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The National Institutes of Health (NIH), through the participating Institutes, Centers, and Offices listed above, invite applications for infrastructure grants in support of research on mind-body interactions and health. "Mind-body interactions and health" refers to the relationships among cognitions, emotions, personality, social relationships, and health. Applicant institutions may request funds to support infrastructure and research designed to (1) enhance the quality and quantity of mind-body and health research and (2) develop new research capabilities to advance mind-body and health research through innovative approaches. These activities must reflect a research theme that is driven by scientific questions within the context of "Mind-body interactions and health" research. A central goal of this program is to facilitate interdisciplinary collaboration and innovation in mind-body and health research while providing essential and cost-effective core services in support of the development, conduct, and translation into practice of mind-body and health research based in centers or comparable administrative units. This announcement invites applications for R21 EXPLORATORY/DEVELOPMENTAL AWARDS. Exploratory/Developmental Awards are intended to support the development and demonstrate the feasibility of programs at institutions that have high potential for advancing mind-body and health research, but have not yet fully achieved the necessary resources and mechanisms to qualify for a R24 Research Infrastructure Award. (See RFA-OB-03-004, Mind-Body Interactions and Health: Research Infrastructure Program.)

The International Clinical, Operational, and Health Services Research Training Award for AIDS and Tuberculosis (ICOHRTA-AIDS/TB) Program provides extended support for training to foster collaborative, multidisciplinary research in developing country sites where HIV/AIDS, tuberculosis (TB) or both are significant problems. As used in this Request for Applications (RFA), the term ICOHRTA-AIDS/TB is broadly defined to encompass building capacity for integrated clinical, operational, and health services research across the full range of conditions and issues that relate to care of adult and pediatric patients with HIV/AIDS or TB (e.g., opportunistic infections, HIV malignancies, neurological and mental health consequences, behavioral issues, cardiovascular disease, hematologic conditions, blood safety issues, pulmonary manifestations, ophthalmologic manifestations, gastrointestinal conditions, drug and alcohol usage, gender-related issues and oral health manifestations). This program is an integral and critical component of a comprehensive global strategy of the National Institutes of Health (NIH) and Department of Health and Human Services (DHHS) to address the needs of the millions suffering from HIV/AIDS, TB, and related conditions in resource- limited nations. It will extend and intensify efforts to provide clinically appropriate and sustainable care to these individuals in a manner that supports continuing and expanding prevention activities. These efforts will have direct health, economic and security benefits for the United States (U.S.), as well as the global community. This program will increase research training across the span of clinical science and public health practice and involve a wide range of health professionals (e.g. nurses, midwives, physicians, dentists, health care administrators and public health workers). The first phase of the ICOHRTA-AIDS/TB program began in fiscal year 2002 (FY02), with one-year planning grants (PA-02-022) to foreign institutions to organize and execute an application for a Phase II Comprehensive ICOHRTA- AIDS/TB Cooperative Agreement. Only the recipients of the Phase I planning grants and their chosen U.S. (or pre-approved non-U.S) collaborating partner institutions (together referred to as Research Training Units) are eligible to apply for Phase II Comprehensive ICOHRTA-AIDS/TB awards, which will begin in fiscal year 2004 (FY04). The Phase II awards to the Research Training Units will provide support to both the foreign institution and its linked U.S. partner (or pre-approved non-U.S.) institution through five-year cooperative agreements to each partner institution. Each partner institution will be responsible for implementation of its portion of the integrated research-training program. Training will take place at the U.S. or foreign sites and mentored research will be carried out mainly at the foreign site. The program may also provide support at the foreign site for training to develop and extend core research support capabilities necessary for long-term sustainability of the research capacity of the foreign institution. In support of the overall ICOHRTA-AIDS/TB program, a separate RFA will be issued in fiscal year 2003 (FY03) to fund a single Coordination Center in FY04 which will help to monitor and evaluate the ICOHRTA-AIDS/TB program research training units and to develop programs to address common capacity building needs across the research training. The Fogarty International Center (FIC), together with the National Institute on Alcohol Abuse and Alcoholism (NIAAA), the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases (NIAID),the National Institute of Child Health and Human Development (NICHD), the National Institute on Drug Abuse (NIDA), the National Institute of Mental Health (NIMH), the National Institute of Neurological Disorders and Stroke (NINDS), the Office of Research on Women's Health (ORWH), the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), and the United States Agency for International Development (USAID), invites Phase I awardees to submit applications for Phase II cooperative agreements to develop comprehensive international clinical, operational, and health services research training programs. These applications should foster the development of integrated strategies to successfully implement evidence-based interventions pertinent to the global health crises created by HIV/AIDS and TB. Co-sponsoring institutions are U.S. Government (USG) agencies contributing financial resources to the ICOHRTA-AIDS/TB Program. Applicants are strongly encouraged to design programs that strengthen the capacity of the foreign institutions to collaborate with the NIH, USG, other governments, international agencies, non-governmental organizations, foundations, faith- based organizations and other groups in their efforts to respond to this global health crisis.

