NIH Directors Transformative Research Awards (R01 Clinical Trial Optional) | RFA RM 22 020

Opportunity Information: Apply for RFA RM 22 020

The NIH Director's Transformative Research Awards (R01 Clinical Trial Optional), funding opportunity number RFA-RM-22-020 (CFDA 93.310), is a National Institutes of Health grant program designed to back research that is genuinely high-risk and high-reward. The core aim is to support individual investigators or teams pursuing ideas that are unusually bold, original, or unconventional, with the potential to reshape how a field thinks about a problem. NIH is looking for projects that could create entirely new scientific paradigms, open up fundamentally new or improved clinical approaches, or produce transformative technologies rather than incremental advances. This program sits within the NIH Common Fund's High-Risk, High-Reward Research portfolio, which is specifically intended to give promising but nontraditional ideas room to develop.

A key feature of this opportunity is that preliminary data are not required. Instead, proposals are expected to stand on the strength of their underlying logic, rationale, and the clarity of the argument that the work could have a major impact in a broad area connected to NIH's mission. The scientific scope is intentionally wide. Applications can come from across behavioral, social, biomedical, applied, and formal sciences, and can involve basic, translational, or clinical research. Clinical trials are allowed but not required (hence "Clinical Trial Optional"), which means applicants can propose a trial if it is essential to the transformative goal, but they are not limited to clinical trial designs.

The program also emphasizes participation from the full diversity of the nation's research workforce. NIH explicitly encourages applications from investigators from underrepresented groups and diverse backgrounds, referencing NIH's broader diversity interest notice (NOT-OD-20-031). Alongside this, NIH welcomes proposals from eligible institutions across all geographic regions and from many different organizational types, reflecting a broad commitment to finding the strongest transformative ideas wherever they originate.

To help focus review on the science and the transformative potential rather than reputation or institutional name recognition, NIH is piloting an anonymized initial peer review process for applications submitted under this FOA. In practice, this means applicants must follow specific instructions to anonymize certain parts of the application so that the identities of investigators and institutions are withheld until a later stage of review. The intent is to reduce bias and ensure that the evaluation centers on the novelty, rigor of reasoning, and potential for major impact.

Eligibility spans a wide range of applicants, including state, county, city/township, and special district governments; independent school districts; public and private institutions of higher education; federally recognized Native American tribal governments; tribal organizations; public housing authorities/Indian housing authorities; nonprofits with or without 501(c)(3) status; for-profit organizations other than small businesses; and small businesses. The FOA also calls out additional eligible categories such as Historically Black Colleges and Universities (HBCUs), Hispanic-serving institutions, Tribally Controlled Colleges and Universities (TCCUs), Alaska Native and Native Hawaiian Serving Institutions, Asian American Native American Pacific Islander Serving Institutions (AANAPISIs), faith-based or community-based organizations, regional organizations, eligible federal agencies, and U.S. territories or possessions.

Foreign eligibility is limited. Non-domestic (non-U.S.) entities and foreign institutions are not eligible to apply as applicants, and non-domestic components of U.S. organizations are not eligible to apply. However, foreign components, as defined in the NIH Grants Policy Statement, are permitted, meaning a U.S.-based applicant may include certain justified international elements as part of the project when allowable under NIH rules.

For context on timing, the source data lists an original closing date of 2022-09-01 and a creation date of 2022-05-12. The award ceiling and expected number of awards are not specified in the provided listing, so prospective applicants typically need to consult the full FOA details for budget and project period parameters, application formatting requirements (especially anonymization rules), and the exact review criteria used to judge "transformative" potential.

• The National Institutes of Health in the health sector is offering a public funding opportunity titled "NIH Directors Transformative Research Awards (R01 Clinical Trial Optional)" and is now available to receive applicants.
• Interested and eligible applicants and submit their applications by referencing the CFDA number(s): 93.310.
• This funding opportunity was created on 2022-05-12.
• Applicants must submit their applications by 2022-09-01. (Agency may still review applications by suitable applicants for the remaining/unused allocated funding in 2026.)
• Eligible applicants include: State governments, County governments, City or township governments, Special district governments, Independent school districts, Public and State controlled institutions of higher education, Native American tribal governments (Federally recognized), Public housing authorities/Indian housing authorities, Native American tribal organizations (other than Federally recognized tribal governments), Nonprofits having a 501 (c) (3) status with the IRS, other than institutions of higher education, Nonprofits that do not have a 501 (c) (3) status with the IRS, other than institutions of higher education, Private institutions of higher education, For-profit organizations other than small businesses, Small businesses, Others.

Apply for RFA RM 22 020

[Watch] Creating a grant proposal using the step-by-step wizard inside the applicant portal: