Better at the Bench

Introduction

In my opinion, the research strategy is both the most fun and the most difficult section to write. After writing about yourself, and the institute, and the resources, and your collaborators, you finally get to write about your research!!! Yay!!! The problem is that you have to be very selective about the information you include in the research proposal. We could all easily spend pages writing the introduction, packing it with details about studies that were done both in the field and in our lab. However, you need to be concise and feed the reviewer only the information they need when they need it. This section really only gets better with extensive writing and revision. So, my two best pieces of advice are to start early and get a lot of feedback from your advisor, lab mates, and other science friends to make the research clear and well thought out.

resources

Books

• Hollenbach, Andrew. A Practical Guide to Writing a Ruth L. Kirschstein NRSA Grant. Amsterdam: Academic Press, 2014. [ISBN 978-0-12-420187-3]
  Chapter 5: Blind them with science — the research training plan.

• Russell, Stephen W. and David C. Morrison. The Grant Application Writer’s Workbook: National Institutes of Health Version. Los Olivos, CA: Grant Writers’ Seminars and Workshops, LLC, 2016. www.grantcentral.com
  Chapter 10: Research Strategy (Significance and Innovation)
  Chapter 11: Research Strategy (Approach)

Videos from the Stanford Grant Writing Academy (some of these require a SUNet login for viewing)

• Organizing the research plan (23 minutes) by Dr. Rachel Sparks.
  An excellent talk from the 2019 Grant Writing Symposium. Dr. Sparks is the research proposal editor for the Stanford School of Engineering and has worked on over 100 grants! Here, she shares her insights on how to begin crafting a research plan. A very methodical approach to writing the research plan. An excellent resource for researchers that want to get started or learn more about the process.

• The research plan: developing the devilish details (35 minutes) by Dr. Tim Stearns.
  Another wonderful talk from the 2017 Grant Writing Symposium. About 13 minutes into his talk, Dr. Stearns introduces the Query method as a means to expand on your specific aims in the Approach section. Query stands for: (1) Introduce the Question you are addressing, (2) present the Experiments you are proposing to execute to address the question, (3) describe the Results you anticipate gathering, and (4) describe how Your interpretation of the results will inform the original question.

• A formula for abstracts (8 minutes) by Dr. Russ Altman.
  A fantastic talk from the 2017 Grant Writing Symposium. In her talk (link above), Dr. Sparks recommends using this formula for creating an abstract as a means to create an outline for your research strategy. In this short and informative video, Dr. Altman breaks down the abstract into six essential pieces: (1) Identify the big problem relevant to the funding source you are applying to, (2) identify the the critical sub-problem your work will address (where the sub-problem is a smaller problem that is relevant to solving the big problem), (3) introduce a new opportunity, (4) associate yourself with the new opportunity, (5) outline a research plan, and (6) summarize the outcome of what will happen to the world/field upon solving the sub-problem.

• A strategy for communicating your research strategy (7.5 minutes) by Dr. Sky Brubaker. A quick and informative introduction to the research strategy.

• A picture speaks a thousand words (12 minutes) by Dr. Sarah Heilshorn.
  This is one of my favorite videos on the Grant Writing Academy website. Figures are a very important component of your research proposal. Reviewers often do not have a lot of time to review your grant, so having clear and beautiful figures can be a huge asset. In this talk Dr. Heilshorn walks you through the process of making clear figures. A must watch to help you simplify your figures.

• Strategies for success (4.5 minutes) by Dr. John Dabiri.
  In this very short video Dr. Dabiri shares his strategies for grant writing. One piece of advice I really liked was about being honest with yourself about the weaknesses in your proposal (such as incomplete preliminary data, alternative hypotheses, or uncertainty regarding your ability to accomplish your research goals in the time provided) and your approach to mitigate them. This indicates to the reviewer that you gave the research a critical look and you are not just blindly enthusiastic about the work to be done.

• A reviewer’s perspective (3 minutes) by Dr. Jeffrey Koseff.
  Dr. Koseff describes how reviewer’s often read proposals either late at night or on the plane to the review meeting. Reviewer’s only spend about 20-30 minutes on each application, so his key piece of advice is to “get to the point quickly” with figures that are legible and easy to interpret.

• Top tips for grant writing (5.5 minutes) by Dr. Stacey Bent
  Dr. Bent’s top tip is to make it easy for the reviewer to identify that you have met the review criteria. Other tips include, maximizing the feasibility of your research… while it is good to be ambitious, you also need to be realistic.