This PA replaces PAR-01-118 The NINDS seeks to fund high quality clinical trials to evaluate treatments for neurological disorders. The purpose of the NINDS Clinical Trial Planning Grant is to provide support for the organization of activities critical for the successful implementation of high-risk, complex, or large-scale clinical trials. The planning grant is intended to (a) allow for early peer review for the rationale and design of the proposed clinical trial; (b) provide support for the development of a detailed manual of operations and procedures; and (c) provide support to develop essential elements of a clinical trial, such as adequate plans for recruitment of patients, experimental design and protocols, data management, analytical techniques, facilities, administrative procedures, obtaining IND/IDE, and collaborative arrangements. The purpose of the NINDS planning grant is not to obtain preliminary data or to conduct pilot studies to support the rationale for the clinical trial.

The purpose of this RFA is to facilitate collaborative cross- disciplinary and multi-institutional approaches that will contribute new and vital information about the clinical and pathological course of normal aging and the neurodegenerative diseases associated with aging. This RFA requires the utilization of data and/or samples from at least three currently funded NIA Alzheimer's Disease Centers with the possibility of using additional relevant data outside of the Centers. The project should use the National Alzheimer's Coordinating Center (NACC) http://www.alz.washington.edu/ for expert advice on planning, study design, statistical analysis and data management of the research projects. Applicants can be from the Alzheimer's Disease Centers, the Morris K. Udall Centers, or the research community at large. There must be a plan to share data originating from these studies by archiving them at NACC so that other investigators will be able to conduct additional analyses when appropriate. There must also be a plan for sample utilization beyond that of the initial application. This is a research opportunity for scientists within and outside the Alzheimer's Disease Centers to gain access to unique resources related to Alzheimer's Disease, other neurodegenerative diseases, and normal aging and to support collection of new data and samples. Applicants can also propose to utilize Center data and samples to investigate other age-related neurodegenerative diseases, such as Vascular dementia, Parkinson's dementia, Lewy Body disease, Fronto-Temporal dementia, as well as study psychiatric symptoms associated with dementia, socio behavioral aspects of dementia, and management and care of dementia patients. The National Institute of Neurological Disorders and Stroke (NINDS) is interested in those specific applications which include the Morris K. Udall Centers of Excellence, or other Parkinson's research centers, in the pursuit of those research objectives focused on Parkinson's Disease (PD) or related parkinsonisms. The PD center need not be located with ADCs, but collaboration with those ADCs with existing samples and data sets focused on PD is required. Specific scientific projects of interest include the use of clinico-pathological correlations to study mechanisms of pathogenesis in PD or other parkinsonian conditions, characterization of the pathological features of these conditions, and the collection of patient data on their associated symptoms.

This Program Announcement (PA), issued as an initiative of the trans- NIH Bioengineering Consortium (BECON), is aimed at enhancing nanoscience and nanotechnology research approaches that have the potential to make valuable contributions to biology and medicine. Nanoscience and nanotechnology refer to research at the atomic, molecular or macromolecular levels, at the length scale of approximately 1 - 100 nanometers. The purpose of this initiative is to stimulate cross-cutting, integrative research in these fields of science and technology. In particular, this initiative invites research on: i) the creation and use of structures, devices and systems that have novel properties and functions because of their small size, that may be used to achieve a fundamental understanding of biological processes and /or contribute to disease detection, therapy, or prevention; ii) conception and fabrication of devices, that will effectively detect and analyze nanoscale entities of relevance to biomedicine; and iii) the study of biological systems at the nanoscale for the explicit purpose of using that information to develop nanotechnologies and nanostructured materials that will in turn benefit biology and medicine. It is anticipated that the research projects that will be most responsive to this PA will require interdisciplinary collaborations among investigators with expertise in a range of disciplines, including but not limited to engineering, physics, chemistry, cellular and molecular biology, materials and computer science. Applications submitted in response to this PA may propose hypothesis-driven, discovery-driven, developmental, or design-directed research.

The purpose of this initiative is to encourage and support investigator- initiated research on neuroscience informatics (neuroinformatics). This research will lead to the development of new web based databases, analytical tools, and knowledge management systems to foster sharing of data for all domains of neuroscience research. This program combines neuroscience and informatics (neuroinformatics) research to develop and apply advanced tools and approaches essential for efficient understanding of the structure, function and development in health and disorders of the nervous system, from the genetic to whole systems level. Research in informatics includes databases, graphical interfaces, querying approaches, information retrieval, data visualization and manipulation, and data integration through the development of integrated analytical tools, synthesis, and tools for electronic collaboration. In order for these advanced information technologies to be put to wide use by the neuroscience community, they should be generalizable, scalable, extensible, and interoperable, and be developed in concert with significant neuroscience research.

The Division of Kidney, Urologic, and Hematologic Diseases (DKUHD) of the National Institute of Diabetes and Digestive and Kidney Diseases (NIDDK), in collaboration with the National Institute of Neurological Disorders and Stroke (NINDS) and the National Institute of Child Health and Human Development (NICHD), invites cooperative agreement applications for two Clinical Coordinating Centers and a Data Coordinating Center to conduct a prospective epidemiological study of children with chronic kidney disease. The primary goals of this study are to determine the risk factors for decline in renal function; the incidence of, and risk factors for, impaired neurocognitive development and function; the prevalence of risk factors for cardiovascular disease; and the long-term effects of growth failure and its treatment.

Participating Institutes and Centers (ICs) of the National Institutes of Health (NIH) invite applications for R01 awards to support Bioengineering Research Partnerships (BRPs) for basic and applied multi-disciplinary research that addresses important biological or medical research problems. A BRP is a multi-disciplinary research team applying an integrative, systems approach to develop knowledge and/or methods to prevent, detect, diagnose, or treat disease or to understand health and behavior. The partnership must include appropriate bioengineering or allied quantitative sciences in combination with biomedical and/or clinical investigators. A BRP may propose design-directed, developmental, discovery-driven, or hypothesis-driven research at universities, national laboratories, medical schools, large or small businesses, or other public and private entities or combinations of these entities. On October 11, 2001, NIH issued a related program announcement (PA) PA-02-011 for Bioengineering Research Grants (BRGs). The BRGs differ from the BRPs in that the BRG research will be performed in a single laboratory or by a small number of investigators.

The National Institute of Biomedical Imaging and Bioengineering (NIBIB), the National Heart, Lung, and Blood Institute (NHLBI), the National Institute of Environmental Health Sciences (NIEHS), the National Center for Research Resources (NCRR), the National Institute of Diabetes and Digestive and Kidney Diseases (NIDDK), and the National Institute of Neurological Disorders and Stroke (NINDS) invite grant applications for Small Business Innovation Research (SBIR) and Small Business Technology Transfer (STTR) awards to support research and development of small animal imaging devices and methods that can be applied broadly to research on diverse biological or disease processes. A similar Request for Applications (RFA) for small animal imaging research and development to be supported by individual Research Project Grant (R01) awards can be found at (http://grants.nih.gov/grants/guide/rfa-files/RFA-EB-03-002.html). The primary focus of this Program Announcement (PA) is research and development related to devices, methods, and imaging agents for the investigation of biological and disease processes in small animals. The integration of systems and methods with complementary imaging and/or spectroscopy modalities is also included as appropriate to provide anatomic, physiologic, metabolic, and molecular-level information in small animal models of disease. The motivation for this PA is that recent discoveries in genomics and molecular and cell biology have led to the development and wide use of small animal models of human disease. One of the limitations with the use of these models is the need to sacrifice large numbers of animals for ex vivo tissue and molecular analysis. Imaging instrumentation and methods that permit imaging on the scale of small animals offer an opportunity to address this problem by enabling noninvasive investigations of biological processes in vivo. This capability provides the potential for longitudinal studies in the same animal. The coupling of animal models of human disease with advances in imaging technology presents an extraordinary opportunity for biomedical imaging to play an important role in the early detection, diagnosis, and treatment of disease. Several dedicated small animal imaging systems have been developed and a few commercialized, although technological hurdles still exist that limit the realization of the full potential of small animal imaging for biomedical research and drug development. Progress is needed to improve throughput, sensitivity, and spatial and temporal resolution of small animal imaging devices, to provide quantitative information through improved reconstruction methods that incorporate models of physical effects, and to provide improved methods for system validation. System optimization incorporating the design of molecular probes that serve as links to particular biological processes in vivo is also a focus. Further improvements in system design, image processing and analysis software, and data sharing technology, coupled with improvements and innovations in animal handling techniques during imaging, are needed to make small animal imaging technology more accessible to molecular biologists and pharmaceutical scientists desiring to use animal models as tools for biomedical research and drug discovery and development.

