New web site aids Harvard faculty seeking funding

With literally tens of billions of dollars in federal research funding suddenly available — and application deadlines for proposals extraordinarily short — Harvard’s Provost’s Office has established a new web site to aid faculty members seeking grants.

A new button on the left-hand side of the HarvardScience home page labeled “New Funding Available” brings up http://research.harvard.edu.

The American Recovery and Investment Act of 2009 includes funding for research in the sciences, engineering, and humanities, from agencies ranging from the National Endowment for the Arts to the National Institutes of Health (NIH).

As Provost Steven E. Hyman explained, “We created [the Web site] to help all the members of Harvard’s research community avail themselves of this unique opportunity to apply for new sources of funding.

“There are monies in the federal economic recovery act for social science, humanities, engineering, and natural sciences research,” he continued. “This is a brief window in time during which our faculty have an opportunity to secure new funding for their work. This Web site is meant to help guide their efforts, and to provide full transparency on the use of the funds.”

Gregory Llacer, interim chief of staff to the vice provost for research, said the Web site “provides a one-stop area for faculty and administrators to find information about federal and state stimulus funds available for the academic enterprise.”

Over the past five-plus years, NIH funding, the principal source of government support for biomedical research, has remained flat, declining some 13 percent in real dollars, making the $8.2 billion in NIH funding in the Recovery and Investment Act particularly important to scientists.