as well. 4. Establish an annula nationalmeeting of the awardes to discuss best practices, discuss specific problems they have faced and how they have overcome them, and to invite some of the young mentees to present their science so that the senior faculty can provie advice (but keep goal of meeting for the senior faculty - of note, NIDDK's NMRI already does this for the young trainees) | 1. The institutions will balk at providing recurring hard money support for effort that may seem vague to them- they will want some sort of accountability for the effort the senior faculty are putting in, and not just collecting salary for 3 hrs of work every day! 2. URM Senior investigators would be faced with either/or, if holding this award made investigators no longer eligible to hold R01's . This may be the biggest challenge, although I know there are a few senior investigators like myself who are ready to transition to a full time mentor role. | This is an idea that is late in coming, but one that a few of us senior URM faculty have been advocating for very srongly, vocally and persistently. The NIH has invested billions of dollars in URM trainees, yet the prfessoriate #'s remain unchnaged for the pasat ~40 years. It is TIME to do something of impact- this will have impact! | ||
49 | Seattle Children's Research Institute | Seattle, WA | I would be very interested in an emeritus award mechanism at the appropriate time. My work has developed a new field of knowledge over 25-30 years, and I have been able to start transitioning the knowledge to so far only 2 younger investigators. More are needed. Just reading my published papers is not enough to grasp the entire body of knowledge acquired over so many years. The same paradigm certainly applies to many other investigators by the later stages of their careers. | Closing a laboratory is really an institutional responsibility. The challenge is simply planning ahead. The problem is finding and mentoring the best young investigators and mentoring them as these projects are transitioned to them. For me, this would mean assisting the new investigators with maintaining research core capabilities such as patient ascertainment up and running, assisting with IRB challenges that I have managed for many years, and especially writing grants. Given the current NIH grant budget constraints, it would be very difficult to place the senior investigators salary and limited support funds in the budget. | Transitioning projects is not a one time shot, but a process. The duration should be 4-5 years. The junior investigator should be an experienced trained (i.e. post-doc) through Assistant Professor, in other words defined as broadly as possible. | The NIH could require that resources built up over many years be made more accessible to the research community at large, in terms of key databases and samples. The cost of maintaining some samples is cheap, others (i.e. cell lines) expensive. I have had extreme difficulty with our IRB coming to terms with sending samples to the Coriell Biorepository. So valuable samples built up over decades may be end up in the trash. So new (and ideally more flexible) guidelines should be generated to help local IRBs, which often have little or no idea how to manage this vis a vis the consent issues. | The senior investigator may want to continue some part of his/her research via competitive grant proposals, while closing or transferring others. This should be allowed. Institutions will need to keep the senior investigator on faculty. Some transitional faculty status should be encouraged. | As NIH is well aware, inadequate mentoring is a leading contributor to failure of new investigators to find success. In the last stages of my career, I would be very interested in mentoring new scientists working at places beyond my own institutional last stop. This would require a "matching" database of some type. | ||
50 | Montana State University | BOZEMAN | There is interest in Montana in transition awards for emeritus/senior faculty that relies on NIH funding. We have a wealth of knowledge in senior faculty that would be a shame to waste. | We would like to see award be used to facilitate the incorporation of senior/emeritus faculty into peer review. Many times, peer review is done with an inherent conflict of interest by those who are competing for grants in a similar area, at this time. In addition, there is a lack of true breadth and expertise on some study sections. A study section of emeritus/senior faculty would fix some of the problems inherent in peer review and use the talents of this unique group. Sometimes, the senior faculty are reluctant to retire, and perhaps make room for the next generation, because there are limited "next steps" for their careers. | Number of years (up to 10) For peer review, no junior faculty partner is needed | Provide reasonable funding for the transition to peer reviewing | Loss of status at the university (ie., awards should be deemed honors and prestigious, if possible) | |||
51 | University of South Florida | Tampa FL | This would be of significant interest to us as we have several senior investigators with significant programs of NIH-funded research approaching retirement. | The promotion of a senior-junior investigator partnership is particularly interesting. | Support of 2 to 3 years seems appropriate. Junior faculty could be one with no more than one R-series grant award. | Many senior investigators worry about the legacy of their work. Providing the opportunity to support transition may be sufficient incentive. Our institution would welcome it. | Can't think of any right now. | None. | ||
52 | UMass Medical School | Worcester MA | In this competitive funding climate, this idea makes little sense. If these investigators wish 'to pass the torch' on to a junior colleague, the competitive granting process is well poised to allow this to happen. As such, I cannot support this initiative. The system is creaky but ultimately self correcting and older faculty who are no longer competitive for funding should retire from active research to make way for the next generation of scientists. I find it ironic that the NIH has placed so much emphasis on the plight of graduate students, postdocs and early career scientists transitioning to independent careers, to now propose to further clog up the pipeline by providing a special initiative to older faculty. | This proposal should not happen. | none | |||||
53 | I do not agree that senior investigators should receive financial incentive to transition away from their NIH funded work. In practice it seems that it would be difficult to ensure that the senior faculty would legally have to relinquish their eligibility particularly if they are working full time at an eligible institution(i.e. based on age discrimination???). Also, there are multiple paths for Principal Investigators to transition their funded grant(s) to co-investigators and/or collaborators. Also the notion of supporting senior faculty in their transition to other functions at their home institution seems a bit meddlesome. If faculty are providing a service to their home institution, then that institution should be supporting them and not the NIH. | As stated above, I believe that this is a bad idea and thus should not be implemented. In reality it comes across as tone deaf. Of all the issues the NIH and extramural research community are facing, supporting senior faculty must come very low on the list. No one is talking about this on a local or national level. Most are upset that senior faculty can remain so entrenched despite decreased innovation and/or productivity. The notion that this will reduce the number of active senior level investigators in unfounded as no data has been presented. Making otherwise eligible faculty ineligible based on age seems to have weak legal standing. | I give zero support for this award. The NIH's recent ramblings (a frankly little tangible action) of supporting diversity would likely suffer if senior faculty are allowed to select their successor. The bias against women and underrepresented minorities in the life sciences is becoming more clear and suggests that resources held to a disproportionately white and male senior faculty pool will likely go to more white, males [ ]. | This award is duplicative, unnecessary, and may be legally tenuous. Please reconsider. | Hopefully both will see this as a bad idea that does not support productive, highly valued faculty or up and coming junior faculty. No productive senior faculty member will agree to give up funding eligibility and no institution with a bit of sense will encourage them to. Encouraging unproductive, fading senior faculty to give up research is not in the purview of the NIH. It is on the institution and the person themselves. | |||||
54 | Mass. General Hospital | Boston, MA | It interests me very much. I am a retired senior investigator who had long-term support ([ ] years) from NIH through R01 grants. I have been promoting the career of a junior colleague since I retired. | Promoting a partnership with a junior investigator | It should provide 4 or 5 years of support; probably primarily for travel and supplies. The junior should have at least 7 years of active research remaining. | For me, travel, particularly to Europe, where my junior colleague works. Travel for her to the US would also be helpful. I would like to buy some supplies for my part of the work here, particularly a new computer workstation | It costs me quite a bit in travel to visit my colleague. My institution isn't interested at all; perhaps a little overhead would increase their interest | |||
55 | Department of Biology, Saint Louis University | St. Louis, MO | I think this mechanism would provide very senior investigators an alternative to hanging on out of loyalty to their lab's research team. It would provide adequate time for members of the team to find new positions. | The value of this award is that it would put a finite end to a PI's research pursuits. I see no need to transition the research program to a junior investigator. If the research has run its course, this would be a way to close it down. | no opinion | There could be pool of funding for emeritus-qualified PIs. If these PIs are close to the payline but miss on a grant application, they could be offered the chance to have the application considered for an emeritus award. However, the condition of the award would be that the person would no longer be eligible to submit applications to any federal agency or be key personnel on applications of others (other than unpaid consultant). | ||||
56 | University of Louisville | Louisville, KY | I am against making such an award to junior investigators available. Such an award goes against "evening out the playing field" and will undoubtedly give an investigator who is on friendly terms with a senior investigator a very unfair advantage. | I am against such an award - in the age of competitive funding, it makes absolutely no sense. | Zero years. | I think such an award gives a very unfair advantage to junior investigators - it is not anyone's god given right to get funding essentially as a rubber stamping and without peer review with the applicant standing on his own. | I fail to understand this concept - when a senior investigator retires, it is unfathomable why funding should continue flowing because of lab personnel. This is an outlandish and amazing proposition. Presumably at well-funded institutions, the institution should put up funding to support the lab personnel and additionally with sufficient lead time, the personnel can look for funding through other labs to support themselves. | |||
57 | Pharmacology, U Nebraska Med Center | Omaha, NE | I would not call it "transitioning out" for PR reasons; rather "transitioning IN" to mentoring, senior collaboration, the NIH brain trust, institutional memory, whatever | I have always loved the idea of a senior-junior investigator partnership. But why wait til it is "too late" for the senior partner to benefit directly also?! Come up with this mechanism for those who are X years past funding and realize they need re-inventing or re-invigorating. Actually, I think the best thing NIH could do in this regard is to come up with a SABBATICAL RESEARCH PROJECT GRANT!!! A one-year grant to cover travel to an appropriate lab for a specific purpose that would make us fundable again BEFORE we decide it is best for us to "go emeritus". | Institutions seem not to want to help anyone who needs help. So I would recommend these be fully supported by NIH. Perhaps some form of repayment to NIH if the NIH award pays off in new funds for the institution? | Make sure that it will lead to more funding for the institution and improved status and job satisfaction (and salary support?) for the senior person, and everyone will buy in. | Institutions would rather get rid of senior unfunded folks than use a mechanism to keep them; so there would have to be significant NIH funds to make this look attractive. Keeping an older unfunded person around in the HOPE that they might help a younger person succeed will sound like pie in the sky. | COME UP WITH A SABBATICAL FUNDING MECHANISM!! I truly believe that my failure to get or take time off for a sabbatical and some revitalization is a large part of why I fell off the funding conveyor belt. | ||
58 | Yale School of Public Health | New Haven, CT | With the current stifling grant-funding climate, I know of numbers of outstanding senior faculty who have been unable to maintain their R01 or equivalent funding, in spite of submission of multiple and diverse applications. Many of them have been taking early retirement, which is creating a very substantial loss both for collaboration with their junior colleagues, as well as of their collected expertise in the training of new generations of scientists. "Transitioning out" of a role or position that relies on NIH research grant funding seems to imply either retirement or support for productive roles that is not based on "research grant" funding but some other kind of funding. That appears to be basis of an "emeritus award." | Facilitating laboratory closure or hand-off to a junior colleague is just a greased boot out the door. Peri-retirement senior faculty are in fact the greatest intellectual resource of the scientific community. The current grant climate is just accelerating their loss. The objective of an emeritus award should therefore be to keep senior faculty actively engaged in scientific work and teaching with junior colleagues and students. With the great distortion of current effort focused on obtaining research grant support, many senior faculty have large amounts of unanalyzed study data collected over many years of work, particularly over the last decade, when funding has been so difficult to obtain. This data collection is a massive resource that is potentially going to waste, when it could be used both by senior faculty, junior faculty, and students and trainees. I think that the proposal to analyze fully large data sets that have been collected in NIH-funded or similar studies, in collaboration with junior faculty and trainees, would be an exceedingly important opportunity. | Duration: Optional, according to the details of the program envisioned by the applicant. Application: Skip the "Innovation" and "Significance" criteria. Put weight on the senior faculty member's established, successful and productive career, and on the quality and amount of data available for continued analysis. The data were already obtained through funding based on innovation and significance, so no need to demand this in the context of data already collected. The new 5-page biosketch format would be useful in the context of describing career contributions to science. Budget and scope: Allow for a certain fraction of the budget for research expenses. New findings in existing data can easily point to new avenues or additional experiments. Such development is how successful investigators established their careers. While new activities should not constitute the main research of the grant, there should be possibility of following up new leads. Teaching and mentoring: These need to be clearly laid out, to demonstrate how the senior faculty member's expertise will be passed to the next generations. | NIH needs to see that senior faculty in their collaboration with junior colleagues and in training the next generations of students and postdocs is a national resource on the brink of major decline unless supported by NIH itself. This support may not look like that of a traditional one-to-one relationship between tightly posed science and research results, but is more amorphous. The emeritus award still needs to have objective mileposts and goals, but its point is to allow successful researchers the freedom to continue working on their research ideas while conveying to the next generations of scientists their experience and wisdom. | The NIH Outstanding Investigator Award (OIA) mechanism, recently receiving its first round of grant applications, has some overlap with the ideas presented above. However, the OIA requires continuous NIH R01 funding for a long period of time. In the current grant funding climate, even highly successful investigators can transiently lose their R01 funding before receiving new research grant funding. The emeritus award should require a long and successful career of R01 support, but should not require that it has never been interrupted. Rather, some fraction of time under continuous R01 support (perhaps >80% time over 20 years or more?) would be an appropriate criterion. The same should be true for the OIA mechanism. The 100% R01 coverage requirement is too strict under the current poor grant-funding climate. It discriminates against fields of study that are characterized by large, multi-year grants, as opposed to short, laboratory-based projects. | |||
59 | UCSD | La Jolla, CA | terrific idea, long overdue. this would allow Emeriti to stay involved but not in a PI role, and help younger people with, in many cases, knowledge and skills that are essential but which have fallen out of favor. | As an Emeritus faculty member myself, the main need for funds would be to provide a modest salary (perhaps 20% effort), allowing recall to active duty, and the time to mentor younger faculty in all academic aspects - science theory and methods, academic growth, ethics, writing and reviewing grants and papers.In my own case, although emeritus, I am chair of an NIH study section and Editor in Chief of a large [ ] journal. This gives me a lot of current information to pass along. Without any salary support, the university will not provide even office space let alone internet/phone connectivity. That effectively would sever any ties with younger faculty. Some salary is necessary to convince administrators to allow Emeriti to keep their office Another important funding need is modest travel support to annual professional society-based scholarly meetings and sometimes far-flung collaborations. In my own case, I am collaborating with younger, emerging, investigators in Greece, in Spain, Scotland and China. All four collaborations were begun prior to turning Emeritus, and all have resulted in (many) first-tier physiological journal publications. They are ongoing, but have slowed down due to lack of funding to support the once/tiwce a year on-site collaboration needed to discuss and perform the collaborative research. | I think this has to remain very flexible. While the junior faculty partner inevitably grows up, they are part of a group with both more senior and more junior members who all benefit from such interactions. I would think a 5 year award, renewable once would be needed to promote stability in these kinds of relationships. Obviously, over such a 10 year period, the junior partners would graduate and be replaced by other less advanced investigators - Thus I see this as an Emeritus faculty member being an ongoing resource for not just a specific individual junior person, but for a group over time. I also teach groups of graduate students and postdocs from all parts of the biomedical campus about journal/grant writing and reviewing perhaps 3-4 times a year. This does not involve one on one partnering, but is in addition to that within my own Division. | I am not sure I understand what you are asking here. The award would be its own incentive. There would need to be controls to be sure the funds were being used for the intended purposes. | The main impediment I see is fear by the administration that the campus would get clogged with the senior generation and not allow room for new young people. Especially as the emeritus faculty grow too old to be effective. Not many institutions I know would turn down funds, though, and I also know that many junior faculty greatly value the already-happening efforts that this program would formally support. How to determine legally when an Emeritus member is no longer effective and terminate the support would have to be figured out. If the application process were too complex and detailed, that would be a disincentive. | The devil is always in the details. I would plead that if such a program is developed, there would be two main criteria for funding decisions: the lifelong CV of the emeritus faculty member, and the current activities of said faculty member in the domains this award would be intended to support. This is not a research grant, and the vision is to pass on to younger people the accumulated knowledge and skills of the older faculty. The strength of the CV should be a good indicator of effectiveness of the individual, combined with current activities (to show that the emeritus faculty is in fact (trying to be) academically active). Funding should NOT require jumping through complex hoops or lengthy applications. | ||
60 | La Jolla, CA | I have no interest whatsoever for a new grant mechanism of this type. It is much more likely to be yet another senior PI entitlement, i.e., further sequestration of research grant monies in the hands of the very oldest generation of scientists. There NIH already has precisely this mechanism and it is used to the desired effect. My department has a long tradition of this. It is perfectly ok for senior scientists to hand over their grants to a younger PI, sometime staying on as the co-I for a few years. This happens with R01s and with P mechanisms. The principle is established. | If it does not come with strict rules about the emeritus person no longer being involved in new proposals it will be entirely toothless. And again, the technical means to accomplish this goal already exists. Simply replace the senior PI with a younger PI on the existing award. | A junior faculty partner should be defined so as to promote the advancement of those underrepresented in science, not to continue to sustain those who are already firmly in the system. | Senior investigators who already want to transition can do so, using existing mechanisms. This is proven practice. So the question is about how to lure those who are not already going to do so. Obviously, this is impossible. Because it requires giving them *more* funding / funding security than they have at the current moment. This places more overall funding into this slice of the generational pie. Universities simply want to ensure the IDC of that senior investigator keeps coming to them. So simply assuring a 1-1 IDC transfer will help. But the University also has to think that the replacement is going to have the same, or better, medium term prospects for additional awards. This all just points a finger at why this is such a flawed idea. | Senior investigators don't actually want to give it up. If they did, they can do so using existing procedures (i.e., transfer PI of existing award). Institutions are motivated to keep their proven cash cow submitting more grants. I suppose the best way to do this is to convince them that their nearly-proven cash cow mid career investigators will benefit. | This is profoundly misplaced as an initiative. NIH is supposed to prioritize funding of projects, on a 5 year by 5 year basis, above funding people or programs. We all know that in reality the system is a mixture. But taking the step to further prioritize programs by extending it to trans-generational retention of funding is fundamentally out of step with what has allowed the NIH extramural community to flourish. | |||
61 | Thomas Jefferson University | Philadelphia, Pennsylvania | Planning for a sustainable, vibrant biomedical research enterprise for the nation is a laudable goal. Counting on the nations senior biomedical investigators to implement the goal, in part, is a meritnious approach. My thoughts for the proposed emeritus award are as follows: •It should be a 5 year award to those who shall be ready to retire at the end of the award. •It should be peer reviewed process with emphasis on the senior applicant’s productivity, merit, and the quality currently ongoing basic or translational research. •The award should facilitate training for at least three basic scientists. Their salary should be paid through this award. •Improving communication and writing skills should be a definite and an important part of the training (most of our young PhD’s lack these skills, without improvements of which they shall fail to get their own grants and to be independent scientists). •This award should not prevent the senior scientists from applying from other peer reviewed proposals. •Closing of the senior investigators laboratories at the end of the award should not be a stipulation of this award. A decision of closing the laboratories should remain a prerogative is the institution at which the senior scientist is employed. | |||||||
62 | Harvard Medical School | Boston, Massachusetts | As a young investigator I am strongly against the Emeritus Award for Senior Researchers initiate. I do agree that the average age for getting an RO1 is too high, and that incentives are needed to help advance young investigators’ careers. I am also aware that grant funds, allocated to more senior investigators need to be freed in order for funding to become available to young researchers. However, I fear that the Emeritus program will (i) permanently lock funding resources to be directed to senior PIs, when otherwise, the same money could be used in research grants (some allocated to young PIs), (ii) disincentivize academic and research institutions from maintaining attractive tenured tracks and well endowed chair positions, which are a very good incentive and professional safe-guard for senior PIs. The financial burden of sustaining a well-established PI should rest on the institutions that have benefited from said PI’s success (i.e. Grants, publications and recognition). It should not be the NIHs role to take on an extra economic burden in an attempt to free up grant money, specially not when facing the worth funding crisis in over 50 years. If academic institutions do not offer good incentives for PI in their late stages of their career, why should the NIH pick up the slack? Allow other academic institutions to compete amongst themselves by offering more competitive packages to senior scientist, even for those thinking about retiring from the bench. | |||||||
63 | Colorado State University | Fort Collins, CO | I think this is a super idea! I think that senior scientists have a lot to offer younger scientists, the scientific community, and the public. | Partnering with junior investigators is definitely an important role. Relating scientific ideas to the general public is important Working in disadvantaged communities and with under-presented groups is a role. Providing expertise in the scientific area to others outside of their area is an important role Working at the K-12 level | A 3-4 year support mechanism would be good. A senior, emeritus award should be for a person nearing retirement, but still active. | Not sure what is meant, money is key. | It's not an award for "dead wood"...It should be peer-reviewed. It should be for investigators who have shown that they and do what I've stated in number 2. | excellent idea..but many points need to be worked out. | ||
64 | If a senior investigator has had success during their career to reach "emeritus" status, they have considerable amounts of talent, knowledge, and contacts where there isn't a need for a grant mechanism for them to move out of an NIH dependent position. That transition is easy for them if they want to move on. Take a look, for example, at some very successful investigators that have started companies. They are prime examples of successful scientists who can diversify their interests without the aid of NIH funding. This is an unnecessary grant mechanism. | This "hand off" grant from senior to junior investigator will accomplish the exact opposite of the transition to independence awards. From what I have heard, it has been the emphasis for early stage, new investigators to establish their independence. The first criticism to be stated on the promoted junior investigator in the grant mechanism will be "the applicant has not established their independence." An emeritus award should provide a new position and buyout package for the professor. This should be handled by their institution, where they undoubtedly have tenure. Does NIH want to get involved in tenure decisions now, so directly? | If this proceeds, the junior faculty must be a faculty member that is not of the academic lineage of the senior investigator. For example, the junior faculty member may not be a former graduate student, former postdoctoral researcher from the emeritus scientists laboratory. Furthermore, the junior faculty must not be from any of the emeritus faculty's trainees (former graduate students or former postdocs). | NIH should not incentivize anything. If this award is set up and is suppose to move the emeritus investigator to a position that is not dependent on NIH funds, how will this be enforced? Will the NIH be willing to sanction institutions that do not follow these guidelines? What will the NIH do if an awarded emeritus professor won't follow through with the hand off to the junior investigator? W | This award is essentially telling the emeritus professors that this is your last hoorah. Once this grant runs out, there will not be another grant as this NIH chapter in your storied career has will have come to an end. It will be time for them to move on in their life, ride off into the sunset, so to speak. I see many issues with this, but if I ever make it to emeritus professor status, I don't think I will want to apply for this mechanism. It will provide further ammunition for others to try and get me out of my position. Besides, when this grant mechanism is started, it will only be around for a couple of cycles. The number of newly tenured faculty is going away. So, at some point, it will be easy to move "emeritus" faculty out of their current positions. | |||||
65 | Massachusetts General Hospital, Harvard Medical School | Boston, MA | I have fantasized about a grant mechanism for emeritus investigators, but not for the purpose of shutting them down. There are many outstanding investigators with 40 or more years of experience and an ability to synthesize the new and the old who should keep contributing. Currently the only ways to do that are to have enough clout at wealthy-enough institutions (usually not public universities) to keep an office and small lab at institution expense; to become a member of a younger investigator’s lab; or to keep soldiering on with R01’s, competing with younger investigators. What is needed to allow senior investigators to step gracefully out of R01 competition without losing prestige within their institution is a grant award that will cover institutional costs of keeping them actively focused on research; traveling to meetings; writing; and serving the scientific community. I think a lot of the negative reaction to this idea is from the way it is worded. You don’t need resources to “close a lab”. You need resources --including overhead-- to keep an office (where else are you going to counsel younger investigators?) and an active presence in your field. Please take this idea to the next level. | Two years of support, with renewal dependent on proof of "keeping them actively focused on research; traveling to meetings; writing; and serving the scientific community". | ||||||
66 | NMSU | Las Cruces, NM | In principle this is a good idea but the implementation must be carefully reasoned. I have read the remarks posted on Dr. Rockne's blog and many excellent points are made. Here are a few thoughts: In my view this award provides a unique opportunity to support NIH funded scientists who also have a track record of leadership to the profession in service, education, and mentorship. Emeritus is an inauspicious name for this award. This should not be an award that supports research intensive efforts because these can already be supported by the R01 mechanism, coupling it to research with a junior faculty member also is short sighted, since there are other mechanisms to support this and the impact of the award on the greater community is lessened. For this reason I recommend the word Emeritus not be coupled to this award because Emeritus is a retiree designation and the recipients of these awards should propose a project work plan that is exciting and innovative in the areas beyond research (see below). A possible name would be Career Leadership award. Even better, see Comment 4, name it after a famous scientist who exemplifies the career path you seek to promote. Personally, Linus Pauling is an inspiration for me. Diversity: Eligibility and review criteria should permit investigators who have a record of distinction commensurate with their institution to compete otherwise the range of constitutions and the demographics of the recipients will be severely limited. | The award should have three elements. Each should explain how the proposed activities will transition the PI to new directions that strengthen the research enterprise A research innovation plan. Projects that are high risk high impact with little to no preliminary data. Encourage proposals to undertake a project outside of previous research record eg "Dream Project". Training can be part of the project. Perhaps a wet lab PI seeks to move to public health. A research leadership plan. Proposed activities on behalf of the research community, eg workshops/seminars/webinars on science topics; leadership of metadata networks; launch of new journal etc; support for diversity research enhancement at non-research intensive institutions A scientific dissemination plan: Proposed activities to disseminate research expertise to the non-scientist and communities eg through course development for K-12 or undergraduates; development of community projects; fostering international collaborations | • No longer than 7 years total • Max 150 K a year plus F&A for 3-5 years, renewable once for 3-2 years • Cannot serve as PI of any other Federal grant • Must devote 6 months effort • Only tech and undergrad support is allowable (no postdocs or grads) • Junior faculty should not be part of this award...this requirement is too small in scope and other mechanisms exist. • Expected to attend a yearly conference at NIH to present outcomes of efforts and retrospectives of their career. can serve as advisors to the funding institute • Must provide data of track record of mentoring students and faculty and letters from these parties. | I am not sure this is needed. As long as the award is not purely a research award, and the award requires responsibility for community leadership and research education (where seniority really can have an impact) I think your best senior scientists will be interested because they are doing this already.. Think Carl Sagan, in fact, perhaps this should be named after a famous Nobel laureate such as the Linus Pauling Award (two Nobels for Chemistry and for Peace) | Senior investigators: Loss of prestige and status. Those with strong character will be fine, the vain and prideful will suffer. Institutions. Really? Those with strong character will be fine, the greedy and gluttonous will suffer. | Great idea but please make this something really different than just a small research grant for research sharks to collect salary and stay in the system. Construct this award to result in outcomes that strengthen research and highlight careers that can inspire those in the pipeline by rewarding careers where communities and people have been promoted in addition to research excellence. In other word, please reflect on this question: after 10 years, what do you expect to see as transformative outcomes from this award? | ||
67 | Temple University School of Medicine | Philadelphia, PA 19140 | I am writing in response to RFI NOT-OD-15-064. I do not support the establishment of an Emeritus Award for Senior Researchers. While I believe that senior investigators play a vital role in the mentoring of junior faculty, I do not feel that this transmission of scientific information and skills needs to be supported by the NIH. All researchers, especially senior ones, should be supporting junior investigators and working in collaborative environments. If they have not engaged in mentoring and/or collaborations to this point, giving them a NIH award to do so at the end of their career will not be effective. At a time when NIH funding is tight, supporting senior researchers “to facilitate laboratory closure” should not be a priority. This type of initiative will not keep the US at the forefront of biomedical science and healthcare, nor will it help the next generation of scientists to succeed. It is far better for NIH to invest in junior and mid-career scientists and their research programs than to prolong support for senior investigators who are transitioning out of research. The universities should be picking up the salaries of senior investigators at that point, not the NIH. Early mid-career investigators have it particularly tough because there are no special grant opportunities for this group. Whereas the early career investigators benefit from special consideration and the senior investigators are helped by their experiences and past successes, mid-career investigators benefit from neither. Many mid-career scientists are lost to research careers because of the difficulty in sustaining NIH funded which is required by many academic institutions. I do not support the initiatives described in NOT-OD-15-064. There are much more important needs in biomedical research than the proposed Emeritus Award for Senior Researchers. | I do not support the initiatives described in NOT-OD-15-064. There are much more important needs in biomedical research than the proposed Emeritus Award for Senior Researchers. | ||||||
68 | University of South Florida | Tampa, FL | If configured correctly, it could be a positive. If simply a reward for successful PIs, then not so much | I can see two uses 1) to transfer an important biological resource (supported by many letters from the community) 2) transfer a valuable research program to a junior faculty | I would only favor this idea if the grant mechanism required the senior scientist to serve as a co-PI to a junior scientist in the leadership, PI position. | Evaluate the proposal based on the scientific value of the program to be transferred and the quality of the junior PI and senior co-PI | require a partnership of a senior and junior scientist | |||
69 | The Research Institute at Nationwide Children's Hospital | Columbus, Ohio | I have mixed feelings about this award and I keep asking myself, "do we really need another award for this?" While its intentions seem good, I worry that it will be used as an alternative source/mechanism for senior investigators to keep labs going indefinitely while stymying the true development of junior investigators and the continuity of the research program. I have made suggestions below for trying to mitigate these possibilities. | This should be used only for facilitating the transfer of a successful research program. I don't see any real value in having a new award to "close a lab" - that mechanism can occur at the end of an existing research grant. | -This should be a one-time application and award. No resubmissions and no renewals. Putting this restriction in place will give senior investigators the opportunity to transfer their research program and their expertise without the possiblity of sustaining their continued activity in the lab. I would suggest no more than 4 years for this award. -The junior investigators should have already established independence and not have been direclty involved in the senior investigators' lab in a period prior to the application/award; however, the junior investigator should have a comparative/complementary expertise to the senior investigator and should be familiar with the senior investigator's work. This will help alleviate senior investigators potentially using junior investigators (e.g. instructors and research track faculty) merely for the continuity of funding, and not truly transitioning out of the lab. | I would forsee potential conflict. Senior investigators might not be satisfied with the productivity, approach, etc of the junior investigator during the award period. | ||||
