NIH Proposal Essentials

Proposal Preparation & Submission

The following provides essential information for applying to NIH for non-fellowship projects. The National Institutes of Health (NIH) provides many resources for improving your application, accessed from the泭 硃紳餃泭OCGs Proposal Essentials by Sponsor page.

Visit OCGs Fellowships and Student Research Grants page泭for information and instructions specific to NIH Fellowships.

Starting an NIH Proposal

  1. Contact OCG Proposal Analyst. At least泭5 business days before a deadline, submit a泭Proposal Submission Request (PSR) form 喧棗泭your Proposal Analyst and separately send your Proposal Analyst your preliminary泭 budget information.
  2. Disclosure of External Professional Activities (DEPA). Your DEPA must be up to date and reviewed prior to your proposal being submitted. For information, see泭91勛圖厙s Conflicts of Interest & Commitment: Public Health Service Agencies / NIH Requirements.
  3. eRA Commons Registration. Each Principal Investigator (PI) must have an泭 account with the PI role泭 affiliated with 91勛圖厙 to submit a proposal to NIH. If you dont have an泭 account or need to relate your account with 91勛圖厙, contact泭Lyn Milliken.
  4. Proposal Package Preparation. 91勛圖厙 submits NIH proposals through泭, which is a portal to prepare and submit proposals through Grants.gov to NIH. Your Proposal Analyst will work in ASSIST and provide a compiled proposal to review prior to submission. Most 91勛圖厙 PIs do not work in ASSIST to prepare their proposal, but this is an option if they would prefer to directly prepare their proposal themselves.

Proposal Preparation Process

  1. Proposal Budget. Work with泭your Proposal Analyst to prepare the proposal budget.
    1. Detailed Budget: NIH requires detailed budgets for budgets that have $250,001 or more in direct costs in at least one year of the budget. See the泭NIH Cost Estimation Tool. A detailed泭Budget Justification will be required with the detailed budget.
    2. Modular Budget: NIH requires modular budgets for budgets that have $250,000 or less in direct costs in every year of the budget (unless an FOA states otherwise). When costs are proposed in a modular format, they must be made in $25,000 direct cost increments; OCG will accept an泭internal Modular Budget with direct costs, indirect-exempt costs, and indirect costs specified in place of a detailed budget. Modular budgets do not require a Detailed Budget Justification but instead require a Personnel Justification, Consortium Justification, 硃紳餃泭Additional Narrative Justification.
  2. Prepare Proposal Documents. Following the泭 and specific FOA for the program youre applying to, prepare proposal documents. See the following section,泭Required NIH Documents, for details, and see the泭OCG NIH DMSP page for more information on NIH's Data Management and Sharing Policy requirements.
  3. PDF Documents. Convert all documents to PDF before providing to your Proposal Analyst.
  4. Email Proposal Documents to OCG. Email all documents to your Proposal Analyst and 喧棗泭grantgov@colorado.edu. OCG will upload all documents to ASSIST.
  5. Review Proposal. Your Proposal Analyst will review your assembled proposal document for compliance with NIH proposal requirements. Your Proposal Analyst will also email you a PDF of the compiled proposal. This is your opportunity to review the proposal and make changes prior to submission.
  6. Approve Proposal for Submission. Provide email confirmation that you are ready to submit your proposal.
  7. Submission! Your Proposal Analyst will submit your proposal to NIH and confirm the submission has gone through.
  8. Check Proposal in eRA Commons. A successfully submitted proposal will be available to view in泭.泭 You can make changes to an NIH proposal up until the deadline date and time and/or up to two days after submission, whichever comes first.泭 Notify your Proposal Analyst if any changes need to be made. We recommend only making changes to items of major concern to avoid errors in the submission process. Two days after submission or by the proposal deadline, your proposal will advance to the next stage of referral and will no longer be available for changes.

Formatting NIH Documents

Full NIH formatting requirements are described at the泭. These requirements are summarized below:

  • Black or high-contrast text colors recommended
  • 11 point or larger font, recommended fonts - Arial, Georgia, Helvetica, Palatino Linotype
  • Smaller text in figures, graphics, diagrams and charts is acceptable, as long as its legible when the page is viewed at 100%
  • Use at least 翻 margins
  • All file names may include letters, numbers, underscores and hyphens. No special characters.
  • Do not use headers, footers or page numbers.
  • Headings within texts of documents are highly encouraged.
  • Only use hyperlinks and URLs when specifically noted as allowed in an FOA. Do not use hyperlinks or URLS to provide information necessary to review your proposal.
  • PDFs must be flattened. Signatures, fillable fields, and any documents with layers or those resulting in error notifications must be flattened by泭 prior to submission.泭

Required NIH Documents

  • Any time you do not follow NIH guidelines, you put your proposal at risk of being returned without review.
  • Proposal Analysts will assist in reviewing your proposal for compliance, but PIs are ultimately responsible for ensuring proposals are compliant.
  • Everything from font size to number of pages to excluding unallowable documents is vital to your proposal being reviewed for scientific merit.

For a quick list of required documents and page limits, see:

Details on document requirements are provided in:

NIH Templates, Samples and Forms

Templates and samples of NIH Proposal Documents are available online as follows:

Post Submission Materials

After submission and prior to scientific review, NIH will accept limited types of materials for inclusion with a proposal. Your Proposal Analyst must provide concurrence of acceptance. For details, see .

Just-in-Time (JIT)

After submission, you will receive a Just-in-Time (JIT) request from NIH if your proposal receives a score sufficient to move it to the next round of review. Contact your Proposal Analyst to submit your JIT information. Please note that NIH has updated泭. Beginning late 2025 (date forthcoming), PIs will have to create and download Other Support documents from SciENcv. All uploaded PDFs must be "flattened" via print-to-PDF before uploading. NIH will also ask for human subjects or vertebrate animals approval documents as applicable to the project at this stage before issuing an award. NIH may request a revised Data Management and Sharing Plan at this stage as well.泭

NIH provides details about the JIT process in the泭. See Section 2.5 Completing the Pre-Award Process.

Other NIH Resources

NIH Changes for Human Subjects Research

Related Information
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