Getting started: Make an outline

As recommended by both Dr. Sparks and Dr. Stearns, start “writing” your research strategy by creating an outline. Here I have generated a general outline using the “Formula for abstracts” strategy described in Dr. Altman’s talk and the “Query method” described in Dr. Stearn’s talk.

1. Significance

   • What is the big problem relevant to the funding source your are submitting to? For NIH grants, this big problem has to be something related to human health.

   • What is the critical sub-problem that you will solve with your research? You will not attempt to solve the big problem, because this is beyond the scope of a 3-5 year grant, but you will attempt to solve a sub-problem of the larger big problem. Thus, this sub-problem needs to be essential for solving the big problem. The sub-problem also needs to be well defined and relevant to the funding agency.

   • Note, one significance section can be written for the entire project or a multiple significance sections can be written (one for each of the individual specific aims).

2. Innovation (K-awards only)

   • Why is your approach exciting and why will it solve the sub-problem where other approaches have failed?

   • Introduction of a new opportunity here. Affiliate yourself with this new opportunity and in doing so making the case that you are in a special position to solve the sub-problem.

3. Approach required for each of the specific aims

   • Introduction: Introduce the question that you will be addressing.

     • Preliminary data/studies — a part of your introduction, allows you to both address what has been done in the field already and allows you to present preliminary results to validate your approach.

   • Research strategy: Propose the experiments you will execute to address the question.

   • Expected outcomes: Describe the results you anticipate gathering.

   • Potential problems and alternative approaches: Describe how your interpretation of the results will inform the original question.

4. Timeline

   • How long will this project take?

5. Future directions

   • What is the payoff and what is next?

Instructions

Now that you have an outline, start writing! Here are abridged directions from the Fellowship (F-award) and Career Development (K-award) Instructions for NIH and Other PHS Agencies booklet. Feel free to use these as a resource, but always check back with the grant instructions to make sure all the necessary application components have been included.

1. Significance

   • Explain the importance of the problem or critical barrier to progress that the proposed project addresses

   • Describe the strengths and weaknesses in the rigor of the prior research that serves as the key support for the proposed project.

     • Here, the prior research can be preliminary data collected by you or published data collected by other labs.

   • Explain how the proposed project will improve scientific knowledge, technical capability, and/or clinical practice in one or more broad fields.

     • Address how this research will advance the field.

   • Describe how the concepts, methods, technologies, treatments, services, or preventative interventions that drive this field will be changed if the proposed aims are achieved.

2. Innovation (K-awards only)

   • Explain how the application challenges current research or clinical practice paradigms.

   • Describe any novel theoretical concepts, approaches or methodologies, instrumentation or interventions to be developed or used, and any advantage over existing methodologies, instrumentation, or interventions.

3. Approach

   • Describe the overall strategy, methodology, and analyses to be used to accomplish the specific aims of the project.

   • Describe plans to address weaknesses in the rigor of the prior research that serves as the key support for the proposed project.

   • Describe the experimental design and methods proposed and how they will achieve robust and unbiased results. Include how the data will be collected, analyzed, and interpreted.

     • For more information about rigor in research, refer to the NIH guidance on rigor and reproducibility in grant applications.

   • For clinical trials, describe how your methods for analysis and sample size are appropriate.

     • For more information about clinical trials and how to randomize groups or deliver interventions to groups, refer to the NIH Research methods resources.

   • Discuss potential problems, alternative strategies, and benchmarks for success anticipated to achieve the aims.

   • If the project is in the early stages of development, describe any strategy to establish feasibility, and address the management of any high risk aspects of the proposed work.

   • Explain how relevant biological variables (like sex) are factored into research designs and analyses for studies in vertebrate animals and humans.

     • For more information on the need to include women in clinical trials, refer to the following NIH notice, Consideration of Sex as a Biological Variable in NIH-funded Research.

   • Point out any procedures, situations, or materials that may be hazardous to personnel and the precautions that will be exercised.

   • If research on human embryonic stem cells (hESCs) is proposed, but an approved cell line from the NIH hESC registry cannot be chosen, then provide a strong justification for why an appropriate cell line cannot be chosen from the registry at this time.

   • If you are proposing to gain clinical trial research experience, describe your role on the clinical trial.

   • If you are proposing to work with human fetal tissue, then you need to include a special section titled “Human Fetal Tissue Research Approach,” where you describe procurement, procedures, and justify the use of this tissue in your research — if this section is omitted, then the application will be administratively withdrawn. For more information, refer to the following NIH notice on human fetal tissue.