70 | Oregon Health and Science University | Portland, OR | The emeritus award would have been highly useful to my mentor and me, currently a postdoc in his lab. My mentor was highly successful having had R01 level support for [ ] years and been awarded an R37. A year ago, my mentor was near retirement age and beginning to shut down his lab. His R01 support ran out in August 2014, and being a 5th year postdoc in the lab, I would have been out of a job. I had been trying to get a faculty position with several interviews, but the times are currently tough. I am a productive postdoc in his lab with two first author papers and an[ ] postdoctoral fellowship. But last summer I was within a month of being without a job and most likely leaving academia (which negatively affected an important collaboration). Fortunately for me, I was awarded a K99 less than a year ago. The K99, in addition to another grant I was awarded from the [ ] and a no cost extension of the RO1, is the only money I have to do all my work (~$70k, about half of which is used for mouse costs). Thus, I am the only one in the lab. I have no technicians or students to help me. I must do everything on my own, since there is not enough money. And since I cannot apply for bigger grants since I am only a postdoc, I am stuck with what I have. In addition, my mentor does not want to get another full blown RO1 and he wants to shut down his lab while still being my mentor. Therefore, a smaller grant (~50-100k) for several years (1-3yrs) would allow him to hire a technician to help shut down the lab, ease the burden on me, and transition the lab to me. I plan to continue with this research, but the burden of performing all experiments, continuing my training, publishing, writing grants, etc, has been draining on me. My hope is that this time makes me stronger and does not burn me out. | |||||||
71 | University of Colorado Denver | Aurora, CO 80045 | This concept just gives amunition to Study Sections to deprive active, productive seniors an opportunity to say active and continue to contribute to science and mentor the next generation of researchers. This is a lame concept. I have had only one NIH grant my enture career [ ] and this has been one of the most productive grants ever, Now you want to introduce the concept of deleting me by using such a term. I am 100% opposed to this. | Just drop it. the concept is a stupid idea. The investigator drops out if his productivity falls, not because the investigator is 72. | What does the "award" mean? Money or a title? i agree that some in their 70's may want to "reduce" the size of their labs but NOT close them. The NIH wastes too much money giving more than two grants per investigator. You could keep people my age active and contributing to mentorship of the next generation "half-grants". Most of us do not need fund from the R01 for top salarie as we collect Social Security. In fact, I have reduced my salatyu by 70% and use e mney to buy mice and pay post-docs. "half-grants) are 125,000 per year for R01. Only one per investigator. | Institutions use precious funds to pay for administration salaries. A total misuse of funds. See who leaves every dat at 5 PM. The administrators! | You label those of us who are at their intellectual peak as "emeritus" and drive us into forced second class status. | Drop the term. it is a dangerous word. | ||
72 | University of Kentucky | Why is the NIH even wasting time thinking about something like this? They already have a mechanism in place - it's called an R01. | ||||||||
73 | Texas Tech Health Sciences University | El Paso, Texas | It is a very intriguing idea. | Treat just like a regular R01 in the sense of annual progress reports, an expectation for peer-reviewed publications and other accomplishments. This will allow the most senior and probably most highly-qualified investigators to bow out in a way that is commensurate with their overall career accomplishments. In other words, this is a way for people to go out in style and with success. Of course this plan/approach appeals to me. I have been R01 funded continuously for 30 year, and still have a least 3 more years on one funded grant (and have an idea for a new R01 too). I would love to bow out while still publishing high-quality high-impact peer-reviewed scientific papers. Do not tie this to mentoring of junior faculty. It won't work and will limit the main goal of 'churn', as Dr. Rockey said during the webinar. | Make it a ‘last RO1”: • 4 yrs of funding, full modular budget (250 K direct costs) • full indirect costs • applicable at time of next competitive renewal or sooner • If awarded, recipient cannot apply for further R awards (but is still eligible for applying for other mechanisms). • Add to requirements a commitment to serve on an NIH review group for 4 – 6 meetings (e.g., 2 - 3 per year for 2 – 3 years). This way the investigator gives his or her expertise back to NIH as an experienced grant reviewer. This will make it a bit easier to recruit people to Study Sections too. | As above: make the duration 4 years with a full budget and full IDCs. Also limit PI salary support to no more than 40% of the cap, with the institution being responsible for the rest | Money. Institutions will want more PI salary on the grant. | Don't tie this to junior faculty recruitment or mentoring. Limit just to current R01 grant holders. Think hard about age requirements for eligibility (over 65, over 60, or what?). | ||
74 | Virginia Commonwealth University School of Medicine | Richmond, VA | This is an excellent idea. | One sticking point in shutting down a lab that has been productive for years is what to do with all of the special constructs, cells and reagents that are filling up many -80 freezers. There are many unique and invaluable resources that often get tossed away if no one in the immediate environment wants any of it. A great service and expense that could be borne in part by the NIH would be to provide resources for cataloging material and sending contents to interested investigators at other institutes. This could be anything from providing fedex codes and shipping containers to establishing repositories. At the very least a website on which reagents, cells, bacteria, constructs, etc. could be listed and designated as available to the research community at large would be a huge help. | See comment 4. I think that a maximum of two years added to an existing grant at the cost of the last year of that grant would be sufficient. A junior faculty partner would ideally be either an assistant or associate professor in the tenure track. Anyone with status less that this (e.g. research assistant professor) who is not in the tenure is really just an extended post-doc and probably would need a different kind of mentoring. This could also include physician scientists who should be applying for K awards and would need mentoring for both research issues and negotiating the new world of compensation packages and protected time. | The best incentive would be to extend the length of an existing award for a finite period (e.g. one or two years) with the understanding that accepting the extension precludes the investigator from applying for any more NIH funding. | Many senior investigators won't admit that their research careers are over and convince their institutions that they their next submission will be the one that hits pay dirt. This leads the institution to keep the investigator in space that should be assigned to a more productive faculty member. There needs to be more reality testing for both the investigator and the institution and the availability of emeritus status would be a big help in greasing that transition. | I would be happy to become involved in the process if there is any interest in setting up an advisory group of extramural investigators, particularly those like myself who are reaching the end of productive NIH-funded careers. | ||
75 | UNC Chapel Hill | Chapel Hill, NC | The emeritus award violates the spirit of the Age Discrimination in Employment Act (ADEA) and 14th amendment of the constitution by depriving "non senior investigators" of opportunity to apply for PHS. The emeritus award is quite different in this regard than new investigator awards, which have no age limit only the stipulation of not having had NIH funding before. The emigration award violates NIH peer review principles, since investigator and other review criteria change during the award period and it is known at the outset that the principal investigator on record will not conduct the research as proposed. This opens the door to misuse. | The emigration award violates NIH peer review principles, since investigator and other review criteria change during the award period and it is known at the outset that the principal investigator on record will not conduct the research as proposed. This opens the door to misuse. | The emeritus award violates the spirit of the Age Discrimination in Employment Act (ADEA) and 14th amendment of the constitution by depriving "non senior investigators" of opportunity to apply for PHS. The emigration award violates NIH peer review principles, since investigator and other review criteria change during the award period and it is known at the outset that the principal investigator on record will not conduct the research as proposed. This opens the door to misuse. | This is a bad idea all around. It violates any number of equal protection laws and fairness principles. | The emeritus award violates the spirit of the Age Discrimination in Employment Act (ADEA) and 14th amendment of the constitution by depriving "non senior investigators" of opportunity to apply for PHS. The emeritus award is quite different in this regard than new investigator awards, which have no age limit only the stipulation of not having had NIH funding before. | This is a bad idea all around. It violates any number of equal protection laws and fairness principles. | ||
76 | University of Michigan Medical School | Ann rbor, MI | I would be very interested. No reason why a scientist with decades of experience should suddenly exit the field and take his/her knowledge away. | Best use I can think is to provide support for mentoring a young faculty member, or even postdoctoral fellows (in tandem with a junior faculty). Skills in the laboratory, in grant writing, in publishing, in providing grant or manuscript reviewing, and in mentoring her/his students - all of these are experiences of the senior scientist that can be passed on to improve the science, productivity and impact of a younger scientist. | I would support 2-3 years of partial salary support (20-30%) with a small stipend to allow the person to attend a scientific meeting. Support would be contingent on the identification of specific junior scientist(s) within her/his institution (junior being defined as assistant professor or equivalent, or associate perhaps without tenure), and also a commitment by the institution (dept chairman likely) of the appropriate support (office space, IT support) to allow senior scientist to fully function in a mentoring/consulting/assisting role. | For senior investigators, allow emeritus award to be combined with a limited NIH salary support as co-investigator on a junior scientist grants (maybe set a 20% limit?). This would incentivize the senior person to take an active role in the developing and execution of grant proposals. Such would incentivize institutions to allow "phased" transitions of the senior investigators from a fully investigator-initiated grant funding (multiple RO1s or similar) to the more supporting role. I suggested the travel award specifically to address the opportunity of senior investigators to share their knowledge and insights with a larger part of thier respective fields. | A buy-in from institutions is critical - they would need to allow senior investigators to "dial down" activities. Emeritus grants likely would have to have indirect costs or institutions will not want them. | Some institutions allow phased retirements, some don't. Some support it financially, some don't. Many businesses are today seeking ways to retain the expertise of the growing class of soon-to-be-retirees, and science is no different. | ||
77 | Nathan Kline Institute and Columbia University | New York, NY | I think this is an outstanding idea that I very strongly endorse. I can think of several people that would immediately quality, and would be immensely useful as mentors if they could be engaged in a non-humiliating way. I have watched the process of "ageing-ou"t in these people and see them being shoved to the side before they are ready to leave, and while they still have irreplaceable understanding and perspective. | I think each of those would be excellent, though the latter 2 would be the most obviously productive. | I think that a 3-5 year transition is about right (i.e., specifiable by the individual applicant) Definition of a junior faculty partner would be one possibility (and a good one). Another, would be completion of a specifiable task (e.g., a scholarly contribution, or teaching/leading a course), or a senior scientific service - e.g., serving on panels that review training awards. | The most obvious to me is direct cost support with inclusion of indirects. Another would be to initiate a structure, e.g., "the NIH Academy of Senior Scholars" a bit like the "academy of reviewers idea that emerged a few years back. | The institution may wish to limit or end the influence of a powerful senior scientist to allow it to grow in new directions. For the individual participation would be a tacit admission of a real transition, something many of do not want to face up to. | I really like the idea. If it could be implemented on a 3-5 year basis, renewable upon peer and program review (I think participation of peers and NIH program staff are both important), it might reduce the tendency of senior investigators to cling to their research funding as a way to keep their professional standing and resources in their hime institutions intact. It could provide provide for a more graceful, transition towards complete retirement, one in which the senior academic could maintain a useful contribution, with income. It would be especially important in research mills like medical schools where traditional tenure is non-existant or insubstantial. | ||
78 | University of Colorado Denver | Aurora | This is an unnecessary proposal that is counter productive to encourage and support young, innovative scientists in their career. I strongly oppose its implementation. | All of these ideas are facilitated by natural, existing mechanisms. This proposal will not help any of these activities. | This proposal should fail. | Do not implement. | Just encourages old, otherwise non-competative scientists to linger. | Please do not pursue this mechanism further. Your goal is to fund competitive science. This award simply steals the funds from the young, energetic and competitive investigators to prop up otherwise unfunded, dying research programs. | ||
79 | URMC | Rochester NY | Encouraging retirement of senior investigators is a good thing - no doubt about that. The question is whether this process needs to be incentivized positively or negatively. Should there be a carrot or a stick or both? In my opinion, there's no need for a carrot. Just use the stick. De-incentivize continued applications for R01 awards by aged investigators (perhaps by limiting available budgets, or putting strict time limits on awards). No need for additional incentives, and definitely no need for a new kind of award mechanism. | If such an award were created, the focus MUST be on the junior partner. It could for example include a budgetary component for refurbishment of older lab space or equipment that may be "inherited" from a senior investigator. The use of such an award to facilitate laboratory closure needs to be handled very carefully - there are many old labs with huge issues relating to contamination, environmental health and safety issues, etc. Taking care of these problems should not be NIH's bag. For example, I recently "inherited" a space from an older investigator that is next to my existing modern lab. We had to spend several weeks and a significant amount of discretionary funds to bring the space up to code - get the hoods recertified, removal of asbestos from some cupboards, disposal of old chemicals via appropriate channels, testing for radioactive residues, etc. All of this resulted in the Department being spared a lot of money to officially "decommission" the lab space. The Department loves this, and it was worth it for me to spend money from my academic allowance in order to acquire the new space, but in the end I would question the role of NIH in paying for such capital improvements. | If such an award were created, the focus MUST be on the junior partner. For example give them total control over the budget. Bake in requirements for senior authorship on papers being given to the junior partner. Perhaps make the participation of the emeritus/elder investigator only allowed for the first part of the award (say the first 2-3 years) and then the junior PI would have another 2-3 years by themselves without the senior person's involvement. | What's really need is to de-incentivize the status quo, wherein emeriti continue to submit R01 applications. | The old folks don't want to retire. Who can blame them? Their IRA's were decimated by the financial crisis of '08 and they're trying to hang on for a few more years. Again, NOT NIH's problem. | This really seems like a solution to a problem that does not exist. There are some other issues surrounding this proposal, on the topic of diversity. Because of current academic demographics, almost all the recipients of such an award would be white males, so the initiative would seem to fly in the face of current NIH goals to enhance diversity in the scientific workplace. Furthermore, this proposal seems to be yet another example of "flip-flop" in the extramural programs. Most institutions did away with MERIT awards a few years ago, but this initiative is kind of aimed at the same audience. It's rather like the situation with A2 vs. A1 vs. A0. Same thing again for the biosketch format. Please stop shifting the goalposts and changing the rules and then changing them back a few years later! | ||
80 | Northeastern University | Boston | Bad idea. Why does NIH want to start new programs for special interests. Give more R01 awards so that the paylines will improve. | See above - no need for a special interest award. | ||||||
81 | University of central florida | orlando,florida | In cases where a senior scientist is opening up a new area such a novel gene whose function has broad implications in major health issues, an emeritus award could help to transfer the new area to a bright young researcher while the senior scientist transitions from a PI to a senior member of the research team with the junior scientist transitioning into the PI status . | Essentially a trasitional award that starts with the senior scientist as the PI and then transition into a senior member of the team while the junior researcher transitions into the PI status | A 2-3 year term for the first phase and a similar length for the second phase making a total of 6 years. | Both the Institution and the senior scientist will win if the salary of the junior faculty is paid by NIH for the first three years with the condition that the university will assume the salary after that period.The senior person gains by being able to enjoy the success in the science he/she initiated and then enjoy participating in that research | If the senior person is too possessive that would create trouble .There has to be a chemistry between the junior and senior member of the team.The institution has to be willing to move in a new direction as this will require unconventional processes for hiring and evaluation of the junior faculty member. | If a really accomplished senior scientist and a highly motivated top quality junior scientist can be hooked up ,such a program will be successful. The poor quality of initial review group currently being used will not be adequate to evaluate the emeritus award applications | ||
82 | New York Institute of Technolo | Oyster Bay | I would be highly supportive of this proposal. | I think the NIH and the institution should take advantage of this. There should be a mentoring plan to pass of the research program and techniques to a promising junior scientist. | 7 years, eligible at 62. | Since it is so difficult for NIH to recruit good senior level reviewers, I would suggest that 25% or more of the senior investigator's salary be used to sit on NIH review panels. This could really help the institution and also help improve grant review quality at NIH. | Some may get a second wind. | Again, possible role could be mentoring replacement and mentoring/reviewing NIH proposals. As a paid reviewer who is done with grant proposals, it may also help with integrity of the system. | ||
83 | Lauren G. Gross, J.D. | lgross@aai.org | The American Association of Immunologists | Bethesda, MD | The American Association of Immunologists (AAI), the largest professional association of immunologists in the world, representing more than 7,600 basic and clinical immunologists, appreciates this opportunity to submit comments to the National Institutes of Health (NIH) “Request for Information (RFI): Sustaining the Biomedical Workforce and a Potential Emeritus Award for Senior Researchers” (http://grants.nih.gov/grants/guide/notice-files/NOT-OD-15-064.html). As the largest funder of biomedical research in the world, NIH should explore creative ways to sustain the biomedical workforce. This RFI seeks to pursue avenues to support the transition of senior investigators when they wish to move to other roles and recognizes that in this process there may be synergistic opportunities benefiting more junior colleagues that should be explored. The RFI, which solicits comments on a proposed “Emeritus Award,” has already generated important debate about the prudent distribution of federal research dollars, and is encouraging investigators to suggest solutions to difficult problems that have emerged largely as a result of eroding budgets and an uncertain funding climate. AAI appreciates that NIH has reached out at this early stage to its many stakeholders in the research community, understanding that the creation of any new funding mechanism could be controversial. With respect to the ideas raised in this RFI, AAI is not yet able to submit comments. NIH provided only thirty-one calendar days to comment, insufficient time for many organizations, including AAI, to receive member input or generate a thoughtful response on such a complex issue. Should NIH decide to pursue this idea, AAI would urge NIH to release another RFI that provides more detail on possible proposals arising from the initial RFI and other deliberations. We suggest that the next RFI address the relative roles and responsibilities of the NIH vis-à-vis the investigator’s institution and provide details of proposals under consideration, such as eligibility requirements for the proposed mechanism (e.g. senior investigators with multiple R01s or large projects, etc.), whether participants in this mechanism would relinquish future eligibility to submit NIH grant proposals as PI (or multi-PI or Co-Investigator), and potential budget approaches. | |||||
84 | University of Colorado Denver School of Medicine | Aurora | This is a good idea. It would allow senior and junior colleagues to plan for a thoughtful and appropriate transition. I am very much in favor of this concept. | All of these are appropriate depending upon the individual situation. Personally, from the clinical scientist perspective I would favor partnership/mentorship arrangements between established clinical investigators and their junior colleagues. A senior colleague has a treasure chest of experience with regulatory, funding, industry, foundation, NIH/govt, and other support/entities. How to build and sustain a clinical trials unit - that is the key in passing along success in the clinical arena. | This would depend upon the specific situation and whether the senior/junior partnership is in basic or clinical science. The key is level of commitment of the junior partner - that person must have at least 6 years of funded research (not only NIH) and must have a fulltime academic position. | Emeritus awards should fund at least 50% of a fulltime senior position. | I don't really see any - of course, the enthusiasm will depend upon level of funding, and the inclusion/exclusion criteria for application. | I think it is a good idea. | ||
85 | University of Iowa | Iowa City, IA | The downturn in NIH and other governmental funding combined with the explicit shift in funding to favor junior faculty has caused disillusionment in many senior faculty. It is not easy to appreciate that your work that has not changed in its subjective impact is not honored as much anymore by others as evidenced by one’s inability of obtaining funding. While many senior faculty can understand that these are systems problems causing these dire straits in funding, there is always the residual impression that somehow, after a successful live in science, one falls behind. If such lack of funding success is paired with significant advancements in publications of primary articles in high profile journals it can easily result in emotional unrest or even despair as scientific achievements measured in publications increasingly mismatch to funding levels. If unqualified retirement is considered the only way out of such a situation, such retired faculty will likely not remain engaged within the society they once were actively participating in. Replacing such potentially devastating feeling of being expelled by the society one may have forged into its current state over ones career could be softened by a carefully crafted retirement funding system outlined below. In essence, such a system would help maintain the best and brightest of the seniors through a transition period that allows those faculty a honorable exit instead of simply being expelled without a reason given as the current situation does: one either receives an R01 and can consider oneself appreciated or one does not get a R01 and has to deal with feeling of inaptness outlined above. Remaining engaged is a major aspect of successful ageing and data support that engagement is the key for long term mental and physical well-being, barring unforeseeable health problems. As the percentage of seniors in the society will increase over the next few years to transform the society into one that carries about 20% of 65+ it is paramount that this increasing population remains engaged in the society to maintain their physical and mental well-being and contribute to rather than becoming a burden to the society. Failure to keep seniors engaged will likely result in increased dependency of seniors on the cash strapped health care and social security system. Since the higher proportion of seniors in the society is a lasting transformation of societal structure it will be important for NIH to stay ahead of such societal transformations by adopting a system that allows seniors a graceful exit from the workforce or, if they so desire and have the mental means to do so, keep them in the workforce albeit in a different role as valued advisor. The latter role is important to provide intellectual continuity. | The transition into a advisory role seems to be the only logical way forward to be supported by NIH. Supporting lab closure or transitioning into an administrative role should not be supported by NIH but rather should be dealt with at the University level. | Senior faculty can help to shape the conceptual framework to guide the technical advances that drives much of the junior investigator approaches to science to achieve a higher impact. A 2-3 year transition from a senior investigator could allow research intensive senior investigators acquire the new role of consultant/advisor/collaborator on a junior investigator driven research. To facilitate this transition, a funding mechanism would be appropriate that considers explicitly junior/senior partnerships with a clear description of the transition phase in leadership. A template for such a transition could be the K99/R00 award mechanism that facilitates the transition of junior investigators into independence. However, instead of having a first dependent phase followed by an independent phase, this mechanism would lead from an independent phase into a dependent phase. The independent phase should be for 3 years followed by a co-I phase of two years. It would be appropriate to limit applications for such an award to the age group of 63-68 with justifiable exceptions be allowed at 68+. A faculty on such a transition grant (R63/K70) would not be allowed to apply for own NIH funding anymore after such an award. However, participation on awards of past or new junior collaborators should continue provided a record of new accomplishments indicates continued engagement in research (publication record, citation record, invited talks, review records). Selection of such investigators should be driven primarily by publication and citation records in the last five years before applications (Google Scholar, Web of Science, Scopus). Number of awards in this category should be limited to about 10% of the total number of R01 at a given University. The effect of such limitations could encourage Faculty approaching the age of 66-69 to ready themselves for such an award by adjusting their scientific performance to the level required within the UI to be eligible for such funding. This would be equivalent to the HHMI retirement transition and should be limited to $200,000 per year. | Our society is in a transition stage with an estimated 20% of 65+ people by 2035 (US census data). Many of these people will have 15-20 years of expected live to restructure society toward two almost equal age groups of financially depend people: the 1-25 and the 65+ age group that combined will amount to ovr 40% of people in the US. Engaged aging could provide society at large and the UI in particular with the ability to transform the aging workforce into a benefit for the society, in particular academia. Benefits of a coordinated transition into a society with a novel age stratification will benefit all parties. Benefits for faculty: Aging is dependent on the genetic predisposition and life time aggregated effects. Faculty with a life time of experience and appropriate mental and physical health to sustain a research program could benefit from continued opportunity to keep engaged in research with junior partners. Aging studies show that engagement in societal matters is key for longevity providing active faculty with the means to stay engaged. Faculty that for various reasons is unable or unwilling to continue the demanding engagement should have the opportunity to opt out in a phased way. Having a clear path beyond the current choice of retiring or not could provide a strong sense of belonging which in turn could help keep faculty engaged. Tying the total number of retirement awards into the total number or volume of R01’s would provide additional incentives for senior investigators to help junior faculty obtain R01 grants. Instead of boosting junior investigators chances directly through extra bonus points such an integrated approach would be transformative for both junior and senior investigators ready to remain engaged in research. | Scientific discovery is on a trajectory where technical advances exceed conceptual gains leaving anybody disengaged in these advances lagging behind the cutting edge in ever shorter time frames. Seeing the end of ones research through appreciation of the increasing technical gap between own research and that at the cutting edge disengages faculty with little chances to catch up. Universities aim with their 5 year CDA program to avoid such problems but those intervals are much too long to reintegrate faculty with the technological advancements in their science. | Over the last few years NIH has increasingly supported junior faculty through bonus points toward R01 funding and special funding mechanisms such as K99/R00. The outline above is meant to more evenly distribute those special activities by proposing a transition grant, dubbed here R65/K68, that helps research active faculty to affiliate with a junior faculty and eventually become part of that junior faculty research team. It seems reasonable to limit such retirement awards to the same volume as is the case for K99/R00 awards. | ||
86 | Children's National Health Systems (Formally Children's National Medical Center) | Washington, DC | In the past I have seen Senior PI submit grants for Junior investigators. The biggest problem is that review committees, when they pick up on this change, will comment " sure the Laboratory has the cumulative experience however the recommended PI does not. In the past I have solved this problem by installing an advisory board that is comprised of senior Investigators, that meets regularly, reports, carries minutes of meetings and actively advises the Junior PI. The senior PIs are not in the same line of research however are familiar with issues of staffing, productivity and a large percent of laboratory techniques. Adding a requirement of such a committee would not be possible without first recognizing the need for funding the same at some reestablished nominal rate (15K/ member/year??) | Many senior PI's have human resources management skills that junior PIs simply do not have. Senior PIs also have colleagues and contacts in the field that are human living resources. A junior PI may have an opportunity to meet some of these resources however installing a formal mechanism that would bring these people together in a room would help transition the junior PI and promote the transfer of living resources to the same junior PI. Many times the lager momentum of organizing the past productivity of the laboratory under a classification system is left to the in-coming Junior PI. Also the Junior PI usually has little no administrative support form the research institution hence the creating a structure to past production/productivity is crippled by the lack of resources to complete this effort. Adding administrative support for the sole purpose of creating the classification and structure could prove in many cases to be paramount to success. Furthermore providing professional training in human resource management training is important. Providing training in grants management to the Junior PI is paramount as well. Dedicated pockets of funding for these tasks with draw-down based on proof of training (certificates etc) may be in order. | An emeritus award should have a life of at least one grant cycle between noncompete phases (typically 3-5 years). With a full report on the progress of transition. Past data archive, papers and grants archive, contacts with industry, living resources contacts made.... etc moving towards 100% completion at 80% completion of Emeritus award period. | Publication of the award mechanism. Special Review committees to review this specific problem where Reviewers are given the specific mission to not condemn the Junior Investigator simply due to lack of experience but instead instruct the review committee to more heavily weigh the role of the Advisory committee to the Junior PI, the committee's true ability to advise including issues of proximity and availability etc. | Many institutions award laboratory square feet of space space based on grant income. If a Junior PI takes only one R01 for example, the institution may tend to decrease needed laboratory space. Institutions also have an incredibly difficult time awarding administrative support to single investigators thus many times the Junior PI with all new responsibilities is stuck performing administrative duties that are not productive for the research that needs to be done. Rules of grant should include institutional commitment matching Administrative support and Space. | This is an important initiative and I applaud the NIH for recognizing the issue at hand and for trying to better understand what it would take to have successful transitions. | ||
87 | Johns Hopkins University | Baltimore, MD | This is a good idea to keep longstanding, successful and knowledgeable scientists contributing to the goals of the NIH. | The more flexible the better. Each situation will be unique. To the extent that the awardee can maintain an existing research presence in collaboration with others at their own and other institutions, this will be a valuable award. If there are specific strings attached, less so. | An "exit" award from the NIH system for long-time NIH supported scientists would seem most valuable. Strong support for an existing system for 2 years with step downs in years 3-5 would allow an active investigator the opportunity to contribute meaningfully over an additional 5-year period while closing a research operation in an orderly fashion. Advance knowledge of the funds available over the "last" 5 years of NIH support would allow the investigator to plan accordingly and focus on the science, not the next round of grant applications. Implicit is the understanding that the awardee would not be eligible for additional funding as a PD or PI after the award is completed. The institution should be encouraged to support a minimum percent of faculty salary for the entire term of the award. | Both senior researchers and institutions are struggling with this issue. As long as the term is sufficiently long and the funding starts at a high level with defined step-down, senior investigators may see this as a wonderful way to wrap up a research operation. Defining this as a "last" NIH award would allow institutions to plan for transition of space and resources. | I see this as a mechanism for senior investigators who are ready to wind down a research operation. By defining it as a "last" NIH grant, many may be hesitant to commit. The institution may be hesitant to commit to minimal percent salary support over the term of the grant (if that is included as a requirement), but may value the opportunity anyway, since it is a mechanism to define funding and term for an investigator who otherwise may require considerable institutional support in a much less ordered transition. | |||
88 | Seattle Childrens Research Inst. and University of Washington | Seattle, WA | No interest whatsoever. NIH already has mechanisms in place - competitive review of current grant mechanisms. If grants are not competitive, there is no sense in supplying further funding to senior investigators. This has been well discussed on various blogs - see Drugmonkey, Rock Talk Blog and Data Hound. (1) This problem already has a solution. An investigator can (with approval from the relevant IC) name a new Principal Investigator for a grant. Assuming the PI is qualified and NIH approves, this is an effective transition strategy that has been used many times. (2) For most research programs, is "succession planning" something that NIH staff are worried about? Given that many investigators train numerous younger scientists over the course of their careers and that the system is currently flooded with accomplished younger scientists, the solution to this problem without any mechanism seems to be at hand. (3) Even proposing such a mechanism seems quite inappropriate and tone deaf at this juncture when so many younger scientists are struggling to establish and maintain their careers. | Not applicable since there is no reason to institute such mechanisms | Not applicable since there is no reason to institute such mechanisms | Not applicable since there is no reason to institute such mechanisms | NIH has limited funds and is already squeezing mid-career and junior investigators. Removing more money from the limited funding pot specifically for a new mechanism for which there is no need is a huge impediment. Supporting retiring senior investigators will be at the expense of more junior people and NIH is already robbing the pipeline of new ideas and scientific diversity based on current policies. This will just add to the problem, decreasing the viability of the scientific enterprise | NIH has been tone-deaf to input from its stakeholders in the scientific community. The overwhelming negative feedback from the broad community re the new Biosketch format did not prevent implementation of the new format. Many of us fear that once again, NIH will not listen to the overwhelming negative commentary on this new Emeritus idea. | ||
