Helpful Links

For assistance understanding the many acronyms used at Duke University, visit the Duke Acronyms wikipage.

When research involves live vertebrate animals a protocol for the use of the animals must be approved by the Institutional Animal Use and Care Committee (IACUC) before research may commence. For guidance on when a protocol is required, how to get started with a protocol, and to access animal user training visit Duke’s IACUC website.

Duke University and Duke University School of Medicine offer state-of-the art shared research facilities that are available for use by all Duke investigators. Core Research Facilities provides a list of available shared facilities and an overview of each location and its services, technologies and equipment. Use CoreResearch@Duke to book and bill for use of the facility. Similar to shared facilities, MouseBase@Duke is a database of mouse model strains used and maintained by Duke investigators.  Users can search for available mouse models using a number of criteria.  (Internet Explorer is recommended).

Division of Lab Animal Resources is a resource center for investigators dedicated to the humane care and use of research and laboratory animals. Amongst a host of services, the website also lists per diem rates, fee schedules, and guidance in animal husbandry.

Duke’s reference page provides basic institutional information that is useful for grant submissions, such as: DUNS number, Tax ID Number, Human Subject and Animal Assurance numbers, etc.

Exporting goods and technical data, such as the shipment or transmission of items out of the United States or the release of technology or software to a foreign national in the United States, may be subject to the Export Administration Regulations (EAR). For guidance on export controls and to determine if research activities are subject to the EAR, visit Duke’s Export Controls.

Duke University has internal funding opportunities available to faculty.  Those seeking outside funding opportunities may use Duke’s Research Funding Database or visit our Funding Opportunities page for links to some of the Department of Medicine’s most common sponsors.

Grants.duke serves as Duke University’s Federal grant submission system. Grant materials should be uploaded in grants.duke.edu for submissions to sponsor (primarily Department of Defense and National Institutes of Health).  For assistance using the site or addressing common issues, visit grants.duke FAQ.

If research includes human subjects, federal regulations require Institutional Review Board (IRB) involvement to ensure the rights and welfare of each research subject. Duke's IRB provides training and education for investigators, tips on getting started in the process, and a wealth of information and tools to navigate PIs through the process and address the most common errors. Visit the Duke IRB site for PI/study team checklists, IRB meeting dates and rosters, and PI/research team tools.

For questions related to the design of a clinical research study, the Grants and Contracts Administrator (GCA) and Duke's Office of Clinical Research (DOCR) can help PIs with patient care cost pricing requests and review of grant proposals from the study coordinator's perspective to determine feasibility, recruiting ability, and financial adequacy.

Duke offers PIs access to grant reports in the Grants Management tab of Duke at Work. Through MyResearch Reports, the PI can view reports by fund code, including:  financial summary, fund balance, personnel funded, effort distributions, project obligations, transaction statements, and Final Financial Report (FFR) status. The Grants Management Guide provides step by step instructions for running the reports and is located on the Grants Management tab.

Researchers can review for Department of Defense program announcements and search funded awards and publications, as well as find application information on the DOD’s website.  The Funded Investigators Guide provides a thorough overview of the DOD grants process, terminology and other guidance.

Find helpful links at Grants.gov for Federal funding sources as well as general information about Federal grants, cooperative agreements and contract opportunities.  In addition to funding opportunities, PIs can obtain useful information about the Federal policies, grant terminology and what agencies offer grants.  The site also has resources to answer commonly asked questions for applicants, as well as tools to search new and previously funded grants.

An online tool through NIH, MyNCBI, is most commonly used to help PIs manage biosketches and bibliographies.  It allows the user to save searches, select display formats, filtering options, and set up automatic searches. Other features help Investigators save citations, request and obtain PMCIDs, manage peer reviewed article compliance with the NIH Public Access Policy (My Bibliography) for progress reports, and create an NIH biosketch (via SciENcv).

Biosketches are required by NIH for both competing applications and with progress reports.  The NIH biographical sketch format is available online, however, existing Science Experts Network Curriculum Vitae (SciENcv) profiles can be used to create profiles in the new NIH biographical sketch format.

eRA Commons is an online system where signing officials, PIs, trainees and post-docs at Duke can access and share administrative information relating to NIH sponsored research grants.

In addition to finding program announcements and funding opportunities at Grants.nih.gov/grants, PIs will also find tips for researchers to better understand the NIH pre-award process and post award monitoring and reporting expectations.  The Reviewer’s resource section offers insight into the criteria used to evaluate NIH proposals by grant program.  NIH’s Research Portfolio Online Reporting Tools (RePORT) allows users to search funded research going back to 1992, which can help applicants understand funding habits for an agency.  Reference materials, such as the NIH Grants Policy Statement and notices of policy changes are also available.

To view NIH instructions and forms for applications, visit: SF424 (R&R) for application and electronic submission information, and PHS 398 for instructions and forms.

A list of standard due dates for NIH application cycles and grants mechanism is available on NIH’s Standard Due Dates page.