Introduction to Sponsored Research for Principal Investigators

Welcome to Iowa State University! On this page you will find helpful information and resources to assist you in beginning your research pursuits at ISU.

Registration
- Liquid Office (GoldSheet)
- NSF FastLane
- NIH eRA Commons
- Others
Funding Information
Additional Resources
Getting Started with the Proposal Process
Technical Reports

Registrations

Liquid Office

The first thing you will want to do is to get registered with Liquid Office, which is the software used to electronically route the proposal data forms called GoldSheets.

To register, please send an email to and include the following information:

Name:
Department:
Email Address:
Office Phone number:
University ID:

You will then receive an email confirmation with your user id and password. Once your account has been established, you will be able to start your own GoldSheet as the Principle Investigator (PI) or be included on one as a Co-Principle Investigator (Co-PI).

Access the GoldSheet at the Liquid Office homepage; the GoldSheet Review and Approve page has links for system requirements, login problems, and the GoldSheet manual.

GoldSheet FAQs are also available.

FastLane

If you anticipate submitting proposals to the National Science Foundation, you will want to be registered with their electronic system called FastLane. To register for FastLane, please complete and submit the form at this address:

Send the following information to :
First and Last name; campus email, phone and fax; Highest Degree and year earned; and Department

An e-mail will be sent in response that includes your password.

Click here to login to FastLane.

Here are some additional links you may find useful (each link goes away from the Iowa State web):

eRA Commons

If you anticipate submitting proposals to the National Institutes of Health, you will want to be registered with their electronic system called eRA Commons.

To register, please send an email to and include the following information:

Name:
Department:
Email Address:
Office Phone number:

You will then receive an email from OSPA with your user id. The eRA Commons will send you an email with your password.

Here are some links you may find useful:

Commons Demo Facility

Commons FAQ

Others

Please note some other electronic systems which you may want to register for. With these systems, you can register yourself directly with the system and will not need to contact OSPA for registration.

NSPIRES - NASA's electronic system

Please note that PIs do not register with Grants.gov. Grants.gov only has one registration per institution and OSPA is already registered with Grants.gov. Therefore, all proposals submitted through Grants.gov must go through and be submitted by OSPA.

For more information about Grants.gov, please see OSPA's electronic submission webpage.

Funding

A comprehensive list of funding opportunities is available on the Vice President for Research and Economic Development's webpage. In addition, it includes information on internal grants, proposal writing techniques, and grantsmanship support.

Community of Science Funding and Expertise Database. ISU faculty, P&S staff (P17 or higher), Post Docs and Grad Students may self-register for a profile at http://www.cos.com/login/join.shtml.

Here are a few funding programs designed for new and junior faculty:

National Science Foundations Faculty Early Career Development (CAREER) Program
National Institutes of Health's New Investigators Program
Office of Naval Research's Young Investigator Program
NASA's New Investigator Program in Earth Science
OR search Community of Science
1. where All Fields = (young OR junior OR new) AND (researcher* OR investigator*) AND Requirement = Academic Institution
  [724 matches as of 8/27/07 so you will want to select Keywords and/or location to refine your search]
2. where All Fields = career award AND Requirement = Academic Institution AND Sponsor Type = Federal, U.S. [84 matches as of 8/27/07]

Additional Resources

Here are some additional links that you may find useful:

Office of the Provost - New Faculty includes links to events and information for the new faculty member.

Office of the Provost's New Faculty Mentoring Program

Whenever funding agencies limit the number of proposals that can be submitted by an institution, the Office of the Vice President for Research and Economic Development (VPR) will determine which proposals are to be submitted. Please review the policy at http://www.vpresearch.iastate.edu/docs/policies/InternalReviewGuidelines.pdf.

Getting Started

Technical Reports

National Institutes of Health

You will submit your annual reports in the NIH eRA Commons via eSNAP. eSNAP, the electronic Streamlined Non-competing Award Process, is a streamlined process for the submission of information necessary to receive a non-competing award. The eSNAP system allows Iowa State University to submit an electronic version of a PHS2590 Progress Report to the NIH via a web interface.

eSNAP Users Guide for ISU PI's

National Science Foundation

NSF reports are submitted electronically through NSF FastLane. You may view the one page PDF summary of the report system OR the 190-page PDF with full instructions.

If you have any comments or questions regarding this page, please email