89 | University of Cincinnati | Cincinnati, OHIO | I think this idea is brilliant! | I envision my PIs using this award mechanism to accomplish several goals that are beneficial to the scientific community. 1. Disseminate research resources--both intellectual and physical. For example, it took a senior PI several months to arrange for transfer or embryonic cryostorage of his transgenic lines. Another PI has 30 years of childhood lead exposure data that he doesn't have time to put in order for junior investigators to follow. Given the amount of data and resources accumulated over a career, it would be useful for PIs to organize and disburse in a way that is beneficial. Sadly, some of our senior PIs retire because their 'high' salaries are no longer covered by significant grant funding. When they are feeling forced out, they are less enthusiastic about disbursing their knowledge and resources. 2. Transitioning research programs to 'junior' investigators, and assuring continued research opportunities for the scientific team. I find it interesting that NIH and the CTSAs are focused on Team Science (tm), yet no mention is made of the research grunts--the students and technicians--who product the data. If the senior scientist mentions that she is going to wind down her research, the team members begin looking for new opportunities with longevity. This creates a situation where senior PIs hesitate to talk about the long term strategies of the lab, and instills distrust in the team. Having a transition strategy will provide some job security for the team, and maintain human capital that is sometimes impossible to replace. This will also give the senior PI an incentive to team with a jr person. 3. Review articles. Our senior people have a long-term view of science, and could write some amazing review articles if they weren't busy writing grants to stay funded until the day they retire. 4. A few PIs stick around to help their students graduate. This award could establish both protected time for mentoring and a timeline towards taking in students. | I like the idea of a four year award because it makes it worthwhile to both partners. The senior could be PI for YRs1-2, and transfer to the jr PI for YRS3-4. We lack enthusiasm for writing grants that will cover only one or two years--it's just not worth the effort. | Not sure--but perhaps the RFA could describe some of the resources that would be captured or maintained by the transfer from SR to JR PI. These resources could include data files, transgenic lines, methods and methods development, technical staff support, biorepository stewardship, etc. | Jr people like me get irritated by the funding rates of senior people already. I wrote a grant that scored well, but it was obvious from the critiques that the reviewers like my PI--probably better than my idea. His reputation carried the grant (not that I'm complaining!). Senior scientists might feel pushed out if they are encouraged to apply for a grant like this. They talk about retiring, but receiving this award might make them feel like they 'have' to retire. | I work with some brilliant senior investigators. It would be nice to have a prestigious award available that would give them time to do discovery science. Of course, I wouldn't mind such an award for junior people like me, as well. | ||
90 | [ / ] | Rockville, MD | I am a PO who serves as a Training Coordinator in my [ ] division, handling mostly fellowships and institutional training grants and advising also on career awards. I am in favor of this emeritus award and completely agree that it is good to transfer knowledge to Jr. faculty in the plan. I would strengthen this by setting up collaborations to ensure that the younger investigator has people to publish with and to perhaps spend time in the labs of, perhaps also using or replicating some provisions of a mid-career award such as the K02 or if patient-oriented research, the K24. I do not think the junior investigator should be 10 or fewer years since their terminal degree, i.e. an early career investigator. They have to have some standing. The senior investigator might also designate a committee of perhaps 3 senior investigators at the institution to continue to assist the junior investigator for a period of 3-5 years. I say this because I have seen a rough transition, occasioned by the passing of a senior investigator, where the junior investigator had difficulty in establishing credibility with the grant review committees and I am guessing also with publication committees. Of course the work stumbles as well as the junior person and those in his/her lab as well in my experience. | |||||||
91 | Penn State University Department of Biochemistry and Molecular Biology | University Park, PA 16802 | Several of my colleagues have retired. I do not know the details of how that was accomplished, but it seems to me the potential for loss of valuable information is significant. We have all built up a body of work which, if not passed on, will be lost and future researchers will have to reinvent the wheel in many areas. Not all discoveries make it into publications. I am definitely in favor of such an award and actually think it should be more broadly expanded to help all researchers transition, not just those with junior partners. | Idea of this award is very good. However, not everyone will have a junior colleague to whom the research can be passed on, or who wants to receive it. In that case arrangements could be made available to the entire community such as: 1. Copying, archiving, and rendering searchable the laboratory notebooks that have been generated. Evidence that notebooks have been properly filled out and maintained over the career would be required. 2. Maintenance of a website where investigators could post the data and ideas behind the most tantalizing avenues that have not been explored. 3. A way to distribute valuable resources such as antibodies, cell lines and bacterial strains. These are extremely important to continuity. | If there is a junior faculty partner to receive the award, 2 years for the emeritus faculty and 5 years for the junior faculty to make it attractive and give evidence of productivity would work. A junior partner would be anyone less than 10 years from retiring, with some preference given to those furthest away from retirement in the case of multiple potential partners. The partners would have to be evaluated for their capacity to take on the extra research. | $$$ | If the junior partner is from another country--can that still be arranged? | It is excellent that NIH is confronting this issue. I would urge it to think more broadly in terms of resource and information distribution of the fruits of each retired NIH researcher to the entire research community, and the taxpayers. | ||
92 | Isn't this called "retiring" or "quitting"? There does not need to be federal funding for transitioning someone out of their position. Perhaps this money would be better spent on helping early-career investigators set up and run their labs. Any senior investigator who isn't planning for their transition out of their role shouldn't be rewarded with further funding. | The senior investigator should already be collaborating with a junior investigator if they intend to leave a lasting legacy. And they have had an entire career to acquire skills needed for a new role. | Zero. None. | Most emeritus faculty already have better retirement packages and better pay than any of the younger researchers will ever earn. Stop throwing money at people who are ready to leave academic research. | ||||||
93 | University of Minnesota | Minneapolis, MN | I don't understand the language "that allows a senior investigator to transition out...." There is nothing that restricts most senior investigators from bringing their lab to closure by their own decision. Furthermore, the reality of <10% pay lines is a closure catalyst. | The suggestion that an emeritus award (assuming it is a research grant) could provide an opportunity for acquiring skills needed for transitioning to a new role seems a bit ludicrous. Why would (or how could) an NIH grant that supports research be used for such a purpose? What am I missing? | As one example, the 5 year award would be a baton passing exercise wherein the junior PIs % effort and responsibility would increase and the senior PIs would decrease. Ideally this would be an award the PI has held for some time and is now willing to relinguish. A junior faculty member would not have been a PI on an RO1. The junior and senior faculty members would join forces at the time of the competitive renewal. | This is a tough one, unless the pay line was stretched a bit to accommodate these awards. From an institutional standpoint I would be supportive if the award looked like it had the potential to substantially launch the career of a younger faculty member. | One challenge would be the importance of a discipline-specific match-making ie, two individuals at the same institution (although this may not be an absolute requirement, but most institutions would not want the junior PI to be somewhere else) who have similar interests in exploring a fundamental unresolved question in their field. Filling out this form has prompted me to think of my own colleagues at the University of Minnesota Medical School and how many "eligible pairings" we might have. Another challenge would be the institution's acceptance (or lack thereof) of such an accomplishment by the junior PI as being sufficiently meaningful to give credit toward promotion. | Strong tenure systems at public universities have created an environment that would make this emeritus model difficult to succeed. Given there is no mandatory retirement in these environments, senior PIs continue to submit NIH applications and their department heads expect them to continue being funded and require them to put as much of their salary as possible on these grants. This would detract from the altruism necessary to embrace the emeritus award proposed herein. Outstanding junior investigators would likely bypass the opportunity since achieving RO1 status on their own could/would be viewed as a greater accomplishment. | ||
94 | UW-Madison | Madison, WI | I am interested in the prospect of putting instrumentation and materials to good use in another lab as a senior investigator is closing his lab. However, I think that the majority of ideas that are central to that individual's research plan can be passed to postdoctoral students for their own roles as PI, prior to obtaining emeritus status. | I have no idea how money from an NIH research grant would be necessary to make the transition described… what is the money going toward? If a junior faculty member wants to write a grant with a senior faculty member, what is stopping that for happening now? And, why should it be a separate pot of money? Again, isn't this (in large part) what a postdoc is for? | I worry that this type of thing is supporting an "old boys club" model of scientific advancement. As such, I think it is important that the definition of a junior faculty department gives preferentially to minorities in the field in which they work. | I am wondering whether the "co-PIs" would have to be at the same institution. I am also concerned as to whether a junior faculty member can show that they can "stand alone" when they have such an involved and (presumably) successful mentor directing them (i.e., is this type of award detrimental to the tenure process?). | I think the NIH should decide whether this award is (to put it bluntly) a way for junior investigators to get ahead, or a way to push out emeritus researchers who won't step down, because I'm not convinced that the two go hand-in-hand, and if they do, I again question whether NIH dollars are necessary for that collaboration. | |||
95 | Purdue University | West Lafayette, IN | There is little community interest in an emeritus award. Senior investigators close to retirement should be held to the same standards as the rest of the scientific community when applying for federal grant dollars. I do not see the benefit in paying off establish scientists who are unable to secure funding through other mechanisms. We are losing a generation (or even generations) of young and mid-career scientists due to the continued underfunding of federal grant programs. I don't see the value in setting aside dollars that could be used to keep these researchers afloat to specifically point this towards senior investigators. Furthermore, the diversity in the ranks of the young and mid-career scientists is significantly higher. If dollars are set aside for senior scientists in the emeritus program, the NIH funded pool of scientists will be reduced in diversity. There are other mechanisms that allow senior investigators to sunset their laboratories - this is not needed and is not wise. | |||||||
96 | A good senior investigator is already expected to mentor and transition their work to younger investigators. Through years of funding they already have a cadre of junior investigators already trained to take the reins. NIH allocating already scarce resources to fund something that already should be happening would be yet another example of how the already established investigators (baby boomers) are feathering their nests at the expense of others. | NO EMERITUS AWARD | NO EMERITUS AWARD | NO EMERITUS AWARD | if NIH were serious about funding more research, they would reduce the indirect cost return on R01 awards. they go for administration, not research. there is no reason why a second, third, etc R01 should have the same indirect cost return as the first. | |||||
97 | NIH | bethesda, md | Not necessarily, but it could help, pave the way to avoiding going cold turkey --- as one who has benefited from a gradual lessening of responsibilities I am convinced that a gradual process benefits both the employer and the individual approaching retirement. | Gradually cut off funds for students and research, while allowing PI salary to lag but then too gradually cut that back so that say within 5 or 7 years the award is closed down. | 5-7 year transition seems right, with sr and jr PIs as MPIs on the grant award | First, the award would cause elderly PIs to think, maybe I should do this; also, the FOA would stimulate cross-talk and cross-fertilization between sr and jr researchers. | Impediments probably abound, but the net value makes trying the approach worthwhile | I hope you can sort responses by sr or jr status...it would seem to be important to know if both age groups see advantages in this approach | ||
98 | The Rockfeller University | New York, NY | An excellent notion to explore the ways in which senior investigators can decrease their work in the laboratory and create collaborations with junior scientists locally or internationally. | The program may facilitate the process of retirement from formal teaching and active research while the professor could still serve as mentor to students, postdocs. and junior faculty. The university should provide an office to make it possible for the retired professor to take part in laboratory seminars and presentations by students and interact personally with everybody in the laboratory. | Many universities are in need of an "ombudsman" and perhaps the emeritus award to stimulate the creation of positions of independent senior advisor at the universities or research institutions. (My experience at the Rockefeller that a professor at the university retired from the laboratory work and became during my [ ] dean of faculty much appreciated by faculty and administration.} | My guess is that an initiative like this by the NIH would be much appreciated by the senior academic world. It could be presented like a Fulbright award with a fixed stipend and term of service of 3-5 years but be competitive and to become a recipient would represent a real honor. | It is difficult to find real impediments of such an award program. Instead it may stimulate senior professors to retire and relieve some of the clogging at the top ranks at universities. If the program could be given a name after a former senator or congress member, who over many years supported NIH and basic and clinical research and with good publicity become a truly prestigeous appointment at the end of your scientific career- like a real Award. Perhaps the new National Academy of Medicine could be involved? | There is a great need of experienced scientists for research training, teaching and mentor ship of students and junior faculty in the developing world. I believe such a program could have a serious impact in many parts of the world. | ||
99 | University of Texas at San Antonio | San Antonio Texas | This would be a great way to make the most of investments made in investigators who have been in the system a long time and have built up a knowledge base, skill base and an active research program that is in full force. A junior investigator could step in and be more productive than starting from scratch. This could also potentially free up funding for junior investigators by allowing senior investigators to step aside while their work continues. My concerns are twofold. The risk of nepotism is high and will be difficult to manage. The people most capable of continuing the legacy are those who have been trained by that researcher. Moreover, if the senior person has a say in the decision of who takes over the lab, then they may not want someone who might come in and take the work in a new direction. Finally, there is the risk of developing a "European" model wherein the junior researcher is under the scrutiny and indirect direction of the emeritus researcher. If these risks can be managed, this could be a good program for continuing the legacy of successful investigators. | See above | Full salary for emeritus and r01 like funding for junior. | See above | See above | |||
100 | Albert Einstein of Medicine | Bronx NY 10461 | An award for senior investigators to transition from bench scientist to the role of "gray eminence" would be helpful. | A senior scientist who wishes to transition to this award would find a compatible NIH funded lab to work with.I am doing this ad hoc with University support .The emeritus award (poor name, since the older scientist may wish to remain active in University affairs) should provide some salary support for the senior scientist and some funding for the compatible laboratory to support either graduate students or postdocs and supplies to work on projects of joint interest, perhaps peripheral to the funded lab's grants and utilizing the senior scientist's expertise, equipment and knowledge of the field. | 3 years -renewable. Partner lab must have an ongoing grant supported program, not reliant on the emeritus support, which should be supplementary | As a senior investigator nearing Emeritus status my proposal in comment 2 has worked for me. NIH salary support would have been helpful. Student support for me was invaluable, allowing new exploration leading to breakthrough publication e.g.Nature 2014. | Senior investigators take up space and resources and are often considered "deadwood" | |||
101 | UCDavis | Davis, CA | Very supportive of this idea. Transitioning via a dual PI mechanism would be effective. Sr faculty mentors earlier career faculty in all aspects of grant management to transition PI status. Thus person should already be part of the award as coinvestugator or other role, and established in science. Could even be another Sr investigator , but at earlier career stage. | Facilitate Partnership, leadership transition. | Change Jr partner terminology to earlier career stage (earlier than the emeritus faculty member). Suggest 5 yr awards. It takes time to transition. Also , please consider that many emeritus faculty want to retire from their clinical and admin responsibilities and keep their research programs. Many institutions allow recalls. therefore, this could be another use for the Emeritus awards: to support research programs of emeritus faculty. | Allow Jr faculty to assume research resources if the emeritus faculty. Consider requiring institutional commitment of at least a portion of the resources (kab space, equipment, etc). If Jr faculty assumes research but institutions take away resources, the emeritus awards will not succeed. Also, Allie Jr faculty to draw grant salary during period of transition. Require lower indirects so funds go further. | Instituting are often wanting Sr faculty to retire as they have higher salaries and mire resources that they would like to redirect to others or other uses. Important that these not be compromised, and that emeritus awards incorporate mechanisms to preserve both b | Many Sr investigators who are very productive with large labs and multiple NIH awards are looking for a mechanism to continue in science at a reduced effort and at the same time, a way to transition their programs to others. This will be very appealing to them as a way to transition. Consider an emeritus 'supplemeny' as well. Like the diversity and sex differences supplements. A grant where a Sr PI delegates responsibility for a portion of his/her research work scope to an earlier career stage faculty. A keadersip and mentoring plan transition would be part of these awards as well as a plan to perhaps enhance an existing aim. | ||
102 | Johns Hopkins | Baltimore, MD | There is no community interest. Everyone I have spoken to is against this idea. In an era of low paylines, this is not a wise use of resources. This program is attempting to solve a problem that does not exist. | Please do not do this! There are already mechanisms for a retiring colleague to transfer funds to a junior colleague. | Please do not invest resources in this poor idea. | Please, do not do this!!! Increase r01 paylines instead. | Impediment: this is not a good idea and it solves a problem which does not exist. | Please, do not do this. | ||
103 | Harvard Medical School | Boston, MA | I don't think the NIH should distribute its limited funds to "allow" senior PIs to stop doing research; rather, it should allow early and mid-career researchers to start (or keep doing) research. While he was talking about 3rd R01s, Jon Lorsch's point holds true here too, I think: "it means that another productive scientist loses his only grant or a promising new investigator can’t get her lab off the ground. Which outcome should we choose?" http://loop.nigms.nih.gov/2015/01/a-shared-responsibility/ | Junior scientists today already must be intellectually subservient to our supervisors during a protracted training period. The practice of supporting postdocs on research grants designed by and awarded to PIs already reduces our autonomy, and we do not need additional measures that indenture us intellectually to previous generations. | ||||||
104 | Children's National Medical Center | Washington, DC | The community interest, as exemplified here by faculty of one institution, at least, is high. We observe this interest at our institution in the form of junior faculty/fellow participation in what we call a grants enhancement program. This program provides mentoring for the formulation and expression of new project ideas by these faculty, is greatly used, and has a record of enhancing the success of these faculty members in obtaining competitive research funding. | The emeritus award as described below, would have as its goal to tap the broad scientific knowledge and experience of senior investigators, who would be committed to developing the future generation of biomedical scientists as their primary aim in participating and receiving such an award. | To fully realize the potential of this award, rather than piggy-backing, it should not duplicate funding to already currently (e.g., R01-funded) investigators, but rather provide funding for the concentrated application of effort by those who are now senior investigators who are no longer seeking their own research funding, but rather seek to concentrate their efforts on mentoring junior investigators over the broad field of biomedical science. This would be somewhat analogous to the role of a program director, e.g., of the NICHD Child Health Research Centers for example (which I have served for [ ] years), with the exception that rather than expecting current R01 support, the individual applying for the emeritus role would specifically describe their interest in mentoring and not conducting their own research at this point in their career. | Incentivization could involve tracking of the outcome of the junior investigators being mentored, i.e., their success in obtaining competitive funding through an NIH or equivalent mechanism. | if the award were structured to fill the criteria described for the emeritus mentor (comment 3), the selection process of the mentors would be partially self-selecting. There would be no impediment to senior investigators seeking, for example, half-time (50%), or whatever level of support is necessary to maintain a normal less than full-time but benefits-maintaining position at the institution. This might require a to-be-defined institutional commitment of some resources. level of support for the role, or wha It would be expected that the institution | |||
105 | Chris Pickett | cpickett@asbmb.org | American Society for Biochemistry and Molecular Biology | Rockville, MD | The ASBMB is not in favor of such an award. Economic incentives typically benefit the group receiving the direct investment. Thus, emeritus awards will benefit eligible senior scientists; however, even with the stipulation that the award focus on mentoring, its effects, if any, on junior faculty members will be difficult to discern. Moreover, as discussed in point 6, such an award mechanism may have several unintended consequences. | It is not clear how or why an emeritus award mechanism should be used. Mechanisms already exist that allow a retiring investigator to assign his/her grant to another faculty member and ensure a line of research is continued. Similarly, research grants with co-investigators already provide a mechanism for a senior investigator to pass on information and materials to a junior investigator. We are not aware of data that demonstrate these mechanisms are insufficient to accomplish the goals of the proposed emeritus award. Finally, when an institution and senior investigator agree that the investigator will transition to a new role, the institution should ensure, financially and in all other manners, that the investigator has the opportunity to acquire the necessary skills for the new role. Mentoring of junior faculty by senior faculty is beneficial for the scientists involved and the larger community, and these events already occur. It is not clear that the NIH needs to institute a new award mechanism specifically to encourage events that are already occurring. Rather, the NIH should introduce or strengthen potential training components of co-investigator R01 and other research awards. | As stated in our response to question 2, it is not clear how or why such a mechanism should be used. | In a Feb. 18 webinar, Dr. Sally Rockey said that one of the goals of the NIH is to “increase churn in the workforce.” An emeritus award does this only if the NIH can use this award to decrease the population of senior scientists. It is not clear that the NIH has the authority to do this. Furthermore, established senior investigators can be very productive and resourceful at advanced ages and after long careers. They are currently competing for and obtaining R01 grants. It is not clear that there are or should be incentives that would convince institutions to encourage these scientists to stop making valuable contributions to the institution and the scientific community. | In her webinar, Dr. Sally Rockey said that an emeritus award would be distinct from other research awards as it would be understood by all parties that the emeritus award would be the final award a researcher receives from the NIH. The finality of this restriction itself may disincentivize participation in the mechanism. Furthermore, it is not clear how an emeritus award would affect senior investigators that are a part of P series or other large grants. This lack of clarity may also disincentivize participation. | Instituting an emeritus award could have several unintended consequences. First, in a stagnant budget environment, the money for such an award must be taken from other pools of NIH grants that fund investigators at all career stages. Thus, taking money from other programs to fund an emeritus award could harm just as many investigators as the NIH is trying to help. Second, an emeritus award increases churn only if the award shortens the career of a scientist, or reduces the amount of money that scientist receives. However, without the legal authority to compel scientists at specific ages or career stages into such an emeritus award, the award could just as well extend someone’s career and exacerbate the aging workforce issues the NIH is trying to alter. Third, the potential of this award to provide active scientific career guidance for early-career women and minorities while decreasing the time gaps to independence is significant. In fact, some fora have inadvertently advertised this as an award for underrepresented minorities. However, there is a risk of creating a more insular research model whereby mentors will simply mentor those with backgrounds similar to their own. Thus, the proposed emeritus award may further entrench some of the diversity problems the enterprise faces today. |
106 | NIMH | Bethesda MD | It is difficult to see what the community benefit is in this type of award, that is strong enought to overshadow other awards in a time of restricted budgets and when a large stream of young researchers is pouring into the community. If the goal is to reduce the number of senior investigators so as to indirectly enhance the funding prospects for younger researchers, then it would be better to address the "real goal" directly -- for example, by a revival of the R29 award mechanism. The mission of NIH extramural funding is to accelerate the best biomedical research, not to provide a soft landing for senior investigators. In short, I do not see the merits of this proposal. | |||||||
107 | departement of health | Makassar , Indonesia | ||||||||
108 | Johns Hopkins University | Baltimore MD | Hard to know how to reply but as a [ ] researcher, I am not speaking from self interest. I must state that this is the wrong way to "sustain the scientific workforce." We – the baby boomers – are occupying too much for too long. Propping us up for a few more years with this proposal only serves to actually reduce the sustainability of the scientific workforce because we will continue to starve the next generation. Please don’t do this – sustainability also means ensuring the future, and the younger generations of scientists, who are leaving research, are the future no matter how much we may want to deny this | |||||||
109 | Florida International University Herbert Wertheim College of Medicine | Miami, FL | A number of respondents have, in so many words, said that this is just taking more money from young investigators and giving it to the "old" (like me). However, it if is done correctly, the result will be that the "old" will be able to transition into a mentoring role, and the "young" end up with solid funding. If junior investigators have difficultly competing for grant funds on their own, this award might get them started on independent careers. This is a win-win-win for the senior investigator, the junior investigator and the scientific community. | |||||||
110 | As a mid-career investigator yet to secure an R01, I find it very daunting and challenging to look up currently funded R01 grantees who are in their 15 and 20th year of the funding cycle. Its almost impossible to compete with such investigators in terms of track record and productivity for the very limited pool of funding that is available. Depending on what the purpose of the emeritus award is (is it to ease out senior investigators or encourage them stay on), I could have very strong opposition to such an award. I think its time to open the playing (grant) field to the younger investigators and allow new/fresh and innovative ideas. Senior investigators who feel entitled to continuing their R01s, reviewing and criticizing others' R01's should really move on to something else. | Are there examples of a successful laboratory closure ? Likewise, are there examples of partnerships between senior/junior investigators? How does that work? It seems like on a regular basis, senior investigators are routinely pit against junior investigators, and guess who is more successful at securing funding? | If there were something as an emeritus award, I would say that it should be no more than 1 year, and must require identifying a junior faculty member to take on the reins. | As a junior investigator, the only way I see this working to the benefit of everyone, is if the emeritus award is used to ease out senior investigators. Along with senior scientists come older/conservative views of science (i.e. "this is how it has always been done, dont tell me what to do") which in my humble opinion is stifling science. Younger/junior scientists tend to be more collaborative, more interdisciplinary and more applied. Not to mention less expensive for the institutions. In the long run, they are likely to pay more dividends for the investment of health related researcher than the senior researcher who is continuing his/her research idea that was originally funded 20 years ago. | see comment #4 | |||||
111 | It seems very difficult these days for young investigators to start and maintain their career through NIH awards. Personally I would hate to see some of these meager resources be diverted to retiring investigators. I transitioned into retirement from a 4 year NIH grant and a 1 year no-cost extension that allowed me to finish the promised research and graduate the related students. Faculty need a 5-y plan to enable a gentle transitions. | Emeritus faculty should have enough resources to continue transitions to junior faculty. This should be part of the 5 y plan mentioned above. Retirement should enable recruitment and emeritus status would enable mentoring without the need for additional funding. | Speaking personally, most senior investigators [approaching 30 - 40 y after graduation] have a stale tool box to investigate new problems. Mentoring can/should be done without the need for addition resources. Let the new faculty take the credit as PI. | |||||||
112 | UAMS | Little Rock | This is an excellent idea and one that is desperately needed. The development of young investigators is hindered if the established laboratories disappear. Given the recent funding climate, very few investigators can sustain a research program on NIH grants alone. If the emeritus award covered a portion of the senior investigator's salary, then funding proposals can focus on funding the work and the others involved, versus a portion of the PIs salary. | To follow on to comment 1 above, the emeritus award would enable sustainability of the laboratory, as well as a transition period that would enable the more junior investigators to develop more robust funding and take a greater role in lab income. | The award should be given to senior and accomplished investigators with a history of federal funding and scientific training/development. Like other awards, they should carry 5 yr commitments, and should be renewable at least once. | The incentive for the award would be a certain percentage of NIH max salary award, as well as duration of award. Other awards might consider support for laboratory operations that enable a bridging of the gap between senior and unfunded junior. | I cant think of any down side. Both the senior investigator and the institution would benefit greatly. | This idea is LONG overdue. Many senior scientists are choosing retirement given the funding climate. As a result, many years of research experience are being lost. | ||
113 | Absolutely NO. This is a way of funneling scarce funding money towards people who least need it and who are least likely to originate innovative research. Senior scientists need to understand that there is such thing as retirement, which they very likely are well provided for, and taxpayer money should not be used to bribe them into it. | |||||||||
114 | University of Wisconsin-Madison | Madison WI | In 1962 I read a paper in my electrical engineering journal by JHU Brown that NIH was looking for experienced engineers to apply for an NIH predoctoral fellowship in Biomedical Engineering and become teachers in this new field. I applied, was accepted and did that then came to University of Wisconsin-Madison in 1967. Since then I have worked with physicians here, NIH has supplied research grants on medical devices, and I have written 200 peer reviewed articles and 24 books. So a little incentive from NIH at the beginning sparked much progress. Rather than losing a researchers accumulated knowledge, it would be good to make it available to all. NIH could award 50% of annual pay for one year after termination from regular salary income to be paid after the researcher writes a summary of all he/she has learned that might help future researchers. NIH could post these summaries on the NIH web site. I could even develop another book, "Inventing medical devices" that might spur others to invent new medical devices. | |||||||
115 | Georgia Regents University | Augusta, GA | Great idea. One of the biggest problems for career-development of smart junior investigators is lack of day-to-day intensive input from senior people on writing/editing of papers, grant-editing and grantsmanship on their grants, presentation/discussion of data, conceptualizing the next steps in the research, etc. If done well, this takes lots of time from the senior faculty, so an emeritus professor could have the time to do it. That would be a good use of the skill-set built up over many years. | One big concern is whether the junior investigator would get smothered by the senior investigator, who was used to being in charge. I can see that potentially happening. So this would have to be something that was requested jointly by the junior investigator. And there would need to be annual progress reports to assess the effectiveness of the emeritus faculty member in the relationship. The goal should not be "mentoring" like a K-award, but "partnering" - i.e, somebody to read and critique every grant, every paper, discuss ideas, etc. In that role (if carefully defined), the senior person could be very valuable but not overwhelming. | One emeritus faculty could have the time to partner with several junior people (and we should also include mid-career people as potential partners - I am well established, but I still hugely value the input from my more senior colleagues). So I could envision two models that could be fruitful - a one-to-one partnership, or one emeritus faculty in a division or department with several junior people who all wanted partnerships. The award might allow both models? | |||||
116 | University of Washington | Seattle, WA | I think this would be an excellent approach. There are many examples where NIH has invested heavily, both in terms of equipment and personnel, in a given research area. So having a pathway for NIH's investment to be transitioned to a junior faculty member so the NIH can continue to reap the benefits of their investment along with the continued advancement of that particular area would be ideal. | I don't think this award should be used to close a lab. It should be use to used to transition responsibility from a senior investigator to a junior. The mentorship of the junior investigator by the senior investigator should already be well establish prior to an emeritus award. The emeritus award should just be used to transfer the leadership to the junior investigator. One of the major challenges to this transition is support for graduate students and post-doctoral fellows. As the senior investigator ends their research activities they still need to have graduate student and post-doctoral fellows working for them to finish up their research projects. At the same time the junior investigators need to have graduate students and post-doctoral fellows working for them so they can establish their role in the research program. Providing funding to allow the senior investigator to finish their projects at the same time the junior investigator is ramping up their efforts would make this transition happen much more effectively. | I think the award should be between 3 and 5 years and should be focused on providing support for graduate students, post-doctoral fellows and research supplies, with a limited amount of investigator salary support. Three years is the minimum needed to make an effective transition. The definition of the junior faculty should be fairly broad. It would be best if the junior faculty is not at the beginning of the faculty appointment. If they have at least 5 years of experience as a faculty investigator they will be in a better position to transition into a leadership position of an established research program. I would not put an upper limit on the age junior faculty as long as they plan to continue the research program for at least another 10 years (preferably at least 15 years). | I would set up this emeritus award with the same objectives as the "golden handshakes" that companies offer senior employees. The idea is to make it attractive for the senior investigator to step down from their research activities while opening up more opportunities for junior investigators to obtain research funding. | If the emeritus award is done properly it can be win for everyone. The senior investigator has a way to successfully transition out of research activities at the end of their research career, knowing that the research program they established will be continued. The junior investigator gets the opportunity to use the track record of an established research program to make them more competitive for future grant proposals. Both the NIH and institution benefit since their previous investments in the research program are continued to be utilized and leveraged into the future. | This is a great idea that addresses an unmet need. | ||
117 | Tufts University | Medford, MA | Little to no community interest in such a mechanism exists, from what I have seen. An R01 can already be moved over to another investigator, and senior investigators are recognized quite uniformly as being the last group in the biomedical research system that requires extra funding mechanisms. | The award could be used for mentoring junior faculty and pairing a junior, perhaps pre-tenure-track professor with a retiring investigator to provide mentorship and pass on lab infrastructure. However I strongly feel that such an award is not the priority of the NIH in the first place. | The junior faculty should be the principal investigator on the award and should be essential and central to the administration of such an award. However I strongly feel that such an award is not the priority of the NIH in the first place. | I do not think senior investigators nor institutions are in need of more incentives for more awards. I strongly feel that such an award is not the priority of the NIH in the first place. | There are no impediments to senior investigators and institutions other than the ill-feeling this will breed with junior faculty and early career researchers in what is already a polarized debate. | I have included comments from an opinion piece [ ] on this discussion (https://thewinnower.com/papers/a-call-for-the-voices-of-early-career-researchers): "Perhaps the most telling part of the Request for Information is that public comment is sought for “Impediments to the participation in such an award program, from the perspectives of both senior investigators and institutions.” The fact that there is no mention of junior investigators, and that this is a proposal that NIH has chosen to focus on most urgently, is concerning. There is much anger within the community at the thought that money for R01s (the principal major grant funding mechanism in the NIH) could be lost to increase funding specifically for senior investigators; an argument could be made that these are the last people who need additional funding. In particular, there has been some comment that it is already possible to transfer an R01 grant to another person, so this mechanism may, in effect, already exist. In our opinion, the NIH needs to make a compelling argument for why this mechanism is needed. How will this benefit the members of the emeritus awardee’s lab, or the junior investigator potentially receiving the lab after the transition? Is the goal to encourage earlier retirement by specifying a hard deadline for retirement after receiving the award? Is the goal to ease the transition out of the lab for the post-docs and grad students that need to find new labs? We believe there is also an implication that junior investigators require the benevolent passing of project ideas from more senior investigators, rather than having their own independent projects, and indeed a recent report by Ewan Callaway in Nature has highlighted that, in fact, younger investigators may be considered more innovative than senior researchers, by some metrics (Callaway 2015). Some comments on the Rock Talk blog suggest that making the project focused on the junior faculty by giving them full control over the budget could ameliorate the concern; the senior investigator could be involved with the goal of transferring equipment and of course collaborative expertise. On the other hand, it is encouraging to see the NIH thinking of creative funding mechanisms rather than a reliance purely on the R01-like mechanisms. Discussions are needed on the various ways of making use of talent in science in particular with a system that has a much higher number of “trainees” than permanent academic positions for them to eventually take. In particular, the discussion of methods to share resources and people across lab boundaries is likely to encourage greater collaboration. But if the NIH truly wants to make the best use of the current pool of scientific talent, then we believe that such awards as this, which will only affect a very small portion of the talent pool, should not be their major focus and instead they should look at mechanisms to prevent talented scientists from being forced out of academia at the ECR and junior faculty levels. The NIH certainly can’t be faulted for provoking debate. The only ones at fault will be those who don’t take the opportunity to comment. This is not the only means of taking action to change the biomedical research system; we cannot allow anyone to think “no news is good news.” If ECRs aren’t contributing to the ongoing conversations and making their concerns heard, it is much harder to make progress. In the hope that this has provoked some debate and dialogue, we encourage you to take the opportunity to comment on these proposals." | ||
118 | Feinstein Institute for Medical Research | Manhasset, NY | I am strongly opposed to this initiative. While recognizing that the goal of this award is ultimately to free up additional funds to younger investigators, in fact it is more likely to divert additional funds to senior investigators who are not competitive for R01s. The desired goal can already be accomplished through ordinary mechanisms (i.e., competitive renewals not get funded). If this mechanism is created, there will be a "barbell" structure in which there are advantages to the youngest and oldest investigators, thereby further punishing mid-career investigators, given the finite amount of total resources. Ultimately, I think the NIH is going in the wrong direction by focusing on the investigator. The focus should be on the science. I would prefer a redirection of funds based on disease priority areas, number of lives affected, etc., rather than a redirection of funds based on personal characteristics of the investigator. | |||||||
119 | Univeristy of MIssissippi Medical Center | Jackson, MS | This is a terrible idea. Having now discussed this idea with ~20faculty members of all ranks, funding levels, and career stages at my institution, I have yet to discover ANY enthusiasm for this proposal. | Again terrible idea. The senior faculty will likely appoint the junior faculty who has been running their lab for the last ten years so they can keep control of the resources. Sadly in the vast majority of these cases, the reason the junior faculty have remained in these dependent positions is because they are not competitive as PIs on their own. This award would be unlikely to change their competitiveness once the senior PI "retires" for real, if in fact they ever would. | 0 years. $0. Please, in the name of all that is good and decent, kill this before it grows. | Oh, offer it, and people will apply. If you wave money at people that are already retired, they'll take it. Institutions will love the indirects. I'm sure the size of the award will be substantial enough to make all concerned happy. | None. They'll be thrilled. | What fever dream was this conceived in? Clearly, the money will come from other, competitive funding mechanisms. The idea that we're removing these individuals from the grant pool is laughable. You're just guaranteeing them their own pool of money to bathe in. The junior faculty partner is likely the poor researcher who has been under the PIs thumb too long, and their chances of success after the (unlikely) final retirement of the PI is questionable. This is the worst idea to come out of NIH in my [ ] years in science. | ||
120 | Department of Physics, Drexel University | Philadelphia, PA 19104 | I think this is wise, and even potentially shrewder than realized. A senior investigator might be interested in such an award IN LIEU of trying for yet another R01, for example. But the other important distinction that I would urge is that the energy of keeping a lab running is quite different from the ingenuity of someone who spent a lifetime of study, and can weave together, or suggest to other, interesting or novel ideas. Rather than seeing this as a graceful exit, I think your view would be improved to think of this as the more APPROPRIATE strategy, and one which would be engaged in not by force, but by invitation. | An emeritus award in my mind should actually resemble a fellowship: support to the PERSON, not the lab. Especially in Medical Schools where salary support is expected to be provided, this could allow an emeritus faculty member to interact with colleagues productively, rather than being shown the exit if grants run out. By supporting the faculty member rather than the lab it provides incentive to transition the lab to another person who will become its new leader. Of course some of those situations could be awkward, but that's something one ought to be able to work with at the awarding process. | I would suggest it be like a fellowship, in providing salary and travel support. The key is in the proposal. This is where one could ask for what the awardee plans to do. This would include who he or she works with, implying that a supported/mentored junior faculty member would be a positive but not sole criterion in evaluation. 2 or 3 years seems right. | Perhaps a payline bump for grants submitted from a junior investigator taking over for a senior one. | The problem is really in the all-or-none nature of the present system. Investigators fight to stay funded and active because the only other option (in research) is to quit. Likewise, an institution sees no financial payoff in keeping an unfunded faculty member. | |||
121 | Adam P. Fagen, PhD, Executive Director | afagen@genetics-gsa.org | Genetics Society of America | Bethesda, MD | The Genetics Society of America (GSA) recognizes that the critical shortage of funding for investigator-initiated awards is a compelling reason to consider any and all ideas for ways to mitigate this problem. We believe the most compelling need for any award that supports an investigator transitioning out of NIH research support is to protect the return on investment made in research projects whose results have not yet been published or whose research materials have not been distributed to those who can make best use of them. Rather than setting up a new type of award, however, the GSA believes that the intent of the proposal can be achieved through administrative flexibility of program officers and other staff at NIH. Indeed, this would prevent establishment of another set-aside that would further exacerbate the limited funding NIH has available. An announcement to all current grant holders that NIH staff have a range of administrative options available to them to help in the orderly conclusion of research programs would likely identify those investigators that are already thinking about how to wind down their programs. | The Genetics Society of America (GSA) believes that the most effective use of such an award is to protect previous investments in the research project that would be curtailed, such as in transferring useful research stocks or materials to other investigators or facilitating others in finishing partially completed lines of research. As noted above, we believe that an emeritus transition program can best be handled administratively, rather than by establishing a completely new mechanism. However, we do not believe it is desirable or appropriate for junior investigators to take over the research programs of senior investigators who are ending their research careers. Although it may be reasonable for a senior investigator to transfer a specific set of experiments and/or materials, establishing another colleague as an "heir" to the research program is inconsistent with the investigator-initiated structure that is the cornerstone of the R01 funding model. | The Genetics Society of America (GSA) believes that priority of such an award mechanism should be to optimize the return on the previous investment made in a research program, such as by allowing senior investigators additional flexibility that could facilitate the transfer of useful research materials to others or to share results of partially completed experiments. For example, NIH program officers could be empowered to offer additional time or flexibility in spending remaining funds in ways that protect the agency’s previous support of the investigator. We believe that any consideration for emeritus awards should be merit based and dependent upon significant and sustained NIH support for the research program being curtailed. Indeed, we believe that the consideration should be given to the senior investigator and the opportunity for flexibility to spend remaining funding in a way that protects NIH’s previous investments and need not involve junior faculty at all. | The Genetics Society of America (GSA) is aware that many academic and research institutions have recognized the need to manage the costs of senior investigators and have created incentives for phased retirement. We urge the NIH to sample such programs to benefit from the wisdom other institutions have gained. We also believe that allowing senior investigators additional flexibility in transferring selected resources and materials will provide them with assurance that their contributions to research shall have lasting value, which may be one concern of investigators as they reach the end of their research careers. | An obvious impediment to investigators would be the loss of salary support for those on soft money positions. | The Genetics Society of America (GSA) thanks the NIH for creative thinking in addressing the 24% loss of research-funding buying power since 2003. From the GSA’s perspective, any program or award that further exacerbates the challenge of investigator-initiated funding—such as R01 awards—should be avoided. |
122 | Case Western Reserve University | Cleveland, OH | I have submitted a proposal that is fully presented in Comment 6. | See Comment 6. | See Comment 6. | See Comment 6. | See Comment 6. | Proposal for a Senior Investigator Transition Grant Introduction Terminology: The term “Emeritus Award” is not appropriate. This suggests a mechanism that would support investigators who may no longer have regular active faculty appointments, are no longer scientifically active and have no legitimate priority for NIH funding. This mechanism should be called a “Senior Investigator Transition Award” that would facilitate management of productive final stages of a research program and orderly transfer or wind-down of a research group. The RFI contains concepts that are referred to here as “Scenario 1” and “Scenario 2”. 1. Scenario 1: Transfer of a research program to a new PI: In some cases, there may be a junior or mid-career investigator who is positioned to take over leadership. In this case, mechanisms should be facilitated for transition of the new investigator to become the PI or multi-PI of the research program. Some mechanisms already exist for this, but they could be enhanced. This is a worthy goal that should be developed. However, the proposal in this document focuses on the second scenario. 2. Scenario 2: Closure of a research program with possible transfer of projects and resources to other collaborating groups: In many cases, there may NOT be a single junior or mid-career investigator who is positioned to take over leadership as new PI of a research program. In this scenario, mechanisms should be developed to support a wind-down period to productively complete studies and to allow for possible and transfer of resources, personnel and portions of projects to related research programs. The two goals of such a program would be to facilitate productive completion of projects leading up to a program closure and to facilitate decisions by senior investigators to exit from the pool of NIH grant applicants in order to free grant resources for junior and mid-career investigators. **The proposal in this document will focus on this second scenario. Goals and core approaches 1. Goals and motivations for senior investigators would be to extend their funding period to allow for an extended period of productivity during late career wind-down of a research program supported at a reduced rate by transfer of funds already committed to their R01 to later budget periods and a possible matching supplement. 2. Goals for junior and mid-career PI’s (as a community). The senior investigator would need to commit to not having status as a PI or multi-PI in the future, although continued roles as a Co-Investigator or Collaborator on an NIH grant would be allowable. This arrangement would reduce the senior investigator’s future use of NIH grant funds, freeing resources for junior and mid-career investigators. Proposal Allow senior PI’s who are eligible (see below) to extend use of funds already committed to an R01 for up to 5 years beyond the end of the established budget period for the R01 grant. There would be expectations for a maximum amount of funds that could be extended and for rates of expenditure within the extended period. A matching supplement could also be provided to further motivate investigators to use this mechanism, to facilitate productive completion of research goals, and to allow orderly transfer of resources to related research programs. The budget arrangements would include a transfer of funds that are already committed for future years in the original multi-year R01 budget period to years beyond that period. The funds that would be proposed for transfer would not yet have been sent to the grantee institution, and their award to the grantee institution would be deferred to future years by this arrangement. This would be distinct from a no-cost extension, which allows expenditure of funds that have already been sent to the grantee institution beyond the original budget period. The advantage of this mechanism is that it would reduce NIH commitment to grantee institutions in the near-term years, freeing resources to support other research programs. Example The specific terms and numbers indicated below are for illustration, and the exact terms and numbers could be adjusted within this conceptual framework. 1. Enable transfer of funds commitment from the original multi-year budget period to an extension period of up to 5 years. For example, funds projected for year 4 and 5 of an R01 could be transferred to years 6-10 of the R01 without a competitive renewal application (NIH program review would be required). 2. There would be a maximum cap on amount transferred to the extension period, e.g. $250,000 (direct costs; plus the associated indirect costs). 3. A matching supplement would be awarded, limited to the same cap (e.g. $250,000). Alternatively, a lesser partial match or no match could be specified, depending on how much incentive is needed for participation in the program. 4. A budget timeline would need to be approved for each grant by the NIH. This could be individualized. An example might be that no more than 1/3 of the funds for a 5-year extension could be used within one budget period. This would guarantee that some of the funds would be freed in the near term and would prevent inappropriate excessive accumulation of funds. One case scenario: A grantee decides he would like to wind down his program over the next ~7 years. He is in the third year of a 5-year R01 award that has $250,000 direct cost budget each year. He proposes to defer $125,000 from each of the last two years of the original budget period (termed years 4 and 5 in the table below) into a 5-year extension period (termed years 6-10 in the table below). This provides $250,000 for the extension period, and another $250,000 would be provided by the matching supplement, for a total direct cost budget for the 5-year extension period of $500,000. The matching supplement could be less (e.g. 50% or $125,000 in this example) or could be eliminated. Direct cost projections (this is a table that does not format well in this online text submission box; I can provide the entire proposal in a Word document). Year 4 Year 5 Year 6 Year 7 Year 8 Year 9 Year 10 Future Old grant budget 250,000 250,000 0 0 0 0 0 New grant budget 125,000 125,000 100,000 100,000 100,000 100,000 100,000 Amount freed for other investigators in above example with 1:1 matching supplement +125,000 +125,000 -100,000 -100,000 -100,000 -100,000 -100,000 All future funding that would have gone to the exiting PI Amount freed for other investigators if matching supplement is only $125,000 (half of amount of original budget transferred) +125,000 +125,000 -75,000 -75,000 -75,000 -75,000 -75,000 Amount freed for other investigators if there is no matching supplement* +125,000 +125,000 -50,000 -50,000 -50,000 -50,000 -50,000 *If there is no matching supplement, there is no increased budget commitment for this award, and freeing of funds is accelerated into years 1 and 2, plus removal of funding for future applications with this investigator as PI. The balance of actions could be shifted within this general framework, e.g. by decreasing or increasing the supplement. Indirect costs would continue to apply. Eligibility considerations 1. The PI must have a current R01 with at least one future year budget period committed in the notice of award but not yet awarded to the grantee institution. Multi-PI awards might be excluded, since there is already the opportunity for transition in the leadership team (that position would need to be reconsidered; a separate approach might need to be developed to facilitate transitions of this sort, which is a worthy goal related to scenario 1). 2. The PI must have a sustained track record of NIH-funded research (example, >10 years of R01 funding). This supports the position that this investigator would likely be capable of continuing as a funded investigator in the future. 3. Limited to PI’s at domestic institutions. Advantages and disadvantages Using the above example, over the 7 years and future, the advantages and disadvantages are: 1. For the exiting investigator. Advantages: Ability to extend the period of funds use over a wind-down period to complete research projects, graduate PhD students, make personal transition to other professional and personal roles (non-PI roles in research programs, teaching roles, reduced employment for more personal time, etc). This is as opposed to running full steam until a sudden end. Addition of the supplement adds resources and serves as an inducement to participate in the exit grant program. Disadvantages: Requires commitment to no longer submit applications as PI or multi-PI. 2. For the institution: Advantages: Overlap with advantages for the investigator, including stabilizing support during a wind-down period that might otherwise go unfunded, stranding PhD students mid-way in program, etc. Disadvantages: May limit future salary coverage for faculty; this would need to be balanced by reduced employment or shift to other activities, e.g. teaching. Because the exit award would provide a transition period with explicit future implications, planning to overcome these transitions would be clarified and improved. Indirect advantage: All institutions would have potential to benefit by award of more new grants to other investigators – this proposal would NOT reduce the amount of funding to institutions. 3. For the research team and national research workforce: Advantages: Provides an orderly transition period that will allow research staff with important skills to find new productive positions, and for trainees to complete their period of training. Disadvantages: Some positions might be discontinued 1-2 years earlier due to the reduction in funding during the late years of the original R01 period. 4. For other investigators and the NIH grants budget: Advantages: Would provide near-term reduction of budget commitment to exiting faculty, freeing resources for other grants. Would provide for long-term exit of PI’s from grant applications, reducing review burden and budget commitments to the exiting PI’s in the long term. Disadvantages: The matching supplement amount would compete with other funding objectives during the transition period in order to achieve long-term freeing of resources; this could be mitigated by reducing the matching supplement amount. The balance of advantages and disadvantages could be adjusted within this model by altering the supplement amount or the amount allowed to be transferred from the prior budget period. | ||
123 | Harvard Medical School | Its a bad idea. Better to direct the money into the RO1 program. Why would a funded investigator trade current RO1 funding for an emeritus award? If you want to eliminate funding to older investigators, set an upper limit on age or funding level. Otherwise, just fund the best science. | Its hard to see how it would help. Most senior investigators already do mentoring etc. For those who wish to close their lab, they can just run down their current funding and not reapply. Its not easy to see why extra funding is needed to achieve this. Most successful investigators have already trained other PIs who work in closely related fields, which maintains continuity. No need to repeat this when senior investigators retire. | Linking senior and junior investigators through a grant sounds good, but how does this foster independence? It will look like the senior investigator is driving the science, not the junior. There may be special cases where specific resources (cell lines/tissue banks etc) which represent a shared resource need to be handed over to maintain continuity. This could involve funding to a junior investigator to take on management of this. | Institutes will see this as another way to get money from NIH. Please reconsider. Its a terrible idea. | It looks like welfare for senior investigators. If they can propose great science, then let them have RO1s. If not, then they can retire. We have programs for early stage investigators, which I fully support. How about a break for mid-level investigators who are struggling to renew grants? Perhaps we could have inverse handicap system, where priority for select pay is early stage>mid-level>senior? Shift funding to middle/early stage careers. | Bad idea. NIH needs to address the top funding issue here, which is how PIs salary is funded. Their needs to be an upper limit on salary support (I propose 50%), a limit of 3 RO1 equivalents per PI and a review of indirect costs. Institutes are getting NIH to fund their faculty, and then using the faculty for teaching undergrads/PhD/MD students, for whom they also receive tuition fees. For example, at my institute, we are expected to both raise 95% of our salary and to teach MD and PhD students, undergrads and summer students, mentor junior faculty, sit on academic committees, review papers, write grants etc, all of which is paid for by NIH. Further, not only does NIH pay my salary, but they provide the institute with indirects of about 68% on my salary. Unless NIH addresses this, everything else is window dressing. | |||
124 | Yes, very interested. As a senior investigator who has been involved in developing pipeline programs to increase diversity in the sciences while funded for research, I would like to transition out of the research and focus almost exclusively on these pipeline/mentoring programs. Because I have a fully functional lab, transitioning into more administrative/policy positions is very difficult without the protected salary that a grant provides. The problem is that these programs provide no salary support for the PI. In addition, the institution provides little support but has the expectation that we should continue them. The conundrum is that most of my salary is on soft research money, so I have to continue with my lab so I can pay techs, students, postdocs etc, and also my salary. This Emeritus award would allow my research lab to either be transferred to a more junior investigator or phased out entirely. I think this would eventually facilitate the retirement of senior people and open up more resources for younger scientists. Another issue is that as one of very few [ ] in a clinical department, I am always asked to be in every possible committee, again, to the detriment of my research program. If a scientist does not want this Emeritus award because he/she wants to remain at the bench, then they should continue to do so. This is not mandatory. | This award would provide a safety net for the investigator who wants to transition to other endeavors in academia. Very few institutions provide this safety net if the expectation is that your area of excellence is research. Service does not carry the same weight unless one can prove expertise in management and administration. Having this award would allow further training for leadership/administrative positions. By closing a lab, resources would become available to junior investigators. Alternatively, a junior investigator may partner with the senior scientist to continue or expand the avenue of research. | I think this should be available to investigators who have been consistently funded and are still funded, but who have many, many mentoring and administrative responsibilities without compensation. I believe that anyone who has worked for an institution for 20 years is vested; this award could use some of the same criteria: >20 years of funding, near retirement age (~60 yo) and who have a desire to go in a different direction. | I believe these awards would facilitate the process for those senior investigators who may be tired of the bench and the constant writing of grants and who are thinking of moving into more administrative positions and are having a hard time closing down the lab suddenly. I am sure that down the line, this will open up more resources for younger investigators since senior investigators will be taken out of the competition pool. Again, this should only apply to those investigators who can really demonstrate that they are serious about going in a different direction and not to be seen as another source of funds for a lab. I would make these criteria for review and selection very clear. | I think that as soon as anyone gets one of these awards, they should not compete for research awards anymore. This should be one of requirements and explicitly stated. | The award should only be given to those who have been in the “grind’ for many years (20, 25?), who want to move on to policy/administration/leadership, etc. By having this award, we can essentially open up the field for younger scientists of color and women as they would not have to compete with older scientists who populate most of the review committees and ensure their circle of friends keeps getting funded. | ||||
125 | University of New Mexico | Albuquerque, NM | I have no interest in such an award. If the NIH wants to encourage labs that they are funding to wind up their operations, simply stop funding them! It is that simple. This is simply a blatant attempt to direct more funding the way of senior researchers under the guise of "fairness" to younger colleagues. | I imagine that one would utilize such an award to soak up yet more grant money that could be more productively used to support struggling early- and mid-career researchers. There is no need for a specific new award to promote the transfer of a lab from a senior investigator to a junior one. Indeed, this is not something to be encouraged anyway since a junior researcher who simply picks up where a retiring faculty member left off will be less likely to produce novel insights in the future than someone who comes in with a clean slate and their own ideas. Institutions will take care of the transfer of lab space (and, if appropriate, equipment) as it is in their interest to see these resources used as efficiently as possible rather than lying vacant when a senior researcher leaves. | This is a terrible idea. | |||||
126 | University of Texas at San Antonio | San Antonio, Texas 78249 | This is a great idea. The current situation in most universities is that once a faculty member declares a timetable for closure of his/her research laboratory it is open season on facilities acquired by the senior investigator and space allocated by the administration. A funded transition period for a senior investigator to work with junior faculty, especially those on a tenure track who demonstrate some degree of overlap between their research interests and those of the established investigator at the very least provides an opportunity for both parties to benefit and potentially avoid the abrupt loss of knowledge and NIH investment which is common during this scenario in universities today. | Clearly an emeritus award would be used most judiciously and effectively in the case of a senior investigator who is a team player and has a record of mentoring and collaborating with junior tenure track faculty. The latter individuals, under these conditions, would most likely benefit from a funded partnership with the senior investigator prior to his/her transition to a new role. I would expect that most senior university professors with a history of independent RO1 funding would enthusiastically support an opportunity to initiate a partnership with junior faculty that could lead to extension of the senior investigator's research program after his/her transition to a new role. The key element under these conditions would be the duration and amount of support provided to initiate and establish an effective partnership. | I suggest that two years of support at the level of conventional RO1 funding ($250K/year) would be necessary for this initiative to be effective. It would ne necessary for the senior investigator to commit to a transition timetable earlier than is traditionally declared. At least 50% of the budget for the first year should be directed to the junior, tenure-track faculty partner for supplies and personnel support. Funding for the second year would be dependent on demonstration of the existence of a research partnership that was originally proposed in the application for an Emeritus Award. Although I expect it will be difficult to objectively evaluate such a report, I suggest that the senior investigator's statement concerning evidence of a research partnership should be given special weight. In the second year at least 75% of the budget should be provided to the junior partner. | The primary incentive for the institution is always money, so the windfall of additional overhead charges would be an incentive to support this initiative. Eligibility for an Emeritus Award should be a record of outstanding research productivity and continuous NIH support, so that the institution recognizes the importance of the area of research focus and the advantage of a partnership with junior faculty who could contribute to the continuation of the research program. Strong letters to that effect should be forthcoming from the institution's administration. The most significant incentive is the opportunity to formalize a mentored partnership between a respected senior investigator and a junior, tenure track faculty member whom the institution has invested in as a future research star. | Effective partnerships in research almost always depend on compatibility of personalities of the participants. There is no easy mechanism to neutralize this as a risk in establishing a research partnership. Once a senior investigator declares his/her intention to depart from a conventional research role the institution is focused in acquisition of laboratory space in a timely manner. A mechanism is needed whereby the senior investigator commits his/her essential research space with facilities to the junior investigator for the successful implementation of the partnership while releasing most (all) of the senior investigator's remaining space to the institution. | As pointed out in Comment 1 this is a wonderful and long overdue concept that I truly hope will be implemented and prove to be successful. The initiative has the potential to at least reduce the loss of knowledge and research experience acquired by a productive PI who decides to assume a new role within his/her institution. | ||
127 | Emory University | Atlanta, GA | I am delighted that NIH is interested in addressing issues arising at the end of a laboratory career. From my own experience there are a number of highly effective approaches that could improve this transition, empower junior faculty, and preserve accumulated knowledge. I ran an NIH funded research lab at Duke and Emory Universities from 1974 to 2011. When I decided to close my lab in 2010, I was faced with the following challenges. I was actively engaged in a jointly funded project with [xxx], in which my role was essential to continuation of the research. This project is based on the hypothesis that neonatal infection with a common cold virus is the initiating event in many childhood acute leukemias. I wanted to see this project go forward even after my lab was no longer functioning. In addition, during my career I had developed more than 500 unique mouse and human cell lines (stored in liquid nitrogen) and archived an additional 500 cell lines acquired from other groups. These resources were derived using public funds, and it is my responsibility to assure their continued availability to the research community. I was fortunate to identify a bright former student who was interested in continuing my research. I was also fortunate that four institutions (three universities and the NIH) were able to agree to the plan we set forth to move three years of my sub-contract to her laboratory. The final result is that our research is moving forward and I am able to continue my intellectual contribution even though I no longer have a lab. | There are several things NIH could do to encourage others to make the successful kind of transition I made. The idea of an emeritus award to facilitate this process seems like a good start. Such an award could cover some fraction of salary for both the junior and senior investigators as well as the technical assistance to transition the research program to a new laboratory. One thing that would have helped me had it been in place when I was making my transition would have been some partial salary support for me once my lab and grant had been transferred. My university simply assumed that I would retire on the spot, when I would have benefitted from a less abrupt transition both intellectually and financially. Basically I sacrificed three years of salary support so that the work in which I was engaged would have the best chance of continuing. There are also administrative barriers to smooth generational transitions that could be improved. NIH might offer some incentive to universities to facilitate the paperwork involved, for example, and the moving of equipment from one university to another. | The need for junior investigators to quickly establish independence disincentivizes continued involvement between junior and senior investigators, even though this can often be a highly productive approach. This will probably require a cultural change in perception, but NIH grant support would go a long way toward encouraging these partnerships. | |||||
128 | Mayo Clinic | Rochester, MN | I appreciate the opportunity to comment on the proposed development of a grant mechanism to help senior investigators, like myself, transition away from running an active laboratory. However, I firmly believe that mechanisms such as allowing multiple PIs on research grants already exist to foster collaboration between investigators and provide for a better transition. Senior investigators, such as myself, may also choose to transfer an active grant to another investigator if they are ready to retire or transition to another position. I strongly believe that creation of a new grant mechanism to achieve these goals is totally unnecessary. | As I said, I do not believe that the NIH should create an emeritus award. Investigators with active research programs who are planning to close their labs should be allowed to use existing grant funds to ensure that data and materials are appropriately archived and available for future use. Toward this end, it would be more helpful for the NIH to provide some kind of supplemental mechanism that could be applied for if investigators at any stage decide to shut down their research program. | Again, I do not support creation of an emeritus award. | There are existing mechanisms for the transition of senior investigators. An emeritus award is totally unnecessary. | Understanding these unnecessary awards would be a major impediment. | As a senior scientist, I strongly oppose the creation of an emeritus award. Such awards are totally unnecessary. | ||
