Botanical Dietary Supplements Translational Research Teams (RM1 Clinical Trial Required) | RFA OD 24 014

Opportunity Information: Apply for RFA OD 24 014

The NIH funding opportunity "Botanical Dietary Supplements Translational Research Teams (RM1 Clinical Trial Required)" (RFA-OD-24-014) supports large, highly collaborative translational research projects focused on botanicals and other chemically complex natural products that are relevant to dietary supplements. The central goal is to move exceptionally promising natural products along a rigorous development pathway toward a highly informative human clinical trial that measures effects on human resilience using quantitative, objective outcomes. Rather than funding isolated studies, this program is designed for integrated, team-based efforts that connect natural product chemistry, biology, clinical science, and measurement science into one coordinated plan.

A defining feature of this NOFO is the expectation of a true transdisciplinary, multi-PD/PI team operating under a single, integrated set of specific aims. The work is meant to generate practical, decision-quality evidence needed to design a future clinical efficacy trial, including data that clarify optimal trial parameters. In addition to determining how best to test the product in humans, projects are expected to build and validate key tools and knowledge that make later trials interpretable and credible. One example the NOFO highlights is developing clinical methods to assess whether the intervention actually engages an outcome-relevant biological target in people, which helps link mechanistic plausibility to clinical outcomes and reduces ambiguity when interpreting trial results.

The scientific focus is explicitly on "chemically complex" botanicals and other natural products, where mixtures of constituents, batch variability, and potential synergy can complicate standard biomedical development approaches. This NOFO aims to support the level of rigor needed for these products, from characterization and standardization considerations through translational studies that justify and shape a clinical trial. The resilience concept is also central: the clinical trial endpoint(s) should be objective and quantitative measures of resilience rather than only subjective self-report outcomes, aligning the program with measurable, reproducible human functional responses.

Beyond the research itself, the program places strong emphasis on building capacity for future work in this area. Applicants are expected to incorporate plans that enhance workforce and institutional capability to conduct rigorous, transdisciplinary research on complex natural products, and to intentionally strengthen diverse perspectives within the research environment. In other words, the grant is not only about answering a specific scientific question, but also about growing the people, teams, and institutional structures needed to keep this kind of high-quality botanical and natural product research moving forward.

This NOFO is part of a broader NIH effort called the Consortium Advancing Research on Botanicals and Other Natural Products (CARBON) Program. Related CARBON components include an R01 opportunity focused on leveraging large-scale data to understand natural product impacts on whole person health (RFA-AT-24-008) and an R24 opportunity to support a limited-competition research resource for natural product nuclear magnetic resonance data (RFA-AT-24-007). Together, these initiatives are intended to strengthen the evidence base, infrastructure, and methods for understanding complex natural products in human health.

Administrative details include that the funding mechanism is an RM1 grant (a cooperative, team-science oriented research project structure), and a clinical trial is required as part of the funded project scope. The agency is the National Institutes of Health, the opportunity is categorized as discretionary grant funding in the health area (CFDA 93.213 and 93.321), and the original application closing date listed is July 8, 2024. The award ceiling is $1,500,000, and the listing notes "ExpectedAwards:" without a number provided in the supplied source text.

Eligibility is broad across many organization types, including state and local governments, public and private institutions of higher education, nonprofits (with or without 501(c)(3) status), for-profit organizations (other than small businesses), small businesses, certain tribal governments and tribal organizations, and other entities. The NOFO also calls out additional eligible applicant categories such as Hispanic-serving institutions, HBCUs, tribally controlled colleges and universities, Alaska Native and Native Hawaiian-serving institutions, and faith-based or community-based organizations, among others. Foreign organizations are not eligible to apply, and non-U.S. components of U.S. organizations are not eligible; however, foreign components as defined in the NIH Grants Policy Statement are allowed, which typically means a U.S.-led project may include certain justified activities performed outside the U.S. under NIH policy.

Overall, the opportunity is aimed at well-justified natural products that are ready to be advanced through a tightly integrated translational package culminating in a clinical trial that can credibly test effects on objective measures of resilience, while also strengthening the field's capacity to run rigorous, interpretable botanical dietary supplement studies in the future.

• The National Institutes of Health in the health sector is offering a public funding opportunity titled "Botanical Dietary Supplements Translational Research Teams (RM1 Clinical Trial Required)" and is now available to receive applicants.
• Interested and eligible applicants and submit their applications by referencing the CFDA number(s): 93.213, 93.321.
• This funding opportunity was created on 2024-03-14.
• Applicants must submit their applications by 2024-07-08. (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 $1,500,000.00 in funding.
• 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 OD 24 014

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