FY17 Announcement of the Anticipated Availability of Funds for Phase II Research on Research Integrity | IR ORI 17 002

Opportunity Information: Apply for IR ORI 17 002

The FY17 Announcement of the Anticipated Availability of Funds for Phase II Research on Research Integrity (Funding Opportunity Number IR ORI 17 002; CFDA 93.085) is a discretionary grant program run through the Office of the Assistant Secretary for Health, tied to the work of the Office of Research Integrity (ORI). Its central aim is to support empirical, evidence-driven research that explains why research integrity succeeds or fails in real-world settings, and to encourage practical solutions that can prevent misconduct or help detect it earlier. In this program, "research integrity" is defined in a fairly concrete way: using honest and verifiable methods when proposing, conducting, and evaluating research, and reporting results accurately, with clear attention to rules, regulations, guidelines, and widely accepted professional norms.

A key point in this announcement is that ORI is intentionally pushing the field beyond older approaches that mainly described misconduct or focused narrowly on educational efforts in responsible conduct of research (RCR). After reviewing ORI-supported research and priorities in 2014, ORI signaled a shift starting in 2015 toward research that is more action-oriented and operational. Specifically, the program is designed to (a) identify risk factors that make misconduct more likely, (b) build a solid evidence base for proactive interventions that can reduce those risks, and (c) incorporate lessons learned from prior studies as well as from people with direct experience navigating misconduct proceedings. In 2016, ORI expanded the emphasis further by adding support for the development of tools that make it easier to spot potential misconduct in areas like manipulated images or suspicious statistical results, recognizing that modern research outputs often require technical methods to evaluate authenticity.

The funding structure is organized as a two-phase pipeline, with this FY17 notice focused on Phase II awards. Phase I is framed as small-scale, developmental work meant to generate preliminary evidence, prototypes, or pilot findings. Phase II is reserved for applicants who already succeeded in Phase I and can now propose a stronger, more developed project that builds directly on what Phase I uncovered. ORI explicitly anticipates that Phase I findings may change what a team needs to do next, so Phase II proposals are allowed to adjust scope or direction as long as the changes are clearly justified and tied to the earlier results. The overall idea is to avoid funding large, fixed plans that do not adapt to what the initial evidence actually shows.

In terms of research content, ORI highlights two broad lanes. The first lane draws from social science and related disciplines that study behavior in context, such as anthropology, economics, sociology, criminology (especially white collar crime), psychology (particularly social and cognitive), and law. Projects in this lane might examine how institutional culture, incentive structures, supervision practices, competitive pressure, authorship norms, or group dynamics shape the likelihood of questionable practices or outright misconduct, and which interventions are most effective at changing those conditions. The second lane is more technical and comes from fields like mathematics, statistics, engineering, and computer science. Here the emphasis is on developing state-of-the-art detection tools, including approaches such as machine learning, language technologies, image recognition, and statistical forensics, aimed at identifying potential falsification or fabrication in images and datasets. Put simply, ORI is looking for both better explanations of misconduct risk and better instruments for detecting it.

ORI also signals strong preferences about how projects should be carried out. Collaboration with people who have direct, practical experience handling research misconduct matters is strongly encouraged, including institutional research misconduct officials and institutional attorneys familiar with 42 CFR Part 93 (the federal regulation governing Public Health Service research misconduct proceedings). ORI also encourages projects to be embedded in real research environments and to involve people actively engaged in research careers or training, which reflects a desire for findings and tools that will work under real constraints rather than only in theory.

Eligibility is broad and includes many types of applicants. Higher education institutions are eligible, including public/state-controlled and private institutions, with explicit encouragement for institutions that serve historically underrepresented communities, such as Hispanic-serving Institutions, HBCUs, Tribally Controlled Colleges and Universities, Alaska Native and Native Hawaiian Serving Institutions, and AANAPISIs. Beyond universities, eligible applicants include nonprofits (with or without 501(c)(3) status), for-profit organizations (including small businesses), a wide range of government entities (state, county, city/township, special districts, tribal governments including federally recognized tribes and others), eligible federal agencies, U.S. territories or possessions, independent school districts, public housing authorities, faith-based and community-based organizations, and regional organizations. Foreign institutions may apply, and non-U.S. components of U.S. organizations are also eligible, which reflects ORI's recognition that research integrity challenges and detection methods often benefit from international participation and diverse research contexts.

From the administrative details provided, the opportunity is a grant (not a contract), with an award ceiling of $175,000 and an expected number of awards of 2. The original closing date listed is April 3, 2017, and the opportunity was created on January 5, 2017. In practical terms, this means the program is relatively selective and geared toward a small number of Phase II projects that are mature enough to deliver clear, defensible results or usable tools, while still being tightly aligned with ORI's priorities: identifying misconduct risk factors, testing preventive interventions, and improving detection of falsification and fabrication, particularly in images and statistical outputs.

• The Office of the Assistant Secretary for Health in the health, science and technology and other research and development sector is offering a public funding opportunity titled "FY17 Announcement of the Anticipated Availability of Funds for Phase II Research on Research Integrity" and is now available to receive applicants.
• Interested and eligible applicants and submit their applications by referencing the CFDA number(s): 93.085.
• This funding opportunity was created on 2017-01-05.
• Applicants must submit their applications by 2017-04-03. (Agency may still review applications by suitable applicants for the remaining/unused allocated funding in 2026.)
• Each selected applicant is eligible to receive up to $175,000.00 in funding.
• The number of recipients for this funding is limited to 2 candidate(s).
• Eligible applicants include: Public and State controlled institutions of higher education.

Apply for IR ORI 17 002

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