129 | Harvard Medical School and Brigham and Women's Hospital | Boston, MA 02115 | I think that the Emeritus Award could serve two functions. One function would be to serve as a K05 for a senior investigator to continue with funding that does not take funds away from junior investigators but would allow a senior investigator to continue to do work. An option here might be to have such an award include a component of mentoring and bringing junior investigators to independent investigators with funding. I know that I am very much involved in all my junior investigators obtaining funding and I see this as one of the most important roles that I can play. In this capacity I could help further their science while serving as a mentor and a person who can help launch their successful careers -- while still being able to pay the mortgage. -- A second function might be longer -- over a 10 year period -- to successfully train others to sustain a laboratory that was founded by the senior investigator. To select the right combination of people to take over a laboratory is not easy and the first attempt might not be realistic as the best scientist is not necessarily the best manager of people. I know for myself that I have two brilliant scientists and yet both would be unduly stressed if they had to manage others and provide leadership. I had thought earlier in my career that between the two they could one day run my laboratory but this is not the case. They could run a very small laboratory but not a large one as I have. This is why I think a longer period of time would be needed to transition a productive laboratory to the next generation. -- I think about this often as I can not imagine retiring though I don't want to run a big lab for the rest of my academic career either and a good trade-off would be to hand the reigns over to someone else and remain a resource for them in a mentoring role as well as doing some research. | As noted in Comment 1 -- I think that there could be several different roles for an emeritus award. One that would involve promoting and partnering between a senior and junior investigator(s) with the idea of transitioning the leadership and the other a more ancillary role. | 5 to 10 years if really serious as training junior faculty to grow versus take over a lab are different things. Junior faculty should be Assistant or Associate Professor particularly if you are talking about taking over a lab as it might need someone at Associate Professor level. | Not sure what is meant by "incentivize" -- Having senior faculty assist in helping junior faculty get their own grants submitted, mentoring them, and working on their management skills and what it takes to be a great mentor would be important and to pay a senior faculty member to do this would really ensure that the next generation of researchers are not only well trained but more than able to take over the running of a laboratory without a lot of lost time in rooky mistakes. | Impediments --- ambivalence of senior investigators to hand things over versus to continue. Institutions not understanding the importance of continuity and keeping a lab going with senior person stepping back and promoting the running of the lab by a junior investigator. | I think it makes sense to support senior investigators to help train the next generation of researchers and to also train them to take over running laboratories over time. Some institutions have a K05 award still while others like NIMH do not. This mechanism could be a jumping off point for creating a more generative award for senior investigators to focus on mentoring junior investigators as this is critical if we are to continue to be #1 in science in the world. | ||
130 | University of Wisconsin | Madison, WI | I believe outstanding senior scientists should be encouraged to gradually contract and, eventually, close their laboratories so that NIH funding currently going to them can, instead, be redirected toward junior scientists who very much need this funding to succeed as independent investigators pursuing their own creative ideas. There already exist models by which senior scientists close their laboratories. For example, while still at the very top of his Nobel-level game, Fred Sanger made sure that the outstanding scientists working under his direction (e.g., Bart Barrell) found good jobs and then he simply retired, completely shutting down his laboratory and leaving his former personnel free to follow their independent research paths. Nobelist Paul Berg gradually contracted his research laboratory during his late 60s, shutting it down completely by age 71; afterward, he has continued to find many highly productive things to do as an emeritus professor, including writing several books and taking on major administrative responsibilities so that his junior colleagues might be free to focus their efforts on research. Many senior top scientists view their “legacy” as (i) the contributions they made to the scientific literature, and (ii) students and postdoctoral fellows whom they mentored who subsequently went on to do great things of their own choosing. They did NOT deem it necessary or, even, desirable to have some of their trainees continue the same projects on which their mentors had worked. To do so would be selfish since it would prevent those mentees from pursuing their own creative, independent scientific pathways. In addition, it would not be the best use of NIH funds since the most important, forefront research areas change over time; outstanding junior scientists need to be free to establish their laboratories to tackle the latest, novel, new areas of research that interest them, not forced to continue the ones that made their mentors famous decades earlier. | To facilitate lab closure only, NOT to promote partnership with junior investigators who should be left free to pursue their own ideas if they are good enough to receive NIH funding. There are other mechanisms to acquire skills to transition to new roles; it is not appropriate to use NIH funding for this purpose. | To provide outstanding senior (i.e., age 65 and above) faculty whose medical research has been continuously funded by the NIH and other highly competitive federal sources (e.g., NSF, DOD) throughout the past three or more decades an inducement to phase out their research program. For example, they might be offered a 1-time $250,000-500,000 DC extension total to their currently funded NIH grant(s) in exchange for agreeing to never again submit a grant to any federal government agency as a PI, co-PI, Project Leader, or equivalent. Possibly, they might still be permitted to serve as a consultant or collaborator for a tiny percentage effort on grants P.I.ed by others, but no longer allowed to direct research projects. This final NIH funding could be used by these senior investigators as they deem most appropriate to assist them with the phasing out their research program over the subsequent 2- to 4-year period following the expiration of their currently funded government grants. They would no longer be eligible to apply for this cost extension after their current grants had expired, i.e., it could not be used as a backup plan after failure to obtain a competitive renewal. | See above comment 3 | ||||
131 | Stanford University | Of all the possible changes that could be made to the funding decisions of the NIH, and particularly in the current budget climate, this award mechanism seems very likely to do great harm to existing and future investigators and I have NO enthusiasm for it. Of all the future hopeful scientists I have talked to in my community, I have yet to find a single scientist who thinks that it is a good idea for the NIH to fund transitions for senior investigators. It simply should not be the responsibility or in the interest of the NIH to pay for this at the expense of existing award mechanisms or award mechanisms that would directly reduce the obvious bias towards established and senior investigators for NIH funding and fund younger investigators who have not already received millions of dollars from the NIH. | This award mechanism should not be created. It will take away funding from other award mechanisms. A better way to achieve transition funding for an emeritus faculty member is through the institution employing the emeritus faculty not from NIH funds. | This award mechanism is misguided and should not be implemented. | Instead of incentivizing senior investigators with a retirement buyout plan, the NIH should be funding younger, more innovative investigators that have not received the same chance as senior investigators. Universities should be hiring younger investigators (and they would if the NIH created greater opportunities for transitional grants for younger investigators). | Every senior investigator that would qualify for this program is already well established, received generous funding from the NIH, and continues to have the advantage of getting that money even as paylines decrease for everyone else. Either the NIH starts awarding grants based on merit adjusted for the bias towards established investigators and at the expense of innovative research or even more young investigators will leave careers in science for something better. | We are entering a period in which fewer than 15% of current postdocs across will have a shot at even making it to the point where they have a lab in academia. Less than half of these new labs will be competitive for R01 funding, especially during the first 10 years of that labs existence. The age distribution of R01 grants has very obviously increased with a generation riding on poor postdoc pay and false promises of a future in academic research. If greater opportunities for NIH funding for younger investigators at the graduate, postdoc, and young investigator level are not implemented now, the entire system of graduate and postdoc student labor will collapse and lead to a mass exodus of brain power. The NIH should not be in the business of funding retirements of senior investigators, that should be left to the University. Instead, greater efforts should be made to reduce the age bias in current award mechanisms and mechanisms to better support graduate students, postdocs, and young investigators should be made. | |||
132 | Brigham and Women's Hospital | Boston | I believe that this is a completely unnecessary use of NIH money. If a PI is a good PI then they will be training people throughout their career. They will be able to plan ahead to make sure that they step down or train replacements. This money should be focused on getting postdocs and graduate students trained for the jobs that a PhD itself doesn't train for. There are so many bright young minds, senior investigators need to move out of the way and let young scientist shine shine. | Facilitating laboratory closure and retirement only. | 1 year bridge funding to allow for postdocs and graduate students to find new laboratories to work in and 1 year of salary only funding for the PI to publish papers. | You would need to put a cap on the age a person can be to get an RO1 grant, then senior investigators would definitely use this funding mechanism. For institutions, I think having a mechanism to pay someone that is transitioning will allow for the institution to free up lab space, because a decision has been made. | There is a culture against retirement. Faculty who are planning on retiring will use this funding mechanism no matter what it offers, but I don't believe will encourage faculty to retire. | How will you assess these grants? I'm not sure how you will be able to fairly judge these grants. I suspect that they will all end up going to the top tier schools, when actually the lower tier senior faculty would actually benefit more from some bridge support. | ||
133 | Univeristy of Nevada Reno | Reno, NV | I was shocked at the negative response on the blog to this idea. I can only assume that a diverse workforce only applies to the young and not older scientists. As a woman over [ ] I take issue with the complaint that all persons using such a mechanism would be white males. Also the mechanism would remain in place for the young Turks to use, although they seem to think they will never age. | After almost [ ] years of NIH support I am now unsure (like many younger scientists) if I will be competitive enough to keep my lab open in this next round of submissions. I have already transitioned into a soft money position, eliminated teaching responsibilities, so if I do not get funded I will need to close my laboratory and I will have very little support or time to do it. I have thousands of frozen strains and plasmids I would like to either send to colleagues or other community repositories. Support for this in the form of a 6 month stipend for one technician and myself would solve this problem. If I do fail to get the independent funding needed to keep my own laboratory open one way that I could use my experience in science is if there were a mechanism to compete for a fellowship to support work in a funded laboratory. This could be something like a post-doc mechanism but would involve a little less bench work and a little more writing and experimental planning and like an independently funded NIH post-doc would not cost the funded laboratory anything (i.e. this would be a perk for the young Turks more than for the senior scientist!). A senior colleague in my field from Great Britain who retired early used such an award very effectively in his former student's laboratory for about 10 years! | 6 months of money for PI and technician to close down a long standing laboratory 2 year senior fellowship (funded like a post-doc). This could be a full or half-type position. Senior scientist would apply much as a postdoc does in conjunction with the funded (more junior) laboratory of her choice. | WHile in big cities there is probably no terrible loss when an active scientist retires since there are many other scientist around in the same field to fill the gap. However, in the small city and university that I am in, when/if I retire they will lose a unique resource. I currently help a number of the younger faculty who want to use systems that I am expert in. I am also quite useful in recruiting. FUnding even a small project would allow me (and others like me) to maintain this role. And not-with-standing the young Turk comments (on the blog) that old scientists that have lost funding cannot help younger scientists write a good grant--I doubt that after 40 years of getting good grant scores I will suddenly be unable to help because my current good score just missed funding. Junior faculty are always asking for my help in this. | I assume my name and location will not be published on any publicly available website. | |||
134 | Icahn School of Medicine at Mount Sinai | New York, NY | I think this is a brave idea. | The emeritus award can be used to provide opportunities for acquiring skills needed for transitioning to a new role. Science progresses fast. For junior faculty, there are generally some kinds of oversight committee out there. Not sure how helpful the partnership between a senior and junior investigator would be. | 2-year duration? | The percentage of senior investigators out of total investigators affects the overall indirect cost rate in medical schools. | School can get indirect cost from grants of senior investigators. | |||
135 | Zero interest. This is already possible under existing structure and indeed it happens all of the time. At any time the University can request a change from the older PI to a younger PI and maintain the original PI in some sort of reduced role. This has been going on for at least three generations of scientists in my department. There is no need for any additional special mechanisms. | This is not necessary and duplicative. The only possible useful thing would be to take already existing funding and somehow require the unwilling PI to start transitioning out. | One year. A junior faculty partner could be anyone not eligible for the Emeritus award itself. I recommend using it to bolster the Lost Generation of ~40-55 yr old scientists. | The only thing that can possibly work is some sort of heavy handed threat. Otherwise, this initiative is doomed to fail in the supposed primary goal. Older PIs who want to slowly transition can already do so. Those who are well funded and don't want to stop cannot be enticed by this. That leaves only the older folks who are losing their funding, don't want to simply retire and want one more handout. So this plan increases money to the older demographic. | Senior investigator will to participate is the first problem. There is no way to change that unless the NIH is willing to just say "no more" to them. Institutions, of course, are looking to maintain their IDCs with their high-probability proven PIs. | This is a spectacularly wrong-headed move on the part of the NIH. It is contrary to any notion of good investment in the future. It is contrary to the supposed project-based nature of meritorious grant review. It continues the long running war against the current crop of midcareer scientists. For goodness sakes, why don't you look to make life easier for the mid career folks for once? | ||||
136 | National Jewish Health/University of Colorado School of Medicine | DENVER | This award will take money away from mid career investigators of younger than 65. There are now mechanisms to help new investigators. If a mechanism will be created to help senior investigators, then there is no mechanism to help the mid career investigators. And it is counter productive since the age group is more productive. | it is not necessary. They will retire when they are unable to compete for funding. | this award will promote inbreed of scientists. For example, non tenture-track junior faculty in the senior investigator's lab will take over, reducing the opportunity for other well-trained postdoc to become junior faculty. | |||||
137 | University of Iowa | Iowa City IA | This is a fantastic idea. I have been developing such a plan for myself the past few years but have struggled with the best way to make this transition. I do not want to close my research unit. Rather, I want to recruit a person who can work with me for several years and gradually take over my program while becoming a successfully funded investigator. I have invested a great deal of effort the past 15 years to develop our research team. Our program funds scores of faculty and staff and I do not want to see our program discontinued. | My plan has been to recruit a mid-career clinical scientist who has demonstrated strong grant funding but perhaps little or no NIH funding. I currently have two RO1s (total funding about $14 million). My plan was to add this person on these grants while reducing my time. The problem is that if this happens, then my funding (and salary) would be reduced. An emeritus award that supported my salary and perhaps some of the new person's salary would be very welcome. This person would participate in all of the activities under my direction gaining experience conducting very large RO1s including data analyses and manuscript writing. They would assist me with mentoring junior faculty I currently mentor on K awards and research fellowships. During this phase-in, the individual would be expected to immediately start writing their own RO1s. That would give me several years to mentor the person so they can obtain federal funding before I fully retire. | I believe funding should be at least 3 years but perhaps up to 5 years. The junior faculty ideally should be a successful associate professor (already promoted and tenured) but perhaps an assistant professor in their 4th or 5th year with a strong likelihood of being promoted and tenured. They should have demonstrated success in obtaining grant funding as a PI. For me, the best case scenario would be someone with some success with NIH funding. However, I would be happy if this person had successfully supported a research career from other sources of competitive funding. | In my case, I want to recruit a person in my same discipline. We do not have an individual on our faculty who meets my criteria above and is willing to do such a transition. Therefore, I will need to recruit outside. I suspect that NIH would want both the senior and junior person very well defined (like in a K award). However, from the senior investigator and institutional perspective, it might be ideal to have a commitment from NIH for the money as an incentive for the junior person to accept the position and make a move. It might be very difficult to recruit a person on the hope that funding might be available later. NIH could hold the money until the person is hired and require strict reporting requirements to ensure the funds are being invested well. Institutions are very lean now but freeing up some salary for the senior and junior investigator (plus perhaps some start-up funds from NIH) might allow a university to find funds to move the junior person. | The biggest impediment in my case is finding a person with proper credentials who is willing to move. Mid-career individuals usually have family reasons that make a move very difficult. Using the incentives I mentioned above should help. | I certainly hope NIH moves forward with this program. I also hope that it happens soon enough that I am able to take advantage of this great idea. Thank you for the opportunity to comment. | ||
138 | U of Arkansas | Fayetteville, AR | This award makes no sense to me. In the chemical sciences, there is no senior/junior investigator combination running a research lab. Either a researcher is capable of running an independent lab or not. In any other field, it seems to me that if the junior investigator is successful in securing independent funding, there is no need for a transition grant. If the junior investigator hasn't been successful without the senior investigator, they probably aren't capable of running a lab independently anyway. | |||||||
139 | University of Louisville | Louisville | Many senior faculty, in my experience as a full professor for more than [ ] years, would enjoy and the research community profit from remaining active in research and teaching younger colleagues in their given area of research expertise. The pressure of applying many times yearly for NIH grants or contracts with a small percent of applicants only receiving these awards seems extremely unproductive and frustrating to many senior faculty as well as administrators at their institutions. Part time research and teaching after reaching emeritus or simply retirement age or status but funded by part time but long term support reviewed annually seems to me a reasonable and cost effective way to continue research funded by NIH or other institutions.This will allow turning over this research or helping stimulate interest and ability to perform other related research by junior faculty or students at the parent university or even at other institutions. | Collaboration with informal or formal instruction of junior faculty in specific research work or related research using new skills or simply adding new areas of exploration to junior faculty or students, residents,post docs or other researchers should provide more teaching and research by the emeritus awards keeping more faculty available to teach research activities to junior scientists, students or faculty. Retired faculty who disappear from an institution do nothing to increase depth and breath of mentors available at a given institution. Retired faculty require far less financial or other support, having this from their pensions or retirement funds, than do active and more junior colleagues. Older professors or researchers also may be expected to have less need for money to support children's educational needs and homes; these have usually paid for by retirement age. For modest resources, experience can be retained for a certain amount of time beyond usual retirement age-for many but not all retired faculty at a given institution. | More than one year is almost always needed for a research program or project to be conceived, initiated, data to be collected, analyzed and submitted for publication and revised according to a journals reviewer comments are addressed. The same holds to an extent for presentations at local, national or international meetings of scientists, the other major means of communicating new knowledge or methods. Two or three years to 4 or 5 years with annual review for renewal seem to me, based on over 30 years as a full professor, sufficient to train a new scientist in specific scientific research or research methods to allow the new student, junior faculty or faculty moving into a new scientific area to learn the skills needed to be successful in producing excellent research and be self sustaining financially within academia or other research institutions. | Making modest emeritus awards in direct funding for multiple years with sufficient indirect funding, but less than usual RO1 grants to the same institution, should provide financial incentives to increase interest from the administrators at a given institution and from individual researchers, many of whom will not wish to be active for many additional years. Relieving researchers of required institutional non research duties such as committee activities, will also increase productivity. | Universities have limited space, so this becomes a problem for many institutions. Working from a home office or an extremely modest shared office when this is a major demotion, working far from colleagues or students or with insufficient IT or library support can be an issue. Lack of health insurance at some institutions for part time faculty or other researchers can be another major problem. Some institutions have a policy, spoken or unspoken, of encouraging older faculty to leave. When there is obvious pressure against older faculty, as existed in a very overt fashion at my last university, after a number of years, it can and did for me become so very unpleasant that I felt the need to retire several years before my research projects, funded by NIH and foundations, were near completion. I believe this strong desire at some universities in certain schools or departments, is common in many research universities in the US. To me, it seems a major loss for junior faculty, students, residents post docs and others new the emeritus or retired professors if the skills, knowledge and institutional memory are absent. If worthy research, as indicated by NIH funding, publications in major journals, and by one's peers, end prematurely, it seems to this researcher that the previous NIH and other funding has not lead to any reasonable completion of a given line of inquiry. | Age discrimination is very common, especially at some research universities. Emeritus status is hard to obtain and requirements for this difficult to obtain position almost secret at some schools, including one where I retired under pressure within the previous 12 months. This seems to vary among research institutions, university or other. While adding new and young researchers and teachers is essential for future research to thrive, keeping the experience, knowledge, skills and wisdom of older professors and other researchers seem to me to be of value for our country thriving in innovative and excellent research. Additional training in new areas, such as computer, smart phone and pads may be useful to keep new skills up to date in older faculty. Such training should be an optional part of retaining older researchers who may be computer skills lacking but have excellent knowledge and skills in other areas. Some retired or emeritus faculty are forced to work from home offices and usually without support. Adding office space, communication ability and IT plus library support could be useful where these are not usually provided. | ||
140 | University of California, San Diego | La Jolla, CA | This is a great idea. It will allow a great number of established senior investigators to pass on their knowledge and expertise to junior scientists. | Just like you have described. Money for salary support for Emeritus Professor and modest budget for supplies/expenses plus travel to one meeting | Number of years- 5 yr max. I also insist that age limit for applying should be set at 70 yrs at least. Rigorous study sections reviews not recommended. NIH panel should entertain requests and make decision by taking into the criteria of previous continued funding and achievements. Just like the new biosketch has a section on contribution to Science should be the criteria and publication record. | Criteria, should be to encourage scientists at or beyond the age of 70 to apply for such awards. University should approve the Emeritus status. Scientists can also choose a location other than where they are at. Negotiated with the University or institute of their choosing. | I see none. Investigators at 70 or older should pave the way for new investigators to occupy their FTE. Lots of old scientists are just hanging around and not leaving FTEs. | Reiterate: Age 70 yrs beginning age to apply Salary support is necessary component, can be negotiable with the investigator or set by NIH (200K, maximum). Partial support for Junior faculty or senior postdoc (5 yrs beyond postdoc). | ||
141 | Columbia University | New York, NY | My concern is that there may be too much politics in choosing recipients of such an award. How would applicants be judged? Who will make decisions? I am also concerned that institution may not appreciate this type of award. More and more institutions are making research faculty members pay their salaries from extramural funds. Would an institution penalize a senior scientist who wants to phase out working on NIH-funded research. How would the institution come up with support for him/her in the absence of extramural funding. There are many important issues that need to be addressed regarding this type of potential award. | I'm not sure you need an award or money to facilitate closing a laboratory. As for transitioning to a new role, I fear that institution may not have many "new roles" for unfunded senior faculty. | Not sure. | Somehow come up with a mechanism that institutions must have more skin in the game and support both senior and junior faculty, especially with "hard money" salary lines. | See above. | None. | ||
142 | University of Alaska Anchorage | Anchorage, AK | To be honest, I am not interested. Senior people are either doing good science or they are retiring. This award mechanism is an affront to all other stated goals including diversity, support for young investigators, encouragment for new investigators, and prevention of the loss of a generation of scientists. | I don't think I'll be utilizing it. | Number of years of support: 0.5 | Answer #1 should reflect that I wouldn't want to incentivize the award. | I'm not a senior investigator nor am I an administrator, so I can't really answer. | This doesn't seem like a good idea. See #1. | ||
143 | Univeristy of Cincinnati | Cincinnati OH | I think the idea of "my last award" will only appeal to a small cadre of investigators. Active successful grantees won't need it or want it. Those who have been unfunded for a while will only infrequently be the type of folk that will excite review panels. This needs careful marketing, and I advise collaboration grants honed on transferring concepts/approaches that are disappearing but viewed as valuable (make a list....). | I would prefer these to work as a route to set up short and/or long collaborations to help both the senior and junior investigators. I would like to see senior investigators get these grants that provide travel and supplies for OTHER investigators to visit the senior laboratories to learn techniques/concepts/whatever. Maybe it could even supply $20K for equipment to take home, and a visit from the senior to help get methodology established in the new locale. During the duration of visits, the senior investigator (and their staff if any) could be supported up to 80%, but no money flows unless someone is visiting the lab from another institution (the grant application could include the list of collaborators who plan to visit the lab). If the NIH needs this to be a pre-retirement offering, they could prioritize applications from those who have a retirement letter included. | like a shared instrument grant, you could have the junior faculty "users" be those who are NIH funded at the time of the emeritus award activity. I think this idea should be loosened to avoid cutting out a group of mid-level investigators who are struggling to regain funding and need to re-tool. I would have the junior users be ones who have had active NIH funding in the past 5 years from the time of application. | require institutional commitment of lab space for senior faculty during the award (not unique, but a major threat to senior investigators). offer a discounted internal rate for using the grant as an institutional core facility to help local faculty within an institution benefit even more from it than outside investigators (e.g. supply extra funds to internal investigators who legitimately want to learn from the senior; I realize this is hard to keep from being abused...). Offer a reverse publication charge ($5000) for peer=reviewed articles where seniors and juniors can jointly publish methods in an NIH methods journal to immortalize the methods that are being passed on. | senior faculty hate to admit they are no longer strong active researchers if this is "the last grant", few will want to admit they are at that stage takes precious lab space pulls senior faculty from teaching role this will take ambitious seniors. Do we have that many? Can we make this some kind of prestigious heavy competition? | I applaud the implementation of something to support senior investigators, institutions trying to manage massive retirements, and the field which needs some retiring talents/methods | ||
144 | The Children's Hospital of Philadelphia | Philadelphia, Pennsylvania | I have no interest in this award existing. It further enriches long-established investigators. Transitioning out of a such a role requires no funding, and certainly not a special award. Plan for transition should be made the way any other investigator does so: as current funding is wrapping up, one prepares for the next position or retirement. | No comment. This award should not be implemented. | Specifics of the award should be: $0.00 per year for 0 years. | No comment. This award should not be implemented. | No comment. This award should not be implemented. | Restricting access to incredibly short supply funds to a small pool of near-retirement investigators who have enjoyed long-term success is an astonishingly bad, biased, and short-sighted use of funds. I find it appalling that this idea has been promoted to the point of an RFI. | ||
145 | Shepherd Center | Atlanta GA | As someone who will be thinking about retirement in the coming decade, I have often thought about what will happen to my laboratory after I retire. The opportunity to have support in mentoring a junior colleague to transition into new leadership would be of great value | In my case I would welcome the opportunity to acquire funding that would support my efforts during a time when I am mentoring a junior faculty to take over my role. | An award of 3 - 5 years would allow sufficient time to mentor a junior faculty into the leadership role. I envision the junior faculty to be someone with similar interests and a strong publication history in an area similar to mine | Funding that would provide salary support to the senior investigator, travel funds to consolidate collaboration, and funds for collaborative pilot studes to solidify collaboration would be of value | The institution may want some say in whether the junior investigator selected by the senior investigator is to become affiliated with the institution. There would need to be letters of support provided by the institition that demonstrate the junior investigator would have a role at the senior investigator's institution | |||
146 | Brigham and Women's Hospital | Boston, MA | I am curious about what support might be available for senior investigators who are energized to continue research, especially in collaboration with more junior investigators. As a [ ] in Cardiovascular Medicine here, I've had the honor of working for and with a brilliant investigator, who has also championed collaboration with multiple institutions and investigators representing multiple disciplines. Although he is now approaching "retirement age", he shows no signs of slowing down, nor should he, especially since he continues to collaborate with and mentor young investigators. I would hope there might be some way to support one such as this. | As mentioned above, I would be interested in finding ways to support a senior investigator who continues to collaborate with and mentor junior investigators -- he has also been an "outside the box" thinker (for example, my background was in the arts, but he knew that background included management of large collaborations, so he hired me to help coordinate his collaborative work in medical research). I wonder if there might be some way to support collaboration and mentoring that would be different from the standard "research project" model; something that would support a platform for discovery that wasn't necessarily centered on a specific project. A "discovery base" or something like that; and something that would also allow the senior investigator to gradually turn it over to junior faculty. | Continuing with the above (granted "broad" approach): One of the characteristics of the current "project" model that seems to be frustrating for many, is the lack of support for long-term research and growth. With the constant "hustle" for funding for one project after another (and the increasing administrative burden, which takes time and energy away from research), it puts so many investigators "at risk" of having to close down prematurely, which I've seen happen too often. Obviously, there will always be questions of budget priorities (and what Congress, and ultimately the Tax Payer is willing to support), but if there could be some way (perhaps seed grants?) to support a collaborative "discovery base" or discovery platform -- one that encourages collaborations between Senior and Junior investigators, especially "multi-disciplinary" or "outside the box" thinking; I think this could be especially useful, particular at this time in history where new discoveries and technologies change the research landscape rapidly. | With the above approach, funding would only be available for proposals that would demonstrate collaboration between both Jr. and Sr. Investigators as well as a multi-disciplinary approach. In addition, one would also need to demonstrate (in progress reports, at least) that Jr. Investigators are taking more of a leadership role. However, I do not believe it should necessarily show that Sr. Investigators are "stepping down", but they should be able to demonstrate that new investigators are continuing to be "discovered" and mentored (maybe with time frames similar to other training and/or career development awards). | Some impediments might include senior investigators who demonstrate an unwillingness to really let go and allow junior investigators to take the leadership role. But again, that could be addressed in progress reports, and renewal funding being withheld. An institutional impediment might include the inability to support additional faculty, especially if the institution has budget and space limitations. That question could be addressed in the initial proposals. | Again, I acknowledge that the above might be a bit vague, but I am hoping to find ways to support collaboration, growth and discovery that isn't necessarily project based. | ||
147 | some interest; it would have to be for a short time frame and only for meritorius faculty; a review mechanism would have to be in place; faculty that had already lost funding for 2-3 years should not be eligible. On the other hand, how many resources would this take away from younger faculty? Faculty who decide to retire should have been planning for the transition before the end of their last grant. | all good ideas | limit to 1 year; should provide limited personnel support specifically tied to closing the lab, cataloguing samples for submission to national resources or other investigators. it should not fund new research. | the award itself is incentive enough | limited NIH funds have already made funding difficult for early and mid career faculty. another targeted program for funding will take away from funding young investigators. junior scientists should be independent tenured faculty who want to expand their research program and not young faculty initiating an independent research program; mentoring will be crucial | I am not convinced that this is a worthwhile program. | ||||
