Federal funding agency updates
Expand the topic headings below to get the latest time-sensitive updates from federal research funding agencies.
The National Institutes of Health (NIH) recently issued a notice (NOT-OD-26-018) announcing the following new documentation requirements for NIH proposals submitted on or after Sunday, January 25, 2026:
- Researchers must use the following common forms available through SciENcv: Biographical Sketch, Current and Pending (Other) Support and NIH Biographical Sketch Supplement.
- Researchers must obtain an ORCID iD and link it to their eRA Commons account. To comply with this requirement, the ORCID iD must generate on the researcher’s common forms in SciENcv.
- Principal investigators must certify that they have completed required research security training in the preceding 12 months. This certification is submitted as part of the Current and Pending (Other) Support form.
The Carolina Grants and Innovation Hub and our partners offer a suite of helpful tools and training to support USC faculty and research administrators in meeting these new requirements.
SciENcv common forms:
ORCID iD:
Research Security Training:
- CGI Hub Research Security Training page (USC researchers will complete this web-based training and receive their certificate of completion through the CITI training platform.)
- Important Note: To receive credit for completing required research security training, users must download their certificates of completion and submit them to Research Training and Education Services through the form available on the Research Security Training page.
The National Science Foundation (NSF) recently announced several new policies to help ensure NSF-funded projects are free of malign foreign interference and misappropriation, effective Tuesday, December 2, 2025. All PIs, Co-PIs and senior personnel (including collaborators from other insitutions) are required to complete research security training in order to submit proposals to NSF. Researchers are encouraged to familiarize themselves with the policy updates detailed in the NSF’s Important Notice No. 149 and summarized in a helpful FAQ available on the NSF website.
The National Institutes of Health (NIH) announced a new application and award structure last week for applications that request funding for international component organizations. Effective for due dates on or after January 25, 2026, competing applications must be in response to a funding opportunity using a new grant type when requesting NIH funding for one or more foreign components. The NIH will continue to fund foreign components, as long as they are structured as independent subprojects, but will no longer support traditional foreign subawards. Visit the NIH website to learn more about this change and get the official NIH notice (NOT-OD-25-155), which includes detailed application instructions. For important information on how this change will affect future proposals and awards already received by USC researchers that were proposed before this new guidance, check out the Office of Sponsored Awards Management website.
Federal funding agencies have begun to resume operations after the federal government shutdown. Some of these agencies have made announcements about how they will proceed as they resume sponsored funding processes. Their announcements are linked below to ensure USC researchers have access to the latest updates.
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Coming soon:
- National Science Foundation (NSF)
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- Department of Defense (DOD)
- National Endowment for the Arts (NEA)
- National Endowment for the Humanities (NEH)