This Request for Applications (RFA) solicits applications to plan and develop collaborative research and capacity building projects on brain disorders throughout life relevant to low- and middle-income nations. Applicants are expected to develop innovative, collaborative research programs that would contribute to the long-term goal of building sustainable research capacity in neurological/neurodevelopmental (including sensory, motor, cognitive and behavioral) impairment throughout life. This RFA is joined by the following Institutes and Centers: NIH sponsors include the Fogarty International Center (FIC), National Eye Institute (NEI), National Institute on Aging (NIA), National Institute on Alcohol Abuse and Alcoholism (NIAAA), National Institute of Child Health and Human Development (NICHD), National Institute on Drug Abuse (NIDA), National Institute of Environmental Health Sciences (NIEHS), National Institute of Mental Health (NIMH), National Institute of Neurological Disorders and Stroke (NINDS) and the Office of Dietary Supplements (ODS); for Canada, the Canadian Institutes of Health Research (CIHR) and for Mexico, the Consejo Nacional de Ciencia y Tecnologa (Conacyt). These sponsoring organizations seek domestic and international collaborative applications which address brain disorders in the developing world and which build research capacity of low- to middle-income countries to address brain disorders within their country or region. This first phase of the "Brain Disorders in The Developing World: Research Across the Lifespan" initiative, beginning in fiscal year 2003 (FY03), will consist of two-year planning/development grants using the R21 grant mechanism. The R21 grant will provide support to initiate preliminary studies and to organize, plan, prepare, and assemble an application for a more comprehensive R01 grant involving collaboration between high-income and low- to middle-income country investigators and which incorporates both research and capacity building. The main goals of the R21 applications should be to assess needs, develop collaborations and needed resources, show feasibility and generate preliminary data for the collaborative research to be proposed in a follow-up R01 submission. The applicants should propose specific milestones and a timeline to meet these goals. During the R21 award period, the applicant should: o further define the type and area of research to be developed; o develop and solidify collaborative relationships and understandings with the partners in the developed and developing countries involved; o assess current resources and needs, such as and including the need for an institutional review board (IRB) for studies involving human subjects; o develop and initiate a plan to address these needs to enable the proposed research and capacity building to be successfully carried out; o identify the training and other capacity-building opportunities to be incorporated into the research application in the context of the proposed research; o initiate cross-training of collaborators where necessary for the proposed research; and o conduct pilot studies and generate preliminary data; Projects should: 1) Involve a partnership between high-income and low-to middle-income country individuals or research teams; 2) lead to pursuit of basic, epidemiological, clinical, prevention, intervention or health services research in the area of brain disorders of relevance to low- to middle-income countries; and 3) build capacity as necessary in the proposed research area to enable further research to take place. An RFA for the second competitive phase of the "Brain Disorders in The Developing World: Research Across the Lifespan" initiative is currently planned to be issued in fiscal year 2005 (FY05), subject to availability of funds. That RFA is planned to provide support for collaborative research and capacity building to high-income and low- to middle-income country partners through the R01 mechanism. The second phase RFA competition, as currently planned, will not be limited to the R21 grantees under this competition, but will be open to all eligible applicants.