148 | MIT | Cambridge, Mass | any new formula that results in maximizing return on past NIH investments in a particular project, laboratory or investigator should be on the table. | Laboratory closure is a difficult thing. It could very well be that making one final award with a ramp-down towards laboratory closure would be attractive, if competition for such awards would be less intense than for RO1 and other investigator-initiated applications. HHMI is an interesting model: senior investigators can forego a review and receive a final 5 year extension of their current funding: the end, with special provisions depending on membership in NAS etc. . Partnership between senior and junior investigators: this would seem a rather exceptional situation. Professional pride on the part of the junior investigator may collide with expediency ("easy money"?) | To make this attractive at all, it would have to be for a 5 year period, with a progressive decrease in funding. I would start it at the level of a Pioneer award, and finish at the level of an R21, so that total cost might hover around a typical RO1. Bear in mind that the purchasing power of the modular RO1 has decreased significantly since this mode of funding was introduced. | Examine the track record of NIH-funded investigators (number of publications, H-factor, academy membership (NAS, AAAS)). Pro-actively approach the top x% in terms of productivity and the top y% in terms of age bracket and have program officers perform a marginal review to determine eligibility. The likelihood of obtaining such an emeritus award would have to be sufficiently high to make it attractive to forgo other NIH funding opportunities. Another possibility would be to identify investigators in this posible category and suggest conversion of an RO1 application that missed the payline by x % into an emeritus award ("bonuspoints" as currently applied to ESIs). Focus on investigators >60 yrs old with ample non-NIH funding (HHMI) who hold more than a single RO1 and convert these into an emeritus award. | For this type of award to be attractive, the likelihood of success of an application would have to be astronomically high compared to alternatives. This will not sit well with ESIs if it turns out to be a zero sum game in terms of numbers of investigators funded. | It would be important to ensure that the number of senior investigators eased out of the NIH system would result in a measurable increase in the total number of NIH-funded investigators. | ||
149 | UNC-CH | Chapel Hill | I have been a leader in my two ares of research for > 40 years, but have been considering retirement due to the scarcity of NIH funding. I fully believe that priority in funding should go to those younger and more energetic than I. However, I remain as excited as ever about my research and have explored ways to work with younger investigators to offer what insights and help I might offer as a result of all my experience. As we age, while we lack the energy we had in our 40's, 50's and 60's, the knowledge we have contributed and have gained though many years of sponsored research should ideally not be lost. I am exploring alternative funding sources, but would be very interested in the possibility being considered. I applaud the NIH for recognizing this problem and discussing possible solutions. | I feel strongly that such a program should not reduce funding for younger investigators, so a way to fund this would have to be found. I might favor a requirement being that funding would be based on establishing a limited-time collaboration between junior investigators and the senior investigator that should further the transfer of knowledge and career of the young investigator. | There will be much disagreement over the detailed procedures for such an award. I think it should be for a limited duration, but with the possibility of renewal if the collaboration between beginning and more senior investigators is shown to be successful. I believe the funding should flow somehow to both, perhaps as a contract or some other structure associated with the beginning investigator's award. A beginning investigator might best be defined in terms of years since first NIH grant - years since PhD is clearly no longer a reasonable criterion. I would favor considering people who might be in the midst of their first renewal based on the argument that the primary purpose is to allow the experience of the senior investigator to pass on to the younger one; this can happen for several years after a first award. | I doubt that it requires much incentivizing from the perspective of the senior investigator; the ability to continue to contribute to biomedical science is plenty of incentive for me. Institutions are all different in how they deal with senior faculty. Medical schools or research institutes simply do not have funds to retain the presence and contributions of esteemed faculty who no longer have funding, so a stipend for the senior person should be a significant incentive. If the junior/senior collaboration was within the same school or institution (Medical or not), an incentive would clearly be the assisted provided to one of its junior faculty in launching their careers. Teaching schools would likely need some senior faculty funding to permit release time. In all cases, the program might be used to encourage institutions to offer faculty some sort of partial retirement with the senior person's stipend coming from his/her retirement plan, the institution, and the NIH. This would insure buy in from the senior investigator and the institution and spread NIH funds further. | I can't see few from the perspective of a senior investigator who would have the opportunity to continue to contribute to her/his field. The only one might be the need to go thru additional years of writing grant applications. The institutions should be expected to buy in financially to some extent, and this might be an impediment. It might be overcome by the benefits of having a valued faculty member/scientist associated with the institution longer. | I think that the two impediment mentioned above might be alleviated to some extent by making the process somewhat of a mutually beneficial partnership between all three stakeholders. Institutions should be willing to put up funds only for those faculty whose presence on campus would positively impact their mission. A researcher would presumably only apply if they were properly motivated because they would have some retirement funds in the game. The NIH, for its part, should set up a separate and expedited review procedure that would would be based on different criteria than those applied to R01s. | ||
150 | An additional mechanism to support the research of senior researchers is unnecessary. The only idea I would have sympathy for is supporting partial salary while a soft money PI weans down from multiple R01s to zero. I can imagine a situation where senior PIs keep applying for R01s because they're not ready to retire, but yet they need to support their salary. And if their salary has been spread across multiple grants for years, then they have extra incentive to keep renewing those R01s for longer than necessary. Let's face it, in the current (unfortunate) environment, these people have essentially been "employed" by NIH for their whole careers, so it's reasonable to expect that they wouldn't otherwise have a source of salary. But it is a bad idea to set aside money to support research of people who are already at a massive advantage for obtaining funding. Money would be better spent to benefit the pay lines of mid career folks who have to submit grants constantly to maintain their research. | If a person agreed to give up one R01, then a theoretical award could support 25% of their salary while their other grants wind down. I don't think these individuals should be allowed to hand-pick their successors. Junior faculty have a lot of good and tractable ideas of their own that should be funded competitively like everyone else. | It would have to be contingent upon giving up a portion of their research dollars, while other grants are still active. But they'd have to agree not to renew those other grants also (i.e. the award would be at most 4 yrs) | Salary support itself might be enough to incentivize senior investigators. Institutions are hungry for indirects, so I suppose the only thing that would help satisfy them is the guarantee that the research money is going back into the pool for younger PIs to compete for. | Institutions would rather have the investigator keep bringing in the big bucks, now that they're so good at it. | |||||
151 | University of Arizona | Tucson, AZ | A significant part of the issue is that NIH enables institutions to to put faculty in a position to derive most or all of their salary from grants and then allows indirects to be obtained on that salary. Thus incentivizing a system for administrators that takes away dollars from actual research. One step would be to limit PI salaries to no more than 40% of the cap on all NIH grants or remove PI salaries from IDC calculations. This would alter the dynamics of the transition near the end of career. That being said, there is some merit to create a mechanism to capture the expertise of senior investigators for the benefit of the new investigators. As a NIH funded investigator for most of the last [ ] years, I'm already utilizing the mechanism of the MPI grant to work with younger investigators. All my applications to NIH for the last 3 years have been MPI applications with younger colleagues who are trying to get their first NIH grant. While only one of these was funded, it was a useful experience for each colleague as I was able to show them some of the grantsmanship needed to prepare and submit an application. In one case, there was a concern that the MPI mechanism prevented the use of the ESI advantage and I served as a co-I instead. I'd suggest that the MPI mechanism could be used for the benefit of both the senior and junior investigator if a category of MPI was created that included both a senior investigator with a substantial track record and a tenure-track investigator under the age of 40. MPI applications in this category might be eligible for at least some of the ESI scoring benefit. | The emeritus award should be primarily for the benefit of getting younger investigators funded under the mentorship/partnership of senior investigators. It should enable the junior partner to learn grantsmanship, research skills, lab management and to network with the labs in the field. This could utilize the MPI mechanism to enable the transition by placing specific requirements to meet tan "Emeritus" subcategory including a MPI transition plan and requirements for experience by the senior investigator and status and age for the junior investigator. If these requirements are met, then scoring could use a version of the ESI bonus already in existence. If the upper age limit were 40, it would help shift the average age for a first grant down. The Emeritus designation should only be used in scoring, not in the final award, so that it does not become perceived as a remedial mechanism for the junior partner | The Emeritus MPI should require both a substantial track record by the senior partner and tenure track status and age limits (40?) for the junior investigator. There should be a limit of 15% effort for the senior partner and an MPI plan that details the transition of the research program. If these criteria are met, then some or all of the ESI scoring bonus could be available. There should be an upper limit on all NIH salary support for the senior partner (50%) so that he or she could mentor more than one junior faculty member but limiting so that the mechanism does not incentivize an extended late career for the senior partner. The normal 4-5 year grant period should be sufficient and it should be renewable by either the junior partner alone or (in exceptional cases) with the junior partner as the Contact PI. | If the Emeritus MPI category had some or all of the ESI advantage but limited the availability to tenure track junior partners with more than 50-60% institutional salary support for the period of the grant, it would require that the institution have a substantial commitment to the career of the investigator, not just an incentive to obtain IDCs for a limited grant period. Similarly, some requirement for substantial grant and study section experience by the senior partner would limit the award to those whose expertise would be most useful. The category should also require an explicit transition process identified in the MPI plan and limit the salary percentage of the senior partner so that it does not become an extended NIH-funded new career. | If the program is only eligible for promising tenure track junior investigators and senior scientists with a substantial track record, receipt of the award would be a feather in the cap for each partner and would have some desirability. It could be seen as similar to the K99R00 award but would avoid the issue of a young tenure-track investigator continuing to work with their postdoctoral advisor. If the proposal included some portion of the ESI scoring bonus, that might be sufficient incentive by itself. | I think that such a program can be valuable if designed carefully to enable transition of research projects and expertise. Avoid making it a program to support research institutions with little or no commitment to the investigators or the support of retired or semi-retired faculty as their institutions shed their salaries off to the NIH. | ||
152 | NYU Langone School of Medicine | New York, NY | Given that a mechanism (PI change) exists for changing roles on a grant, this is a solution in search of a problem. It is unfortunately all too likely that such a mechanism will create more problems than it solves. | Most likely, this would be used by senior investigators to exert control over the junior faculty they have selected to carry on their research aims. This will effectively continue the already too-long postdoc "training" period. | If it must exist, safeguards to prevent abuse are crucial: 1) the junior faculty member should not lose ESI status by participating. 2) the junior faculty member must be sole PI by the end of the grant 3) the senior faculty member should lose eligibility to gain new support (at least for the granting IC) once opting for "emeritus" status. | Give the emeritus award the ESI bonus available to the junior member. To reiterate, this would solidify this unnecessary mechanism as the boondoggle it is likely to be. | Senior investigators may not wish to participate if there are the restrictions placed in 3.3 (i.e. losing eligibility for new grants). | As a new investigator in the R00 stage looking to transition, I can't think of anything that would be more debilitating to my independence than to be beholden to the many senior investigators around me looking for one last hurrah. What is clear is that many of them have grants that are awarded because the study section is inclined to look favorably on the PI. Ultimately, I'm too new to say whether this is reasonable or not, but the same grant judged on its scientific merits wouldn't be scored, and this has gone on for the last decade or so. I'm hard pressed to see the need for this mechanism, inasmuch as PI transfer on an R01 is in place. | ||
153 | ucsf school of medicine | San Francisco, California | I am not sure why this is called an emeritus award is it implies retirement and a past functionality. I think the idea of transitional awards should focus upon bringing up Junior investigators as a function of more senior investigator passing on their resources. This this is something that would benefit Junyor investigators more and then senior investigators it seems to me. It also would have the positive virtue of maintaining resources that have been assembled over of years or even decades. | I think that this should focus upon the preservation of resources, including money, equipment, ongoing studies etc. this is for the benefit of science overall notches Junior investigators. I think that archiving of data for public research use is a highly valuable activity that should be incorporated into these awards. | frankly I would rename this to something else and emeritus award. Judging by the blogs on this this seems to be generated a lot of fury about underfunding of junior investigators. Having said that it seems to me that a maximum of five years would be more than adequate for any kind of transition, although this could be flexible.hey Junior investigator might be somebody who has already working with the originator of the study, maybe younger than that person, with documented work in the area of interest. | capping the salary of older investigators has already had A discouraging impact on maintaining older investigators continuing their work. This reflects a general negativity toward scientists that has grown over the past 10 years. perhaps NIH could given exemption to the salary cap for activities that involve the so-called emeritus transition.if the award could require the archiving and dissemination of resources including data, and there could be actual funding for this (as opposed to now), this not only would support past development of resources,it would broaden The population of scientists that my want to use it. | One blogger said that the merit award was actually a better program and I agree with that. Why was it better? It recognized the contributions of senior scientist over years of effort.it allowed them to maintain their resources and reach out to others for collaboration. The main impediment however will be that there will not be enough money for whatever is required. That seems to be the name of the game now. | I think this is a good idea but it also engenders the notion that older people she get out of the way. Is Kahana said there is extreme amount of ageism in the comments made by bloggers.why focus on older people? Why not focus on preservation resources developed by investigators? | ||
154 | Professor Emeritus, Johns Hopkins University and Garvan Institute of Medical Research | Sydney, New South Wales, Australia | I think the proposed emeritus program is brilliant. | I think that one of the major gaps in the transition from postdoc to junior faculty is a formal mentoring program. That is, not every junior scientist can find a senior faculty mentor who will guide him/her in academic politics, grant writing, manuscript writing, manuscript reviews, and public speaking. These tasks take a great deal of time and there is no material reward for the senior mentor. It is kind of like teaching--medical schools do not reward teaching; teachers reward themselves from a sense of satisfaction. It will be working with the junior faculty member. He or she won’t need advice on techniques. Rather, the key knowledge will be about how to present oneself in public seminars, how to form testable hypotheses, and how to communicate in writing. With the internet and Skype, mentoring can be conducted electronically and from a distance. Even to pay for a professional writer to serve as a “grant reader” will cost a researcher $120/hr and it isn’t clear how one justifies the cost or where the funds come from. I don’t think it can be charged off to a government grant. But a grant reader is different from a grant writer—the effective mentor will have knowledge of the field, suggest references, and have ideas on the subject: he or she must be a grant reader and a grant writer. This kind of skilled advice is hard to find and difficult to get in today’s environment. It is hard to find time to be a generous colleague because senior researchers have the same pressures as a junior researcher. It would be the responsibility of a NIH mentor (with an Emeritus award) to be available for these tasks. I think it is a great idea. I’ve been thinking about how to keep active when I retire from lab work, and have been investigating becoming a writing consultant for non-native English speakers. It would be preferable to work with American researchers on topics about which I know something but again, grants and universities have not made funds available for such services. All the grant writing seminars held at Hopkins were led by individuals with masters degrees and who never actually wrote an NIH grant. Plus, attending such a one-day seminar costs money. Listing to someone talk about grant writing is entirely different from having to write one and getting continuous and constructive feedback on the efforts. Grant writing requires multiple iterations. Knowledge is expensive and under-appreciated. Selection criteria would be the applicant’s record and there would have to be letters of support from a number of senior postdocs or junior faculty who have been mentored by the applicant. These letters of reference would require a rating on a list of activities (e.g., grant writing, budget planning, manuscript preparation, politics, manuscript/grant reviewing, public speaking, interviewing research assistants, etc.). The recipient of an Emeritus Award might be assigned to work with five (5) junior faculty in their field of research. So each Institute would have its own set of Emeritus Awardees working in that specific field. | I think the award will require a minimum of 2 years to assess progress. Is the Awardee sufficiently motivated to make the program successful? The definition of a junior partner would be self-regulating; the partner would “apply” for a mentor through the same scheme. The partner would write a personal statement about what his/her needs are. That way, recognized experts in the field would be paired with young scientists with similar interests who might have even be familiar with the mentor’s work. One would have to track improvements in grant scores and manuscript publications. Learning to be a successful faculty member takes time. | The problem is how to measure success. In teaching, there is a wide range in quality, personality, and outcomes—is simply passing the course adequate? Given the low rate for successful grants, grant awards is a rather high bar to measure success. So a “commission” program won’t work unless the success yields a huge reward because there is bound to be early failures. The point, however, is that by working with a junior faculty member over a period of several years, there will be a good chance for success. Measurable outcomes might be grant scores and signs of improvement with subsequent applications. Or improvement in their teaching evaluations. Success of an awarded grant could be acknowledged by the host institution contributing a portion of the grant’s indirect costs to the NIH emeritus program and as a bonus to the mentor. | I think for the emeritus program to be practical, the senior investigator has to be retired from lab work. If the senior faculty has the same pressures as the junior faculty, I don’t see how that person will be able to devote full attention to being a mentor for someone else’s research. It will be difficult enough to find good mentors as it is. There is also the reality of how receptive the junior faculty member will be to having someone advise. So many young people are focused on being independent that they have a tough time accepting help. It makes them feel dependent. I’ve run into this with postdocs who feel humiliated by criticism by the senior faculty. Everyone wants to be clever and successful and feel that they made it on their own—the rugged individual. Can the senior advisor “advise” and then step back to let his/her advisee bathe in success? Regardless of the potential obstacles, I think the program would be important. | |||
155 | University of Minnesota | Minneapolis, MN | It is a good idea, but I suspect many senior investigators don't know when is the time to give up or to transition in a truly mentorship way. In addition, it would be difficult for the junior investigator to separate themselves as independent from the senior investigator. However, I think it is a great idea to utilize invested resources/labs to continue the research. | To promote utilization of existing resources to support and develop junior faculty and to help them acquire the skills to take the existing resources in a new direction | junior faculty - not yet R01 funded or perhaps on their 1st R01 and need a lab basis years support - about 5 | provide more support as the junior investigator becomes more successful | Institutions are worried about loss of a "proven investigator" to someone new who might not have the same track record Senior investigators are unwilling to admit that it is time to go | Consider that transitioning to a a team of junior investigators, rather than just one, so that a group can capitalize on the existing resources of the senior investigator. | ||
156 | University of Miami Miller School of Medicine | Miami, Florida 33136 | I was delighted to read of NIH’s interest in establishing some form of “emeritus” award for senior investigators to pass on/sustain the research capability of their laboratories. Nearing [ ] years of age, I personally would like to institute a gradual transition from Principal Investigator to “Significant Contributor” for continuing studies with our research team where my 50+ years of professional and scientific experience could assist junior investigators in assuming responsibility for their own R01s. Unfortunately there is no formal mechanism to accomplish this as of this writing Before making a few suggestions in support of such a mechanism, let me briefly mention my own background. I spent nearly 20 challenging and rewarding years at NIH as a [ ] at NHLBI, developing a program of “biobehavioral” research in the prevention and control of cardiovascular disease. During my last years at NIH (1987-91) I completed an MPH at Johns Hopkins University School of Hygiene and Public Health, stimulating a career-shift from cardiovascular to HIV/AIDS research. I established a biobehavioral research program in this area at the University of Miami Miller School of Medicine, which has been consistently funded by NIH over the past 20+ years. During this period, I have mentored many junior (and senior) faculty as well as medical students, Residents and Fellows from many fields of medicine in developing R23s, R21s, R03s, Diversity supplements, in preparation for submitting R01s. I served as [ ] for Research from 2002-2009, establishing a formal research mentoring program in my department. I also was [ ] of the Mentorship Committee of the CFAR at UMMSM. One of the major challenges was trying to get senior PIs to set aside the time to provide substantive mentoring experiences to more junior researchers because of the time commitment involved. When mentoring was added as a criteria for academic promotion, things improved somewhat, but the pressure to keep fully funded continued to make writing R01s their top priority. I also served on an IOM committee which highlighted mentoring as the most important determiner of success for the fledgling scientist. | I feel a special responsibility to all of my research colleagues to continue to support my and their research activities, but also feel the need to shift into a more formal mentoring/ support role, rather than continuing to be “the PI”. If such an “Emeritus” award was to be established by the NIH (and I was successful in competing for such an award), it would allow me to systematically transfer the leadership of my research program as well as to provide substantive support to aspiring younger colleagues in their efforts to become independent scientists. It would also establish a "standing" within the institution through which one could offer seminars or workshops on "Grantsmanship 101"- type topics (grant writing, how to navigate the NIH bureaucracy, application preparation, etc.) | 1) One (non-renewable) award for five years 2) Limited to 50% effort (with possibility of matching funds from institution?) 3) Applicants should have a record of consistent NIH support 4) Application should include a timeline for transfer of program leadership 5) Application should include a detailed proposal as to how their mentoring activities would be structured 6) Yearly progress reports would be the basis for continued funding and would detail mentorship accomplishments of the past year plus a future plan for the coming year Obviously this list is hardly exhaustive. One admittedly self-serving suggestion would be to include international studies (much of my current work) as HIV/AIDS research could certainly benefit from supporting/mentoring host country researchers in their prevention and control investigations. | One additional comment concerning incentivizing would be to revive (from the 70s) the practice of providing (typically) three months terminal salary support for research staff if a study (or laboratory) is to be closed down due to lack of renewal funding. | [N.B: My apologies: I wrote the letter before I saw your format. I'm attaching the letter here in case the division into "Comments" does not work] I was delighted to read of NIH’s interest in establishing some form of “emeritus” award for senior investigators to pass on/sustain the research capability of their laboratories. Nearing [ ] years of age, I personally would like to institute a gradual transition from Principal Investigator to “Significant Contributor” for continuing studies with our research team where my 50+ years of professional and scientific experience could assist junior investigators in assuming responsibility for their own R01s. Unfortunately there is no formal mechanism to accomplish this as of this writing. Before making a few suggestions in support of such a mechanism, let me briefly mention my own background. I spent nearly 20 challenging and rewarding years at NIH as a [ ] at NHLBI, developing a program of “biobehavioral” research in the prevention and control of cardiovascular disease. During my last years at NIH (1987-91) I completed an MPH at Johns Hopkins University School of Hygiene and Public Health, stimulating a career-shift from cardiovascular to HIV/AIDS research. I established a biobehavioral research program in this area at the University of Miami Miller School of Medicine, which has been consistently funded by NIH over the past 20+ years. During this period, I have mentored many junior (and senior) faculty as well as medical students, Residents and Fellows from many fields of medicine in developing R23s, R21s, R03s, Diversity supplements, in preparation for submitting R01s. I served as [ ] for Research from 2002-2009, establishing a formal research mentoring program in my department. I also was [ ] of the Mentorship Committee of the CFAR at UMMSM. One of the major challenges was trying to get senior PIs to set aside the time to provide substantive mentoring experiences to more junior researchers because of the time commitment involved. When mentoring was added as a criteria for academic promotion, things improved somewhat, but the pressure to keep fully funded continued to make writing R01s their top priority. I also served on an IOM committee which highlighted mentoring as the most important determiner of success for the fledgling scientist. I feel a special responsibility to all of my research colleagues to continue to support my and their research activities, but also feel the need to shift into a more formal mentoring/ support role, rather than continuing to be “the PI”. If such an “Emeritus” award was to be established by the NIH (and I was successful in competing for such an award), it would allow me to systematically transfer the leadership of my research program as well as to provide substantive support to aspiring younger colleagues in their efforts to become independent scientists. It would also establish a "standing" within the institution through which one could offer seminars or workshops on "Grantsmanship 101"- type topics (grant writing, how to navigate the NIH bureaucracy, application preparation, etc.) Having said all of the above, a few suggestions: 1) One (non-renewable) award for five years 2) Limited to 50% effort (with possibility of matching funds from institution?) 3) Applicants should have a record of consistent NIH support 4) Application should include a timeline for transfer of program leadership 5) Application should include a detailed proposal as to how their mentoring activities would be structured 6) Yearly progress reports would be the basis for continued funding and would detail mentorship accomplishments of the past year plus a future plan for the coming year Obviously this list is hardly exhaustive. One admittedly self-serving suggestion would be to include international studies (much of my current work) as HIV/AIDS research could certainly benefit from supporting/mentoring host country researchers in their prevention and control investigations. One additional comment concerning incentivizing would be to revive (from the 70s) the practice of providing (typically) three months terminal salary support for research staff if a study (or laboratory) is to be closed down due to lack of renewal funding. Please feel free to contact me if I can be of any additional assistance in supporting this initiative | |||
157 | Tufts University School of Medicine | Boston, MA | Other mechanisms exist by which senior investigators can secure their retirement. Successful senior investigators are a valuable resource for junior researchers. Should the senior investigator be interested in being engaged in research/academia at the age of retirement, the Institution should provide a way of doing so, for example by giving them the possibility of teaching undergraduates or graduates. | I don't see the need for an emeritus award since it is expected that the senior investigator would have 1) secured retirement, 2) planned laboratory closure, 3) mentored junior investigators and facilitated them with knowledge/experience/guidance to secure their own funding, throughout the last years of his career. | NIH money should go to funding more RO1 grants for junior researchers. | |||||
158 | UCLA | Los Angeles, Ca | Senior PIs have typically had decades to "transfer" their expertise to mentees, if they haven't done it by now, they won't do it with an emeritus grant. If you intend to increase funds available to less senior PIs, make a financial cap on the total size of fudging award(s) your target "emeritus" PI can receive. If the emeritus PI is sincerely interested in guiding their people into independent careers, they can mentor that person into getting their own R01, R21 or other. Giving them any money to stay adds to the incentive to stay and increase pension pay outs. | The money should be used solely to advance the careers of a junior person under their mentorship. It should not be available as salary or supplies for the PI but should only be given with the emeritus PI as a collaborator with the PI as a junior member of the lab. | The emeritus award, if it goes through, should include penalties for those that do not transition to retirement, as well as penalties to the university because we all know finances drive university decisions and providing additional funds to someone who has clearly retained funding only gives them a bigger stick. Junior faculty partners should be post-docs or higher (but not a tenure-track faculty) in the emeritus PI's lab that is trying to get a tenure-track position. There should be a detailed written plan with milestones of how that junior member will establish independence during the tenure of the grant. If the award is made for more than 1 year, the amount of the award should decrease annually if the milestones aren't met. | I don't think this should be incentivized, or considered as a serious use of NIH funds. | Eligible PIs don't want to retire because of pension interests and the desire to remain intellectually active. Many are not productive although some are. The universities should transition them from a tenure track lab head to a teaching or other position and not provide additional funding for research. Period. | Stop the "old boys network", this proposal seems to blatantly encourage funding people that are already connected and have had a full career. | ||
159 | University of New Mexico Health Sciences Center | Albuquerque NM | We have strong interest in NIH developing an emeritus award as articulated. We believe there should be a requirement for NIH funding of senior investigators to transfer awards to junior investigators during the period of award. | Emeritus awards should be utilized to ensure continuation of outstanding scientific investigation while promoting the career development of junior faculty. | A junior faculty partner should be defined as a non-tenured assistant professor. Two years of support for the transition would appear appropriate. | Senior investigators would be given committed time in which to mentor and transfer leadership, staff and overall project organization to the junior faculty partner. | There should be a requirement that senior faculty move to retirement and emeritus status at the end of the award. Emeritus status typically comes with more benefits that just retirement. | |||
160 | Minneapolis, MN | From the online discussions I have read, there seems to be very little community interest in this. I personally do not think it is necessary, given that there is already a way for this to happen: transitioning current grants to new PIs is very common and seems to work well for transferring the legacy of a research project to younger faculty in the senior investigator's field/department. | As above--there is no need for an emeritus award to do this. Senior investigators with longstanding funding already do this with junior or at least less senior faculty in their institutions. | The only people who are incentivized for this are the senior investigators who do not currently have active NIH funding (since those active awardees are able to transition using existing processes). That is not a very useful demographic to target. | Funding diverted to this program would affect other, more active investigators' likelihood to get funding--which would ultimately be more damaging to institutions than just phasing out the research programs of retirees using the strategies they already use. | There is just no justifiable rationale for this program during a time when money is so tight and it's hard enough to even fund all of the outstanding proposals coming in from investigators at all levels with long careers ahead of them (as long as they can get support). If a senior investigator has current funding, they have no need of some additional award to transition it--the mechanisms for doing so exist. If the senior investigator does not have current funding, it is likely that it is because they were not remaining competitive in the difficult funding environment and they have probably already begun to wind things down (often with the support of their institution). This program would be redundant and focused on a demographic that has already had decades of favorable treatment and privilege--in light of the recent data on minority disparities in funding rates, there are FAR better places to put funds than into an emeritus award. I will be extremely disappointed in NIH leadership if this program moves forward. | ||||
161 | This is likely to be a very valuable resource with minor costs, similar to the impact of the Loan Forgiveness Program for Clinical Investigators has had at the other end of the pipeline. | There are two valuable uses: 1) Promote partnership between a senior and junior investigator; 2) Promote merging the investigator's laboratory into a larger unit in order to expand the larger unit's team's breath of research activities by acquiring technical expertise and ideas that have been developed in the investigator's lab. This would be particularly useful if for example the investigator's lab was primarily related to bench research and the investigator's lab could be merged with a larger unit that is focused on human based research. The team concept would also increase the likelihood that the individuals mentoring skills would be effectively used. While facilitating lab closure may be useful, it would terminate the knowledge base and skills present in the lab. It also would be useful to provide opportunities for the investigator to acquire new skills in his new role, e.g., take business school or management classes if the investigator is transitioning to an administrative position. | 1) Based on other types of individual awards, most specifically represented by NIH's K series, 2-3 years would be minimal. 2) The individual will need documented evidence that mentoring is part of their legacy similar to the K 24 awards. 3) The individual will need documented NIH grant support for at least 20 years.While documented support from industry and foundations are useful, it is the documented NIH support that generated the technical expertise and knowledge base that should be supported by this program. More years of support would be too restrictive and fewer years too loose. 4) A junior investigator would need to be a faculty member that no longer qualifies for the "new investigator" category. This individual should have grant support on his/her own from government, foundations or industry and have a trajectory in publications, promotions, other activities (e.g., NIH review groups, journal leadership) that bodes for continued success. The junior investigator should also be in a closely aligned field so that the expertise to be acquired can be accomplished smoothly. 5) If the lab is to merge into a "team" program, the team needs to be broad based enough to effective utilize the new expertise and technical skills. Also the team should consist of enough fellows, students and junior investigators so that there would be many opportunities for mentoring. | Most effective is time and money. Using the NIH K-24 as a model, a minimum of 50% NIH cap salary and fringe would be required for a minimum of 50% time committment for two years. Dropping the support to less than 50% will not provide enough incentive as has been documented by those categorical institutes that reduced their support to 25% with an accompaning reduction of applications. The instiution will need to provide office and secretarial assistance. If you require the institutions to put up some salary money unless the institution is transitioning the individual to an institutional administrative position, I think the program will fail. | The greatest impediment for the institution would be a requirement that it needs to provide financial support for individuals that are primarily going to perform mentoring and transitioning. If such is required, I think the program will be dead on arrival except for those individuals whom the institution wishes to transition into an administrative role. Furthermore, if that is the case, I do not think that an emeritus award should be used to support this transition, it should be solely the institution's responsibility. For the investigator the greatest impediment is likely the time commitment. With many other opportunities potentially available to him/her, the award needs to be structured with as few strings attached as possible, with sufficient salary and time support but not so much time required to impede the investigators participating in other non-research activities. | Strongly encourage you to go ahead with this award, but judiciously structure it. | ||||
162 | Uniformed Services University of the Health Sciences | Bethesda, MD | For several years, I have suggested to Program officers and at least one Institute Director the concept of a LAST award (you can make up your choice for the acronym, but I meant "Last Award for Scientific Transition"). I prefer LAST to Emeritus. We had a FIRST award decades ago, but we need to find a way to achieve the transition to younger awardees without giving any edge to either party. . Basically, senior scientists would indicate that if awarded, they could not be a PI (or co-PI) again. Period. The award could be transferred to a younger colleague within the first four years of this award. I called it an R65 (or R70), but when transitioned to the successor, it would have to be renewed as a competitive RO1 but does not change the PI status on the NI. The former PI can still be a mentor but would not have the responsibilities associated with PI status and can transition to retirement if so desired. That would between that PI and his/her institution (and their 401K, I guess). P.S. I won't address Indirect costs, but that is really the heart of the funding problem that only OMB can tackle. They should reduce indirect costs on second and third RO1's: this has led to this expansion of an unsustainable enterprise and greed for the medical research institutions in the US. | To transition to junior investigators and allow senior PI's to mentor and enhance research without being a PI | 5 years, designate transition to junior PI (this is an OPTION not a requirement) by year 4. This could be the LAST award to this senior PI without a transition. | Funding based on peer- review at regular study sections with no extra points for senior PI. No incentives are necessary: the PI should want to transition. The junior PI, if designated, would not lose new PI status when applying for renewal from R65 to RO1 | Universities want the indirect costs and reputation. Multiple indirect costs are really the heart of the funding problem that only OMB can tackle. They should reduce indirect costs on second and third RO1's: this has led to this expansion of an unsustainable enterprise and greed for the medical research institutions in the US. The junior PI, if designated, should not lose new PI status when applying for renewal from to RO1 | Bruce Alberts said it all several years ago when he was Editor of SCIENCE. Please re-read and send to all Federally funded institutions. | ||
163 | Purdue University | West Lafayette | This is an excellent idea. | This should be broadened to include transitioning to administration (department head, dean, etc) or other type of position that would support multiple faculty, not just one. The junior investigator idea is worrisome because it is geared to only one person and is likely to create academic nepotism. There is already a severe bias towards investigators with specific academic family trees showing training in famous laboratories. This narrows scientific progress by focusing hiring and funding on a select set of ideas and models. Wouldn't it be better to support senior faculty that want to mentor a group, rather than train a junior version of themselves? | A minimum of 10 years of NIH support and a history of training students and postdocs to launch their careers. | Would this be compatible with phased retirement programs? This should be checked. | ||||
164 | SUNY Downstate | I have previously expressed categorical opposition to this idea, which is in my view nothing more but providing an already privileged group with a cushy retirement on taxpayer money. I have given some thought to what other comments I would have to make - please see below | Dear NIH I feel it is very important that you start considering what goes into the making of good science and act accordingly. No major scientific discovery has been made by people who behave as administrators - ie, they direct the work from their comfortable office chairs, while the real work is done in the lab by someone else. The system currently in place is akin to medieval guild, in which the postdoc or grad student or research scientist is basically indentured to the PI - in some cases even after they leave the lab. If a project ends up well the credit is taken by the PI, if the project fails the blame is assigned, in increasing order, on the postdoc, grad student and tech. These three last categories are cynically treated as disposable - and the comments I witnessed across my career coming from established PI's are a disgrace to our profession. The issue for may of these people seems to be how to extract as much as they can from their lab and take credit for work that they've only vaguely contributed to beyond paying salaries. Because PI's have so absolute power over the careers of the people working under them, no conflict of interest and contribution declaration that has to be done to NIH or journal will be secure from undue interference. The system needs to be revamped massively. Fresh ideas and fresh faces are desperately needed. Not only that you have to ensure that PI does not become a for-life position, self-maintaining just in virtue of how the system assesses credit and support - you need to make serious changes so that the credit for the work done in the lab is more justly divided. One strategy is to tighten up the overview of the grant post-award. It's so hard to get a grant past review, and yet afterwards nobody seems to be concerned with what happened to the work proposed. I know of a case with 3 NIH grants for example who hasn't published one paper from own lab in the past 3 years- nobody notices something this obvious? What happens to the postdocs and grad students- have they been mentored adequately, have they been compensated for their efforts, have they been supported in their career choices, or they've been used as cheap labor and left to bang their head against the wall in the lab with their project - good if they finish, and under the bus if they don't? For as long as science continues to be treated as an administrative rather than investigative enterprise, huge quantities of money will be wasted with no results. What drives scientific inquiry is genuine curiosity - this is the fuel behind perseverance, hard work, and ingenuity that underlies any important discovery. This cannot be measured in blind count of publications (many in fact being 'collaborations' in which the person manages to sneak their name on the author list without much contribution), or in how the work reproduces what we already know - this pertains very directly on how innovation is assessed by the review panels. These sort of people spend their time in the lab, working on the problem directly - because that's where their interest is truly, and this is where ideas come from. And the problem is, the more senior someone becomes, the less likely is to do research themselves, or come up with something genuinely new. The profile of people who can significantly advance knowledge do not include the characteristics of individuals whose primary concern is climbing the ladder, money, fame, directing the world from the chair, and the rest of deviant behaviors that we witness today in academia. You hold the strings of the purse, you have a lot of power in stopping the destructive dynamic that is currently taking place. Thank you for consideration. | |||||||
165 | University of California, Irvine | Irvine, CA | it is a good idea | to sustain the good research work in the lab without worrying the fund issue | at least 10 years for a full time faculty with good and consistent track record in research; junior faculty could be non-tenured senior researchers in the lab who can continue guide the daily operation of the lab. | awards can cover overhead expenses (like office administrative expenses, lab space charges) and this allows school to retain faculty without having to pay for the daily expenses. | age may not be an issue to some senior investigators while some young ones have lost the competitive edge/interest once they obtain tenured position | |||
166 | University of Washington | Seattle, WA | Funding for mentoring is a good idea, and active research is often an important component of mentoring. It is not clear that the funding for mentoring needs to be tied to a transition to emeritus status though that can be one direction. Mentoring from faculty who are truly retired may not be light mentoring. | The Senior Scientist Research and Mentorship Award (K05), which is no longer active, was used by several institutes and seemed to work well at the NCI. | ||||||
167 | University of Hawaii | Honolulu, HI | I think this is an excellent idea. | One idea would be to provide funds to allow investigators to prepare manuscripts. Many investigators have data that has not been completely evaluated and published. Today, the cost of publications in many journals is ~$1,250 to $2,500 / manuscript. If a senior investigator prepares manuscripts after the previous grants are completed (i.e., funds are not longer available), they have to either 1) not submit the MS or 2) pay for the cost of publications out of their own pockets. Thus, having a small grant to cover data analysis (statistical support), preparation of figures (e.,g., annual cost of GraphPad, SAS, or other statistical programs), and publication fees would encourage senior investigators to publish all of their research results (that the NIH and other sources funded). | Would recommend they be for 5 years to allow senior investigators to complete all aspects of their previous studies. | See 2 above | ||||
168 | Johns Hopkins University | Baltimore Maryland | The logic behind this award, and indeed its necessity at all, is unclear. Giving more money to late-career investigators is supposed to facilitate the closing of their labs? Furthermore, there is already a mechanism for PIs to transition their grants to other PIs - the exact thing that would facilitate a senior scientist winding down his lab. This award would likely further reduce the already limited funds for R, K, and F mechanisms, and likely further increase pressure on young investigators, who are struggling to establish research programs. The proposal, in general, appears rather tone deaf to the funding problems facing many researchers. | |||||||
169 | SRI International | Menlo Park, California | As a [ ] year-old, NIH-funded investigator (now and for the last 35 years), I feel competent to respond to these issues. Failing continued research funding (I have a grant currently under review), I would be very interested in a program that allowed me to transition from active research to advising more junior investigators with respect to A) what needs to be done in my field, and B) how to get money to do it. | The fact that a senior investigator warrants emeritus status presupposes that he/she has had a productive laboratory that has made significant contributions to biomedical research. Does NIH want to lose, when such people retire, all the laboratory's expertise and resources? And shall we send out all the junior investigators in the lab to start from scratch--assuming they can find a job? As a [ ] year-old PI, I can attest that the end of ones career comes infinitely more quickly than was ever considered, and that virtually no PI whom I know has planned adequately for it. We do, therefore, very much need at least a year to begin transitioning the lab--giving the supporting players a chance to lead, as well as to garner documentable evidence that they can do so. I could list about 20 areas that should be delegated, but the bottom line is to set a deadline and mentor the transition. | An emeritus award should require significant contributions to the field. This is always difficult to measure (e.g., do 5 publications in Nature/Science/PNAS equal 100 publications elsewhere?). Such selections should therefore be made by qualitative evaluations, and by a selection committee consisting of major players in each field. | The awards need not be for millions of dollars, but they should nonetheless be highly publicized and given appropriate status and a lofty title. For example, you might call the recipients "NIH Emeritus Faculty" and give them some modest role in NIH decision making. | Many, many institutions are reluctant to accept awards that provide less than full indirect cost reimbursement. NIH traditionally does not provide full indirect cost reimbursement for salary-only awards. One can argue the merits of each position, but if NIH wants this to be a prestige program, it will recognize reality. | Although the authors of this questionaire will doubtless resist any such criticism, the OBVIOUS fact is that the only thing that has been considered here is how to get senior investigators off the stage in the quietest, most efficient manner possible. Did anyone of you consider that some of us old people might actually have something yet to contribute scientifically? Where, in this document, are questions about what we have yet to do as scientists? Have you taken a look at the average age of most of the Nobel Laureates in biomedicine? While it is true that, after nearly 50 years in the business, I am tired of the NIH grant-getting rat race, I am by no means tired of science! I have spent a great deal of time learning my trade, paying my dues in endless study sections, and figuring out what really needs to be done in my field. In gratitude, you have sent me a questionaire about how best to shut down. How about, you've been an extremely productive scientist for many decades and have given great service, and, to thank you, we'd like to give you, unfettered, a modest grant by which you can take your last shot at making a major discovery in your field. For the sake of science, if not simple fairness, that's what you should be asking. Maybe a couple of people who authored this presumably well-meaning but misbegotten document sport some gray hair. Nonetheless, it doesn't excuse its blatant and offensive "ageism". | ||
170 | University of Washington | Seattle, WA | I think this is an excellent idea. An emeritus award could allow senior investigators to continue contributing to biomedical research without having to carry the bureaucratic load of running a lab. The charms of managing staff personnel, writing staff performance reviews, complying with the ever-increasing regulatory demands for animal or human subjects, environmental safety, occupational health, biosafety, etc. lessen with the passing years! But the fun of doing research remains. | Promoting partnership between senior and junior investigators seems like a clear winner for all parties. Junior faculty benefit from the decades of experience that their senior partners have to offer, and the senior investigator gets to keep his/her hand in research without the burdens of running a lab. What's not to like about this arrangement? The award could provide partial salary support for the senior investigator, perhaps on a sliding scale depending on the % effort. As a transition toward emeritus awards, I think it's worth considering awards based on past productivity for senior investigators. Having sat on many grant review panels over the years, it sometimes seems a waste of effort to make established and still productive senior investigators jump through the same hoops of providing detailed experimental protocols that is expected of junior PI's who still have to prove themselves. When NIH still did site visits, I recall participating in a review of a senior PI who was a National Academy member and a leader of his field. One of the other reviewers objected that the PI didn't provide enough detail on what controls he would use, and this evoked a withering comment "I am Dr. XX YY... do you seriously think that I don't know how to use controls?" It was an awkward moment for all of us. He had a point. The alternative of providing opportunities for acquiring new skills is attractive, but it's not clear how realistic this is. As a step toward | Perhaps 3 years of support with the option to renew? Not sure it's a good ideal to commit to 5 years at the most senior levels! Junior faculty partners could be defined as within 12 years of their initial appointment as an assistant professor. | The salary provided in the award should be enough to fully or partially offset the salary reduction that would result from not having an R01. For faculty with 9 month appointments, this might be equal to 2 months of summer salary. For research track faculty this might be 50% of the salary they received from R01. To incentivize insititutions there should be some indirect cost, though perhaps at a reduced level. To avoid the emeritus award being a drain on the junior investigator's budget, the emeritus award should include some reasonable amount for supplies. | A significant reduction in salary from giving up an R01 program would be a deal-breaker for senior investigator. The reduction in bureaucratic demands is worth a lot, but there is a limit to its monetary value. Institutions will not be happy if they lose all of the IDC previously brought in by senior PI. Some IDC would have to be part of the emeritus award. | I hope this initiative comes to fruition. | ||
171 | I believe there is very little interest is such an award. Senior faculty should consider transitioning to other activities or retiring, but this is an issue that should be handled by such investigators and their institutions. NIH has no role to play other than those available through existing grant mechanisms such as the use of co-PIs and changes in PIs (approved by NIH). | None of the above. The only potential use of such an award is encouraging transitions from those who are reluctant to do so, but it is not clear how this could be accomplished. | If such an award were created (and, again, it should not be) the maxium duration should be 2 years and no junior faculty partner should be involved. The award could be used as a trade-in, that is, changing an existing grant to this transition award with increased flexibility but no additional funds. | This is one of the major flaws with this proposal. It is hard to see how such an award would be used except as a supplement to existing funding. Of course, if additional funding were available specifically through such an award, both investigators and institutions would be interested. | Some questions that may reflect impediments: Could investigators who received such an award be barred from applying for additional funding as well? How could this be implemented without age discrimination issues arising? | This is a very bad idea. NIH does have a potential role to play by highlight strategies for addressing such transition issues using existing mechanisms and peer review and encouraging senior faculty to consider the health and the stability of the overall biomedical research enterprise. The situations for many early- and mid-career scientists are quite stressed and precarious at present. It seems tone deaf at best to put forth an idea that would clearly favor those who have already been blessed with many opportunities. | ||||
172 | University of Texas Health Science Center at Houston | Houston, TX | Stupid idea for many reasons. Go see the comments at Rock Talking. This is a waste of money. | Money to "facilitate laboratory closure"? Seriously? The university should be responsible for any money that requires transitioning. If the PI wants to transfer the grant to a junior PI, more power to him/her. There is no need for additional funds. | There should not be an emeritus award. | There should not be an emeritus award. | The impediment is that it is not needed. | You should be encouraging people who should be retiring to GET OUT, not giving them more money. | ||
173 | Colorado State University | Fort Collins, CO | I believe that this award is unnecessary and would reallocate scarce NIH resources to the group of investigators who least need them and to may not solve what appears to be a very minor problem in the biomedical research enterprise. Providing extra support for ESI/NI investigators makes sense as they only have a few short years to establish themselves but may be competing for research dollars against investigators with 40+ years of experience and very well established research programs. Senior PIs have already established themselves and have generally made significant contributions to science, and in general have an easier time of getting/staying funded than new investigators. If a senior PI wants to transition his/her work to a junior colleague it would be better for the senior PI to act as co-investigator on regular competitive R01 grant that the junior PI submits and then transition their research program to the junior PI organically. This way the junior PI gets credit with their institution for the grant, and the best science gets funded. In addition, facilitating lab closures or transfers should be the responsibility of the University, not NIH. Senior PIs with active grants who wish to step down from their research programs have usually been able to transfer their regular R grants to another colleague at their institution if the University and NIH agree. I have seen this done several times and it appears to work well. Giving a special award to senior PIs to in effect anoint their successor is antithetical to the competitive process that the rest of the scientific community has to go through and seems unfair, especially when many of us are already struggling to keep our labs open while doing cutting edge research. I don't mind if a senior PI wants to keep working until they are unable to work anymore because of age, as long as they have to go through the same competitive process the rest of us do. Therefore I do not think that this proposed award is the best use of scarce NIH funds. | N/A | N/A | N/A | N/A | N/A | ||
174 | Cornell University | Ithaca NY | I have witnessed some senior investigators use the opportunity of their presumed final NIH grant to transition into retirement and/or transition into the position you indicate. Given 4-5 years of a funding horizon and a robust track record of previous productivity, I imagine there is very little means to identify such a practice or modify its behavior. I think actually that some senior investigators plan for this type of parachute to end their programs in a relaxing fashion. Given the high salaries of senior investigators, deep research networks, and well equipped laboratories, it seems unwise to bestow another award to facilitate the same activities they are already engaged in at the expense of opportunities for younger investigators and those seeking to build their careers. In my opinion, the NIH should explore a cap of research funding that any investigator can get. This will reduce the near indentured servitude that some postdocs must face, not to mention the PIs benefitting from the ideas these fellows contribute to their lab without the opportunity to pursue them themselves. I suggest 2 R01s per PI, or 1 R01 and one other major grant (U01, PPG, etc.). I agree that there are some scientists that are truly brilliant, but none of them are doing research without huge reliance on postdocs/graduate students. If these PIs can't hold onto them forever, they would be more incentivized to mentor them to be competitive for other positions in academia and industry. | If this is to happen, it should be a K award format, with said faculty already achieving an appointment at a community college, much like an K99/R00, but almost the reverse. Instead of having a mentor, such award must demonstrate a commitment and innovation to mentorship and educational/training excellence. For example, developing new ways to impart research knowledge on disadvantaged student groups to prepare them for college/grad-school. In my opinion there is no need to facilitate lab closure or junior investigator partnership, as this likely takes place during the long duration of the last R01 grant. It is only this group that would actually have a sizable lab to close, and they shouldn't be rewarded for their poor planning. | Should be 4 years, 1 year at the current institution, 3 years at the community/junior college/undergraduate school. The definition of the mentorship target group and the methods should be clearly articulated. The award can cover a portion of the salary for the PI since the college would not likely be able to cover it. This individual should NOT have a lab or research supplies. They are to focus on mentoring, and it is unlikely they have touched the bench in decades. | Talk to [ ] on how best to do this. He is really doing a great work in Atlanta working with local high school students. | This award should have enough impediments to it so that only those who truly want to transition in this way would take advantage of it. | See my comment above on instituting a Cap on total research funding. | ||
175 | Baylor College of Medicine | Houston, TX 77030-3498 | While downsizing of large laboratories of senior investigators may be beneficial in terms of providing more resources for junior investigators in the current funding climate, complete closure of competitive research programs will be counterproductive. There are other solutions as listed below under Comment 2. One limitation at many institutions would be the need to maintain 50% effort for the university to receive full health insurance benefits but perhaps with decreased salaries, and the need to transition long term employees to other stable positions until they wish to retire. There would also be a need to have resources to preserve unique biomedical resources, e.g. mouse models, unique cell lines. So rather than completely phasing out a laboratory, a system allowing a gradual transition over a period of years would be preferable perhaps with a gradually declining budget. Universities would have to allow faculty to retain some office space, internet access, parking privileges etc. This latter option would only be in cases where the senior investigators no longer supervise a competitive research program. A cap on the total amount of NIH grant funds received by any one investigator may also help alleviate some of the problems of funding junior investigators. | I would encourage senior investigators to submit competitive grant applications with junior faculty taking advantage of their different and complementary expertise. For example, we are already actively partnering with junior investigators on several research projects and joint grants. This has resulted in joint publications in Cell Reports, Cancer Cell etc. We coordinate a joint laboratory meeting of several junior and senior faculty members that provides unique feedback for trainees and junior faculty. We co-mentor students and post-doctoral fellows to help facilitate their successful applications for independent fellowships. We also participate in a series of career development and grantsmanship programs. All of these activities require maintenance of an active research program, and would not benefit from complete laboratory closure. Having senior investigators as a co-PI, with perhaps less of their salary listed on the grants would free up resources for the NIH. | Within the current NIH framework, a three to five year award with decreasing senior faculty salary might be feasible with a junior faculty member as a co-investigator. They may not need always to be at the same institution and could be a multi-PI collaborative grant from different institutions. The junior faculty member would preferably be a tenure track independent faculty member. While they potentially might also be a non-tenure track faculty member working in the PIs group, I think this would be less desirable unless the junior faculty is able to contribute both technically as well as intellectually to the research project. As before, universities would have to allow faculty to retain some office space, internet access, parking privileges | Institutions would have to allow faculty to maintain effort say at 50% with perhaps a decreased salary but maintenance of health insurance. Specifically, the faculty member should be able to be part of the University Health plan and not have to obtain individual insurance through other plans. | Institutions would have to change the policy where the percentage effort on a grant has to be equivalent to the salary requested up to the NIH approved salary cap. Senior investigators should be able to use their retirement for salary and decrease the amounts actually paid by the institution. | If this is implemented for the extramural program, the same guidelines should be applied to the intramural program at the NIH, where the average age of faculty in some cases appears to exceed that of university faculty in extramural programs. | ||
176 | University of Missouri | Columbia, MO 65212 | As someone who is currently in the process of shutting down my laboratory and retiring, this would be a perfect award in my opinion. Only wish it had been available a year ago. To me the perfect use would be to facilitate laboratory closure by providing funding for support of personnel (Techs, postdocs, not PI's) while they are transitioning to closing down their lab. In many cases it could also be used as I would have liked to support animal colonies while experiments are being completed. The duration should be at the most 2 years; 1 year might be sufficient. It should be funded only when it is clear that the PI is no longer going to be submitting grant proposals for future funding. If an individual receives one of these awards and also puts in an application for an RO1 or other grant, the emeritus award should definitely not be funded. It should not be used as a means for senior investigators to simply get additional funds, but truly for facilitating laboratory shutdown. | Covered above. | I don't think it should be incentivized. Most senior investigators who are finished writing grant proposals and are ready to shut down don't need an incentive to apply for this. I would have applied immediately if it had been available. | I don't see any from the perspective of my particular institution or my personal take on this. | If you would like to award one retrospectively, I would be first in line to apply! | |||
177 | tufts university | Boston MA | I think the idea is great, and may encourage some experienced people to make the transition sooner and more effectively. Of course a local barrier is the extent to which the institution permits passing the baton. Another are you should consider for the award is UTILIZATION OF TRAINING AND CONTACTS BUILT OVER DECADES OF SERVICE . For example we started Science Training Encouraging Peace-Graduate Training Program. Check the website and video. STEP-GTP.org. I am happy to be supportive and offer additional ideas. | |||||||
178 | University of Illinois College of Medicine at Chicago | Chicago, IL 60612 | I think this is an excellent idea since there are many reasons why a senior investigator would like to change the course of his/her research projects and perhaps help train junior colleagues in the conceptual framework of a project of great relevance to NIH. I will mention my own experience in this area in comment 6. | One can use an emeritus award for many different reasons. Retiring from the boredom of doing the same kind of research for years is one. An emeritus award will allow a veteran scientist to move to an emerging, but different, field where a lack of past experience will be a barrier to receive any new grants. From my own perspective, because of my interest in new types of anticancer drug development, I wanted to switch from conducting fundamental basic research to more practical drug development using the results of my basic research. This is what NIH calls translational research. Again, I will elaborate my case in comment 6 where the National Cancer Institute provided invaluable help. | This will vary depending upon the needs of different researchers. From my perspective, since I am interested in conducting clinical trials of a new type of anticancer drug that does not exist today (and I have results of the successful phase I trial of a peptide drug developed in my lab under NIH funding and the on-going phase I trial of the same drug, known as [ ], in pediatric brain tumor patients in [ ] hospitals in the US sponsored by the National Cancer Institute [ http://clinicaltrials.gov/ xxxxx], I would need 2-3 years of support to modify the drug to make it patentable. My university (University of Illinois at Chicago) holds [ ] US patents and many international patents on [ ], and the parent protein [ ], but the patents have now questionable validity because of the US Supreme Court decision last year on the Myriad Genetics patents. | The way to incentivize the use of an emeritus award will be to encourage senior investigators to move from long standing research areas to emerging new areas where the investigators will be new and not likely to succeed in receiving competitive grant support. Of course, from my perspective, another way would be to encourage experienced investigators to do something new that will be practical and find applications to the bedside, in addition to stimulating the US economy. | The major impediment, as was evidenced in my case, was the lack of funding when I tried to move from basic research, Pseudomonas aeruginosa infection in cystic fibrosis patients, to cancer therapy using one of the proteins [ ] of the infecting bacterium. I was funded by NIH on this project for 20 years, but as my basic research led to the development of a P. aeruginosa protein [ ] as a potential anticancer agent, I lost my NIH funding because the study sections could not appreciate my new results. My application was repeatedly rejected by the study sections. So I co-founded a company [ ] with the Head of [ ] of my University and the company raised 12 million dollars to successfully conduct phase I clinical trial in Chicago in 15 stage IV cancer patients with very promising results (Br. J. Cancer, 2013). | I can only cite my own experience in the importance of having a continuing emeritus award for senior investigators. As I mentioned earlier, once NIH stopped my basic research funding and I had to form a start-up company to raise funds for conducting clinical trials with the peptide [ ] that was developed under NIH funding, NCI took up the leadership role and paid for the pre-clinical toxicity tests so that the FDA could approve the phase I trial. When the phase I trial was completed in 15 stage IV cancer patients where the tumors were resistant to all conventional drugs and the patients had a life expectancy of 6 months, [ ] not only did not show any toxicity even at the highest concentration, but 2 patients had partial and 2 patients had complete regression of their tumors. Three are alive beyond 2 to 3 years. I just hope that NIH will issue me such an emeritus award so that I can train some junior colleagues to take this project forward. | ||
179 | Virginia Tech | VA | No. | To facilitate laboratory closure (pay finishing students, publish remaining studies. 2 yrs; 100K per year, non-renewable. Once funded, PI is ineligible to apply for future RO1s. | No junior partner-junior faculty need to be independent. Max 2 years support. | Make it mandatory for 65yr and above. These individuals could still serve as PIs on T32s and as mentors on F-series grants. Just no RO1s. | Common sense, logic, etc... | Overall, this is a completely terrible idea. Junior faculty inheriting a senior members program is completely offensive to both the junior faculty member and the scientific enterprise as a whole. this is not a feudal system where giants can bequeath fiefdoms on their favorite disciples. Essential reagents can be sent to a common repository like ATCC or Addgene. The University will reuse the equipment. The space will be filled the day after the retirement party. | ||
180 | University of South Carolina | Columbia, SC | This is an excellent idea and would be helpful to both senior investigators and the institutions which employ them. | A partnership with a junior investigator would be very useful to transfer the senior investigators knowledge base and skills. The senior investigator could acquire more general mentoring and teaching skills. | Five years of support for the transition of the award from senior to junior investigator. Junior investigator must be approved by NIH. | Smaller amount of guaranteed, non-competitive, support during the transition period would be very incentivizing. | Senior investigators must have a clear role, and the support of the institution during the transition. | This is the best idea NIH has had in a long time. | ||
181 | University of Kentucky | Lexington, KY | I am not in favor of such an award. The award will likely most benefit eligible senior scientists. Positive effects, if any, on junior faculty members will be difficult to quantify. Additionally, such an award mechanism may have several unintended negative consequences. | It is not clear how or why an emeritus award mechanism should be used. Mechanisms already exist that allow a retiring investigator to assign his/her grant to another faculty member and ensure a line of research is continued. Additionally, the institution should ensure hat the investigator has the opportunity to acquire the necessary skills for the new role. | I do not think this mechanism should be implemented. | It seems that senior PIs are currently competing for and obtaining R01 grants. It is not clear that there are or should be incentives that would convince institutions to encourage these scientists to stop making valuable contributions to the institution and the scientific community. | The finality of the restriction placed on this award may disincentivize participation in the mechanism. Furthermore, it is not clear how an emeritus award would affect senior investigators that are a part of P series or other large grants. | Given the current difficult and flat funding amounts, the money for such an award must be taken from other pools of NIH grants that fund investigators at all career stages. Thus, taking money from other programs to fund an emeritus award could harm just as many investigators as the NIH is trying to help. | ||
182 | Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine | Baltimore, MD | Senior investigators already have all the necessary mechanisms to close down their labs. The problem seems to be that they get too much of a pass in their later years, getting renewals for grants that a more junior investigator could never get to fly. The answer is a more hard-nosed review for these PIs, not some new source of funding. | If a PI is past 65 and still hasn't figured out how to acquire new skills, they should just retire. There are plenty of others out there who can figure it out without a special funding mechanism. The NIH should not be stepping into a void left by institutions who refuse to support faculty who are not bringing in research dollars. NIH should be figuring out how to reduce the number of soft-money positions, now how to increase NIH salary support. | The idea of a junior faculty partner is preposterous, at least for laboratory science. We hire junior faculty because they have fresh new ideas of their own, not because they want to continue the line of research started by someone else over 30 years ago. Give junior PIs a chance to make it on their own, not be subservient to the program (and ego) of a senior investigator who hasn't figured out how to exit gracefully. | See above. | I don't see how the NIH could really enforce a terminal award. What if the recipient changes his/her mind? These are people who are reluctant to retire, after all. I also don't see how the NIH could legally set an age limit. | This proposal was tone-deaf in light of the present dire funding situation. The NIH should take a hard look at why it is still funding some of these labs based on past reputation rather than on actual accomplishments and contributions. I am all in favor of taking some of the money going to emeritus investigators and giving it to mid-career and junior scientists, but it needs to be done sensibly. Why isn't the NIH cutting the budgets of some of these PIs with decades-running R01s? | ||
183 | State University of New York at Buffalo | Buffalo, NY 14214 | Strong interest from a [ ]-year old Biophysicist whose career was initiated via NIH Contract No. [ ] in 1968, transitioning over the years to primary NSF funding and to "particles in the lungs" from cardiovascular implants.Now a UB Distinguished Professor. | Promote a partnership with a new PhD Assistant Professor of Nursing with an asthma-prevention specialty, transitioning a collection of laboratory tools and instruments to that more patient-oriented colleague for expansion and continuation. First project would be correlation of chemistry/abundance of respirable particles collected from asthma-impacted [ ] neighborhood with symptomology. An obvious extension for a lifetime prior study of materials/tissues interactions. | Two-year Award for a single research project should be sufficient, transferring knowledge and equipment to newly appointed Assistant Professor in a program moving from qualitative to quantitative field results. | Provide the Award with minimal administrative conditions but clear expectations--modeled after the successful I-CORPS program that NIH has just acquired from NSF. | NIH "administrivia" is legendary, since dropping of the original Contract-based Artificial Kidney and Artificial Heart Programs. Please return to a "you'all come!" challenge, rather than continuing to support only the "good ole girls and boys clubs"...The needs productivity--and NOT just funding continuity. | Pay attention to NIH Director's lament about "Eroom's Law"--and fix that for the US Citizens. | ||
184 | University of Miami | Miami, Florida | I am strongly supportive. Similar mechanisms do not exist. Experienced investigators too often fade away (at their peak) when NIH funds are no longer available. They feel demoralized because their potential contributions to science and career development of junior facility are minimized. They want to kep contributing but cannot due to circumstances, and often academic restrictions (post 65 years). | Partnership between a senior and junior investigator seems key to success. Experienced investigators under the right mechanisms could help propel careers of young investigators, not in an adversarial competitive manner. Often early NIH success raises competition and misunderstandings between a new investigator and capable more experienced senior investigators (who still have years to contribute). | i think 5 years of emeritus support should be a minimum. Junior faculty can be defined as someone within the first 3 years of a tenure track position as Assistant Professor. Contingencies would have to be considered. What is the emeritus professor dies or becomes incapacitated? What happens to the grant award; NIH would have to set regulations for academic institutions. | From the perspective of senior investigator, it would help if they function in an advisory role. Grant reporting could be the responsibility of the junior faculty member. Young investigators are torn between "K" awards and R01's. I think an R01 type award should go to the early stage investigator (not the seasoned investigator). Academically, this is needed to launch careers of young investigators (experienced investigators need salary support but do not beed satisfaction of more grants. right?). | Senior investigators might be "too tired" and not motivated to write another grant. not true od young investigators. Institutions, particularly medical schools, have come to realize "any money is good money", they will not refuse NIH support of senior investigators who otherwise fall shorten covering demand for up to 100% extern grant support. | Senior investigators often STOP taking on new students, including minorities, about 4 years before their planned retirement. A mechanism of requiring one or two PhD students in the budget could amplify outcomes beyond young investigator training (experienced and young investigates could co-mentor),. Minimum direct costs should not be less than $500k. Otherwise, the mechanism will not be attractive to the best investigators. Best if the emeritus award is open to any experienced investigates over the age of 60 - it is not so important the continuous lists of NIH grant funding but rather their perceived status in their respective fields. Again, i would welcome the new emeritus initiative. | ||
185 | The University of Iowa | Iowa City, IA | Enhancing the value and recognition associated with effective mentoring of students, fellows, and junior investigators is long overdue. Some senior scientists who have had a strong track record of sustained research funding (but may now be struggling with their current grant proposals due to the very low paylines) could have much to offer in guidance and advice to scientists in the career stages mentioned above. It will be important that appropriate candidates show a strong record of not just their own ability to attract research funding, but also sustained contributions to training and mentoring throughout their careers. | I advocate strongly that such an award not be just confined to mentoring of a single junior investigator. This is not only too limited, but could also be self-serving for the emeritus awardee. I believe the support could be used to justify the effort devoted to a significant mentoring role (various such roles are possible), as well as support that may be needed for a transtion. Awardees could form a community of experienced and effective mentors who could come together for an NIH-sponsored conference annually, to share their ideas, experiences, jointly approach problems and challenges in mentoring, etc. These awardees could then ultimately serve as a national resource for these skills. | As above, I don't agree that this should be restricted to a single junior faculty 'partner'. This is too limiting. We are hearing nationally that we need to encourage young scientists in all sorts of professions, not just junior faculty positions. You could well end up with awardees who only assist people who are already collaborators and/or former lab members. This isn't very useful. I believe the emeritus applicant should have a career plan to engage in a variety of mentoring and guidance activities, and such activities at various levels of young scientists should be valued. There should also be institutional commmitment to allow the awardee to focus upon such activities. | In the end, it's all about money. Some salary support for the awardee is essential, although institutions should provide support (both time protected for mentoring and salary) as well. Some support for specific proposed activities may also be appropriate. Also, NIH should publicize these awards as indications of achievement and as honors, and should seek to utilize these emeritus awardees to provide national advice about mentoring. | An investigator who still has some (albeit modest) research support may be reluctant to be labeled "emeritus" unless it is clearly an honor and not a 'consolation prize'. If salary offset support is unrealistic for the time and effort involved, institutions may well not encourage their faculty to apply. | Such awardees should be respected scientists who have had productive research careers. But be careful not to equate effective mentoring with counting the number of former trainees who now have faculty positions. This correlation is far from straightforward. Clear career-long interest in mentoring - and not just one's own trainees - should be evident. | ||
186 | University of Maryland School of Medicine | Baltimore, MD 21201 | The idea is well thought off. However, why selecting University faculty in particular? The Older Scientists that have contributed their life to scientific accomplishment in addition to training of young of scientists deserve more credit. Despite an enormous impact of R01 in the past, the NIH had undermine the innovation by diverting their funds to NIH-derived/dictated non-competitive big $$ RFA applications such as U01, U19, RCUs, BRCs, etc., which favored selected individuals not based on science but intimate relationship with high level NIH Institute Officials. Please go back and analyze what is really come out of these projects. Where are the promised vaccines, effective drugs and high impact scientific accomplishment??? If ageing scientists are responsible for the demise of younger one then please look at the population structure of NIH intramural, US Senate and Congress, Judicial systems and the rest of the government. Please check the interesting article just came out in nature about innovation and experience. | Emeritus award is like forced retirement although may be appealing to some deadwood old-timers. However, it is insulting to top-notch scientists, regardless of age, whom still are engaged in the State-Of-The Art and cutting edge Science. Let them compete for the grant like everyone else. The Peer-Review will determine whether they are worthy of funding. It is pity to burry them under the banner of “Emeritus Award”. Why do we need to go through this? | Please come up with better explanation. Why should we support mediocre Junior faculty? | Abolish favoritisms. Please use the conflict of interest applicable to all with decision making authorities. | no comments | 1. Abolish Favoritisms; 2. Abolish bias against race, nationality, sex and elitisisms | ||
187 | The Ohio State University | Columbus, OH 43210 | The emeritus award is a terrific idea that potentially could fund penultimate-year activities by retiring faculty to allow transfer of research data, specimens, specialized/home-made equipment items to active, junior researchers who may share similar research interests with the emeritus investigator. Over the years, many professional relationships are established in the biomedical research community but one wonders if these relationships are sustained during the early post-retirement period. Typically, graduate and postdoc trainees are likely successors but one can imagine situations where project continuity is lost due to altered career plans of these individuals that lead them into other areas of research or professions such as law or private-practice medicine. In some situations, important research continues up to the very end without clearly identified "heirs" and this seems like a poor endpoint that does little justice for the American taxpayer and weakens the NIH-funded portfolio of legacy research that someday, in the hands of new "owners", might yield important discoveries that would otherwise be lost. | There are several ways to utilize NIH funds to facilitate continuity of important research programs. Funds could be used for travel between donor and recipient to organize the transfer of intellectual property, model systems such as transgenic animals and recombinant DNA reagents, tissue/cell specimens stored in liquid nitrogen, data set archives in both electronic and boxed, hard-copy formats, hiring assistants to archive the materials and arranging for physical transfer from one institution to another, or perhaps conducting short-term feasibility studies to examine novel, hybrid projects that derive from both donor and recipient research programs. For example, maybe there is a mouse model that has been well characterized with regard to cardiac physiology but never tested in the realm of wound healing, developmental biology, pulmonary biology, cancer biology, etc. Such hybrid studies would be quite useful for new R01 applications submitted by the heir as proof of principle. I would NOT use funds to offset faculty salaries or benefits (release time) of the high-salaried emeritus faculty but could consider small percent-effort charges for the junior partner (5-10%) who more than likely is under some sort of soft-money contract with their medical-center employers that have come to rely on the NIH piggybank to fund new institutional initiatives. | The award could run for 2-years in the manner/design of a R03-type grant. There would be a clear track-record of intellectual productivity between donor and recipient that could include a past mentor-trainee relationship. I would not exclude past students of the emeritus faculty especially those who are not yet tenured at their own institution. But these protégés must be at a different institution from their past mentor to avoid "doubling-dipping" outcomes. Funds also could be used to cultivate a succession plan such as organizing seminars, journal clubs, workshops centered around a biomedical topic, novel technique with broad applications, or even designating work-load plans for two or more junior investigators who share a common interest but perhaps coming from different disciplines for example biomedical engineering, physics, and pathology. This approach harkens to the style of collaborative work that came from Cold Spring Harbor Lab, Woods Hole MBL, Friday Harbor, Jackson Lab, etc back in the formative days of cellular and molecular biology. | Institutions may require some protection with regard to transfer of patents and other intellectual property but this would bring expensive legal teams into the picture that would reduce direct cost money to the emeritus faculty. Perhaps most of the indirect costs could be specifically allocated for these purposes since money needed to turn on the lights and outfit labs with other physical services such as hazardous-waste removal would be minimal during the transition year. Phones and computer/internet access must be protected. | Salary recovery deficits at the donor institution during the transition period may complicate transfer of programs and materials especially if the emeritus faculty was appointed on 100% soft money. However, I would avoid setting aside too much money solely for salary/benefits of the senior person in the transaction. Patient privacy issues may be complicated with regard to transfer of human-subjects data/specimens although the general rules of HIPPA may provide uniform guidance that would provide oversight and govern the transfer of data between multiple institutions. Space considerations may be very difficult as this commodity is very limiting at most institution and there probably will be resistance to allowing retired faculty to hold large amounts of office/lab space during the transition period. | |||
188 | University of Illinois at Chicago | Chicago, IL | With the ever increasing age of NIH researchers, having a specific program to help those on the eldest end of the age spectrum seems like exactly the wrong idea. Maybe if some of these researchers actually retired, some room would be freed up for younger faculty's scores to increase. | The emeritus award would exasperate a current problem. You should use the money for this to fund more standard R01's. | 0 years. | Watch this video showing the shifting age of NIH investigators and ask yourself why is this program even being considered. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Z8amAcWCKCw | ||||
189 | Silver Spring, MD | I am opposed to such an award mechanism. The senior investigator should be supported by funds related specifically to the new role or position. | The suggested examples do not require NIH support to occur. Laboratory closure will occur with cessation of competitive NIH project-related funding. Partnerships between senior and junior investigators should be encouraged as the relate to specific scientific projects, which can be done through existing funding mechanisms. Acquisition of new skills should be supported by funding mechanisms related to the new role, not the old one. If the new role is of relevance to NIH priorities, then transition to the new role should be supported by existing NIH funding mechanisms. | Irrelevant to an unnecessary award mechanism. | Irrelevant to an unnecessary award mechanism. | None--anyone would be eager to accept funding to support an investigator who is uninterested or unable to obtain other NIH funding. This award is designed to funnel money to a problem that has no monetary value. | This is really a poorly thought-out idea that should not have reached the RFI stage. | |||
190 | Washington University School of Medicine | St. Louis, MO | On the face of it, the Emeritus award seems like a stupid idea. The people who would likely get such an award would be highly talented individuals who could be supported by institutional soft money and who have already received generous amounts of NIH funding. As a mid-career investigator, I do not support this idea as it is presented here. I have complete sympathy for junior investigators who may even be resentful of the idea. | On the other hand, an Emeritus Award might be a good idea if the intentions of the mechanism were less muddled. I support a mechanism that would encourage senior NIH investigators to retire. I would be interested in such a mechanism myself in a few years. No blah, blah about partnerships, senior PIs have already trained their scientific replacements many times over. Senior PIs that have survived their entire career by bagging grants need no help in acquiring skills for transitioning to a new role. By definition, these folks are adults who can take care of themselves. What some senior folks may need is a kick in the pants to stop applying for funds and retire already. To achieve this role, the NIH could make a mechanism for senior folks that requires very little work, would have a high success rate, and came with the stipulation that, "that's all you get." It would be an easy-to-get final award. Period. Like being president. No more running for office. Adding all the gravy about transitioning skills is bogus. | The award should be for three or at most four years of support. The junior faculty partner idea is particularly terrible. The last thing we need is for junior investigators to be smothered by their elders any more than they already are!! | The incentive for the investigator would be the simplicity of the award mechanism, based primarily on the accomplishments of the PI and a very brief statement of plans. The NIH should also institute a reverse new investigator policy and make grants harder to get if the PI has been funded for 25 years. It is a problem that well-connected, senior investigators compete on the same playing field as new PIs. I don't know that institutions respond well to much of anything except more money. | The impediments would likely be inertia. If applying for R01 grants is what you know, why change? | |||
191 | University of Pittsburgh | Pittsburgh, PA | High level of interest; This is a topic I have thought about a lot from the standpoint of a junior/mid-career investigator, and discussed with colleagues (senior and junior) for the past five years | It should be utilized to -To mentor junior faculty (primary credit for specifically mentoring Early stage investigators and New Investigators to obtain independent level funding; secondary credit for serving as a consultant on a mid-career investigator proposals to enhance the quality of their science) -Freed from the conflict of interest of having to compete for R-level funding, these emeritus investigators could be tapped to provide service for NIH in scientific review and advisory council panels | I would recommend that such an award be offered to individuals > 60 years of age, who currently have at least one full year left in a RO1 or Program Project Award. The award should be for five years --similar to a K-award with option to renew competitively for another 5 years (only if they are under 70). That way most of these individuals who qualify will be funded by the award past 75 years of age. Definition of junior faculty: see comment #2 | - cover their salaries up to the NIH cap - provide them some funds (25K) to travel for scientific meetings - provide them with roles on Scientific review panels, advisory councils | Salary coverage up to NIH cap should be a strong incentive for institutions to keep them to mentor people for grants. It would also free up time to teach courses in academic institutions. Between the NIH cap and teaching students (under grad and grad) they should be able to cover most of their current salaries at the institutions | |||
192 | Its a dog eat dog world in the process of peer review, and there are well known problems with the system. I would suggest that only emeritus scientist review grants. They should be paid for their work. They have the breath and experience to evaluate new ideas. Its categorically untrue that only young people have the imagination to appreciate novel ideas. Only those who are not competing in the system can evaluate in a relaxed and wondering manner. | Its a dog eat dog world in the process of peer review, and there are well known problems with the system. I would suggest that only emeritus scientist review grants. They should be paid for their work. They have the breath and experience to evaluate new ideas. Its categorically untrue that only young people have the imagination to appreciate novel ideas. Only those who are not competing in the system can evaluate in a relaxed and wondering manner. | ||||||||
193 | Califirnia State University Los Angeles | Los Angeles, CA | I think that transition out from NIH funding should be rather supported by the University that employs the PI. Through the indirect costs the PI has contributed t the well being of the institution and contributed to the reputation and it would be now time for the University to give back to the faculty. In addition, a senior PI who can mentor younger faculty will enhance the funding chances and thus return to the University and therefore it would be in the interest of the University. | Out of the examples given, I think the best would be to spend funds on mentoring of younger faculty. Another option would be to possibly utilize the senior PI more in grant review and provide more funds for this activity. Without competing for their own funding they may be even more objective towards the rising new investigators. | I do not like the idea of an emeritus award much- but if it were for mentoring younger faculty I could see 3 -5 years useful. This timeframe would allow for grant development, submission, and if needed revision with the mentee. The mentee would be ideally an incoming assistant professor within the same institution. | Incentives for the emeritus PI could include travel money to attend conferences contingent on actual mentoring of a junior faculty. Supporting a conference for emeritus PI to strengthen their mentoring capacity might be also an incentive. The University would benefit from an emeritus award if it would be used to partially cover salary or retirement for the duration of the emeritus award. | Possibly less availability for University service? | I think I would rather like to see more funds for new investigators and encourage institutions to transition PIs into new professional activities without NIH funding. | ||
194 | Oregon Health Sciences University | Portland, OR | When one gets to be 65 or 68 it is difficult to contemplate spending months, most of one's time, writing grants. That is something young investigators must do and even those in the middle of their careers. For every grant I must renew or submit, I contemplate 2 or 3 years to get it funded, then it lasts 4 or 5 years. The battle to maintain funding means that good researchers, people that are good at the bench, do not do science anymore. So, I would be very interested in a funding mechanism that allowed me to do some good work at the end of my career, certainly I am experienced enough, just look at my funding over 30 years, continuous funding with two grants most of that time. | I have a young assistant professor in my lab and would like to transition out and have him come in. I am not looking at closing the lab but getting enough funding that I can pay him what junior faculty are paid in my dept. He is a research assistant professor, meaning that 100% of his salary comes from my grants. If there was money for my salary or part of it from the NIH, this would mean I could pay him more and continue to train him for a transition toward taking over the research program. Its good for the NIH, the work does not stop. | 3-5 years for senior person. Defining the junior person is key, if NIH recognizes this individual, then the university would as well. Right now, the person described above is a research assistant professor, with no expectation of a tenure-track position or geting any type of position after I leave, so the lab shuts down and the work ceases. And that is a huge loss to the field and the NIH. | |||||
195 | Nationwide Childrens Hospital | Columbus, OH | I believe this is a brilliant idea. Senior investigators transitioning to an emeritus role provide valuable scientific wisdom and expertise in teaching, training and faculty development. The financial support will allow them to continue on in the same institution or transition to a new role at another institution. Since many tier 1 research universities place value in extramural funding, these faculty would be deemed an asset rather than a liability. The added benefit is that tenure-track faculty slot would open up to more junior investigators. | The award should primarily cover salary support for the senior investigator, a research component with a junior "partner" and support for new professional activities (leadership course, community outreach, workforce diversity, curriculum development) | Number of years of support- 4 Junior faculty-anyone with the same research interest- including small or minority colleges. | Investigator- I get paid for my expertise and have value to the institution | How much would the institution have to pay and the amount of indirect cost | |||
196 | University of Maryland | College Park, Maryland | I think this is an interesting, creative idea. | A major reason why senior investigators hesitate to close their labs and assume other types of activities is their responsibility towards lab personnel. Most successful senior investigators have experienced postdoctoral scientists working in their group, and often these individuals have young families to support but are having great difficulties finding positions after the initial training as postdoctoral associates. The current shortage of jobs in biomedical research is a serious crisis, which is leaving talented young people without any options except continuing their association with a senior scientist supported by NIH grants. Recently published discussions of this issue have led to recommendations for PIs to reduce the number of trainee positions in their lab, while offering more staff scientist long term positions. I agree with this recommendation, except for one critical issue - how to maintain funding for these well-trained staff/research scientists? Thus, in my view, the main role of an emeritus award should be to provide continuity in the salary of staff scientists for a few years - a measure that should be coupled to a commitment from a more junior investigator to employ these individuals. | To provide adequate transition and continuity in personnel salary, the award should be for about 4 years, split in two phases (similar to the K99/00 awards, for example). A junior faculty partner should be identified at the time of application, and funds initially requested for 2 years of support to the senior investigator, at a level sufficient to cover personnel salaries and the supplies needed to publish ongoing work. Close contact, discussions and ideally joint publications with the junior partner should be a requirement for this first phase. Then, a second phase would be activated, upon commitment from the junior investigator to continue to employ essential members of the team for at least 2 years. This would work as an incentive for the junior faculty member to take on the prior responsibilities of the senior partner, and benefit from his/her experience. For this to work, I suggest that the "junior" partner is not defined too narrowly; non-tenured Assistant Professors may not be able to take on such a responsibility, so the ideal partner is likely to be at the mid-career level, Associate Professor or recent Full Professor. | See above - by providing salary support to experienced research scientists originally associated with the senior lab, and transitioning to the junior lab. | It may not be easy to identify the ideal partnership in the same institution; it is hard to envision this working among different institutions, but maybe this should be considered. The award would mostly likely involve transfer of equipment between labs, and this can create problems even in the same institution, if different units are involved. | I am aware that there has been resistance to this idea, from scientists who think that any additional funds should just be given directly to young investigators. The problem is that more funds for young investigators awarded through the regular mechanisms (based on project impact) would still have to involve competition with a large number of investigators. The emeritus award would allow funds to be directed to younger investigators through a different form of evaluation, which would emphasize their willingness to collaborate and to contribute to the careers of staff scientists. | ||
197 | Oregon State University | |||||||||
198 | Stanford University | Stanford, CA | I think this is a great idea. I have known several senior investigators who wanted to continue to contribute actively, and had a wealth of knowledge to do so, but stepped out of the field because of the burden of running an NIH-funded research lab. To keep select highly accomplished and knowledgable individuals engaged in research, mentoring others, and passing on knowledge while not running a lab is a great idea. | I think this should be guided by how the emeritus individual can contribute. Partnership with junior faculty or other existing labs seems like perhaps the most relevant of all. Making it possible to keep a small amount of research space available (e.g. for a specific microscope or other unique piece of equipment) could also be important, so that the investigator could complete analysis of existing data for publication. Training for transition to a new role sounds valuable too. | Junior faculty partner = anybody who would like the emeritus to spend significant time interacting with the students and postdocs in their lab to advance the science. Years of support: I would suggest a range of 2-5 depending on the proposal. | Institutions: overhead for a small amount of office and research space for the emeritus. Senior investigators: salary, a little space and retained equipment. | Institutions will worry about overhead per square foot of space. Critical. Senior investigators: salary, and respectful treatment by the institution. | I strongly support this. The NIH has focused great effort on junior investigators in recent years. While this is great, it's also true that senior investigators have a tremendous amount to offer that is wasted at the end of their careers. | ||
199 | University of Colorado Denver AMC | Aurora, CO 80045 | I Agree. This will allow the senior investigator to focus efforts on helping junior faculty in the transition. If both are competing for support is not conducive to a transition process. It could be quite detrimental in fact. | I think the best idea is to promote partnership between senior and junior investigator, avoiding closure of a lab. | It should be 3-4 years to allow enough time to set up the transition plan, finish papers together and submit grant applications by the junior faculty to obtain independent funding so there is no gap in support. | The emeritus award will have to have ~50% indirect costs (or whatever negotiated by the institution) so there is strong support from the department and the institution. Concomitantly, the department has to recognize the partnership with the junior investigator and support it. Searching for new faculty is very expensive to a department so this plan would be beneficial and appealing to all parts. | Senior investigator not willing to pass on his/her science or using the emeritus award to prolong his tenure. Institutions more interested in hiring new investigators actively writing grants. The point is to find common ground with mutual benefits for all (hard, but it doesn’t mean not worth trying) | This is a great initiative. I hopes it flies because it would help junior investigators stay in academic science, and for senior researchers to continue their legacy the best way possible, at the bench. | ||
200 | University of Massachusetts Medical School | WORCESTER, MA | Excellent idea. I assume the emphasis would be on senior investigators who have performed "research" over their careers. As a senior [ ] considering retirement, I have spent part of my time over the past 2 years mentoring my presumed successor in the politics, managerial skills, and leadership skills needed for this important research support role. I am suggesting that NIH look beyond senior investigators and include broader research mentoring needs for this potentially important grant. | Formal training, supplemented by on-the-job mentoring, to acquire the needed skills for learning the management and leadership skills needed to direct a large laboratory animal vivarium and its staff. This can be online training or classroom training. | I would suggest a maximum of 3 years of support. A junior partner need not be faculty. Given that formal management training is rare at any level of research management, I would include any person being specifically groomed for directing a multi-veterinarian academic vivarium with a limit of one such current award per institution. For practical purposes it would be appropriate to establish a minimum number of NIH grants and dollars to qualify for an emeritus award. | Any improvement in management and leadership skills, particularly financial and personnel management, is an incentive to any forward thinking institution. The incentive to a senior veterinarian is limited. As he or she slows down a little the grant monies become a form of release time that is paid back to the institution. In other words, it helps secure that person's position. | I don't think the institution would see any impediments but I foresee that some managers on their way up the research leadership ladder might resent any suggestion that additional management/leadership training might be useful. They may feel that they've nearly reached their goal because they are being groomed for that new position, so why waste time with putting some icing on the cake. | I fully understand that my suggestion is not mainline for the primary reasons this grant program is being considered. Nevertheless, research support of the type I have suggested is a vital part of an overall biomedical research program. | ||
201 | University of Michigan | Ann Arbor, MI | This is a nice idea but I'm not sure that this is the best use of funds when NIH research support is so difficult to obtain. | I've had a couple of senior colleagues who closed their independent labs but continued to work actively in research by joining the group of a collaborator, either junior or senior. In the cases I witnessed, this worked very well for everyone involved. A modest amount of salary support and a small supply budget would facilitate these kinds of arrangements. | Consistent records of NIH funding and recent research productivity. | See above. | ||||
202 | Pacific Institute for Research and Evaluation | Oakland, California | First, a disclaimer. I am a senior investigator, likely to benefit from this initiative. I was involved in academic and research administration for the past 25 years. I retired from these positions last December, and am now free to pursue my research interests again and also dedicate more time to mentoring. The limitation that I presently find is that to keep myself funded and continue my research I only have limited time for mentoring. The equation is simple: more time spent talking to young investigators and post-docs, reading their KO1 applications and providing feedback, less time to papers and research applications. So, the idea of supporting mentoring is very commendable. NIH can do this through the proposed mechanism or can resuscitate the KO5. I wanted to apply to a KO5, but was told by my NIAAA contacts that the Institute was not supporting these Ks any longer. So, go for it. It is a great idea. There is a lot of talk from everybody about the great value of mentoring, now we need to support it with real dollars. | To help post-docs and junior investigators advance in their careers by providing a role model and advice on: writing papers, responding to reviewers' comments, interacting with co-authors, applying for jobs, interviewing for jobs, selecting places to work, negotiating start up funds, applying for grants, deciding on the need for further training, advising on professional transitions such as pre-doc to post-doc and post-doc to faculty, advising on how to relate to students and to colleagues, advising on the right time to take administrative responsibilities, advising on when to accept review responsibilities, etc., etc. | Provide maybe 3 initial years, renewed for another 2 or 3. A junior faculty partner is an assistant professor in a formal university environment or a young research investigator past post-doc status. | Advertise it widely. Provide full overhead (not just 8%). Allow applicants to decide percentage effort, say, between 30 and 50%. Senior investigators then will not have to abandon their research careers to serve as mentors. | Institutions always complain that training grants do not provide full overhead. Address this issue. Do not require that full investigators dedicate, say, 75% of their time to the effort (as I think the KO5 did). This is too much effort and places limitations in other activities such as research. I am assuming that NIH will want mentors that are engaged in research. | Go for it! | ||
203 | SDSU School of Public Health | San Diego CA | I'd be interested .......I haven't yet spoken to many colleagues though. | I think all of these make sense.....the lab closure seems least important, as the funded University should be using its F&A to do this. | 2 years of full or 5 years of partial support? Junior faculty: first time or early career investigator (e.g. <10 years post doc) | Institutions can promote partnership among their recent or future hires c/ senior investigators who are getting long in the tooth. Senior investigators get the $$, + special national recognition if successful . | Ego. I have colleagues in the late 70s who are still applying for R01s and even P01s. They are no longer trying to get famous, nor really even contribute to the science......instead, it's more like they don't think the science can continue w/o them. Regardless of whether one is religious, have everyone read Ecclesiastes 1, v 2-11. I especially like v. 7: "All the rivers run into the sea; yet the sea is not full; unto the place from whence the rivers come, thither they return again." (King James version) | Please make MENTORING a review criterion in our standard reviews, simply by adding it to the R...review template or at least as part of "Environment". Use the descriptor "the degree to which the application develops junior researchers within the limits of the funding and the degree to which the PI is already established". If you feel you can't make it a score able criterion at least make it an unsecured one. We old folks will get the message! | ||
204 | Dept. of Public Health Sciences, University of California, Davis School of Medicine | Davis, CA | I believe that funds for this award that would go to salary for a retiring senior investigator would be better spent on awards for those at the beginning of their careers. Retiring senior investigators usually can count on retirement plan income, and many work into their emeritus years. It would be reasonable, however, to provide salary support to a junior investigator to work with a retiring investigator in the transfer of a research program to that junior investigator. | Laboratory closure costs should be borne by the sponsoring institution and, as appropriate, by the sponsors of the specific ongoing projects being shut down. It would be reasonable, however, to provide salary support for a junior investigator to take over an ongoing research program, along with some transition funds. | 2-3 years without salary support for the senior investigator (directing those moneys instead to a junior investigator); junior investigator should be someone at the assistant or early associate professor level; consider preference for those without NIH or equivalent PI status. | Public recognition of emeritus for "passing the torch" in a way helpful to junior investigators and their area of investigation. | Funds should be sufficient to realistically support junior faculty and transition of the research for a period of time allowing the junior investigator to establish him- or her-self, i.e., 3-5 years. If adequate support is present, there should be no serious impediments. |