Effective Strategies for Working with your Sponsor
Oct. 24, 2025—Your fellowship sponsor (your PI) plays an important role in your fellowship application, especially for fellowship applications to the NIH. Beyond supporting you as a scientist, they are responsible for writing key sections of the application to demonstrate their commitment to your training and career development. Sections of an NIH NRSA application written by the...
Understanding the NIH Alphabet Soup
Oct. 24, 2025—Applying for NIH fellowships comes with a whole new set of acronyms. Here’s a quick guide to the ones you’re most likely to encounter: Funding Announcements FOA – Funding Opportunity Announcement The official notice that describes eligibility, objectives, requirements, and deadlines for a grant or fellowship. NOFO – Notice of Funding Opportunity The newer term...
Resubmission (if needed) and Next Steps
Oct. 24, 2025—Not all fellowship applications are funded on the first try, but many successful fellows are awarded after resubmission! If you plan to resubmit your application, consider the following: Read your summary statement carefully. The reviewer comments highlight strengths and weaknesses, so look for common themes across reviewers. These will be important to address in your...
Contacting your NIH Program Officer (PO)
Oct. 24, 2025—After you have figured out which FOA to apply to, verified your eligibility, and decided which institute to apply to, the next step is to contact your target institute to verify their institute is a good fit for your proposal. The “Program Officer” (PO) is your main NIH point of contact for questions about the...
Contacting your Vanderbilt Grant Manager
Oct. 24, 2025—A VU or VUMC Grant Manager is your primary institutional contact for submission requirements, internal deadlines, and routing. They manage the submission of your fellowship application to the NIH and will need to begin working with you weeks in advance of the NIH deadline to meet VU’s or VUMC’s internal deadlines. They will also assist...
Common pitfalls in NIH fellowship applications (and how to avoid them)
Oct. 24, 2025—Fellowship applications are complex. Not only do you have to have a strong scientific proposal and training plan, you also have to manage multiple documents and deadlines. Here are some strategies to help you avoid some common mistakes. Contact your Vanderbilt grant manager early in the process. Your Vanderbilt grant manager will “route” your grant...
Guide to NIH Fellowship Reference Letters
Oct. 24, 2025—Reference Letters are a required component of NIH fellowship applications (and they are different than Letters of Support!) Key points about Reference Letters: You must have at least 3 reference letters, but up to 5 can be submitted. You may want to request more than the minimum number in case one of your recommenders does...
Understanding the NIH Peer Review Process
Oct. 24, 2025—After you submit your application, the review process may seem mysterious. Here is a step-by-step guide to understand what is going on behind the scenes. Cycle Due Date (F Series) Scientific Review Council Round Earliest Start Date I April 8 June – July August or October September or December II August 8 October –...
Identifying the “right” NIH fellowship opportunity
Oct. 24, 2025—Before you start writing a fellowship application to the NIH, it is important to identify the right funding opportunity and connect with the institute staff who manage that funding opportunity to ensure your project aligns with the institute’s priorities. Understand the different types of NIH NRSA fellowships that support research training (a.k.a. “mechanisms”). F30: For...
2025 American Society for Microbiology Branch (ASM KY-TN) Meeting hosted by Meharry Medical College
Oct. 23, 2025—The American Society for Microbiology (ASM) is a professional life science organization with over 37,000 members (scientists, educators, and health professionals) who are dedicated to promoting and advancing microbial sciences around the world. The Kentucky/Tennessee (KY-TN) branch of the ASM meets twice a year. The 2025 ASM KY-TN Fall Meeting is taking place on November 7-8th at Meharry Medical College....
PhD Career Stories: Therapeutic Start-Up
Oct. 22, 2025—Sareina Wu, PhD FOUNDER/CHIEF EXECUTIVE OFFICER Dr. Sareina Wu is a pioneer in the field of virus-free gene therapy and has been internationally recognized for her work in the field of piggyBac transposons. In striving to reach the pinnacle in the field of gene therapy, Dr. Wu founded the innovation-driven therapeutics company GenomeFrontier in 2018. ...
Medical Writing: Part time (Internship), full time, or freelance contract positions, TheMedWriters, Remote
Oct. 22, 2025—Part time (Internship), full time or freelance medical writing contract positions for PhDs, MDs, DCs, NDs Virtual / Telecommute / Work from home / Online A small medical writing company, The Med Writers, is looking for medical writers who have a medical or biomedical degree and some writing talent. This could be freelance or...
Effective Strategies for Working with you Sponsor/Mentor
Oct. 21, 2025—Your fellowship sponsor (your PI) plays an important role in your fellowship application. Beyond supporting you as a scientist, they are responsible for writing key sections of the application to demonstrate their commitment to your training and career development. Sections of an NRSA application written by the Sponsor: Mentoring Approach and Candidate Mentoring Plan Prior...
2025 Chicagoland STEM Postdoc Readiness Initiative
Oct. 17, 2025—Northwestern University, the University of Illinois Chicago (UIC), and the University of Chicago (UChicago) are excited to announce that registration is now open for the fifth annual Chicagoland STEM Postdoc Readiness Initiative! We are writing to ask you to share this opportunity with your STEM grad students and postdocs. About the Initiative The programming will be held virtually on Friday, November...
Funding Opportunity: Winter 2026 NCI Pathway to Independence Award for Early-Stage Postdoctoral Researchers (K99/R00)
Oct. 17, 2025—The purpose of the NCI Pathway to Independence Award for Early-Stage Postdoctoral Researchers (K99/R00) program is to increase and maintain a strong cohort of new and talented, NCI-supported, independent investigators. This program is designed for postdoctoral fellows with research and/or clinical doctoral degrees who do not require an extended period of mentored research training beyond...
2025 Annual NIH Career Symposium virtual event
Oct. 17, 2025—This virtual, multi-day event will highlight a broad range of career paths available to biomedical researchers. Panels and workshops throughout the symposium are designed to help postdocs and doctoral students in the life sciences explore new career paths, learn more about a specific career, and prepare for a successful job search. The Career Symposium will...
2026 ExCEL Scholar Award Competition
Oct. 7, 2025—We are excited to announce the 2026 ExCEL Scholar Award competition, inviting postdoctoral researchers from across the country to present at a research symposium hosted by Montefiore Einstein Comprehensive Cancer Center (MECCC) in the Bronx, at Albert Einstein College of Medicine. Application requirements include contact info, CV, research summary, letter of recommendation, area of core...
Stephen Ornes and “AI and Science Journalism: An Uneasy Future”
Oct. 7, 2025—Stephen Ornes, a freelance science writer, three-time winner of the AAAS Kavli Science Journalism Award, and a Writer in Residence at Vanderbilt University, spoke with Grady College journalism students on Sept. 20, 2025. The topic of his talk was “AI and Science Journalism: An Uneasy Future.” Check out his talk here:
Boosting knowledge: Sharing the science behind vaccines
Oct. 2, 2025—Boosting knowledge: Sharing the science behind vaccines A NEW free training opportunity from SciLine, based at the American Association for the Advancement of Science (AAAS) Thursday, October 9, 2-3 P.M. ET – NEW COURSE Vaccines are a constant topic of public conversation for seasonal, political, and scientific reasons. At the same time, scientists are...
Business Development course through Nucleate
Sep. 26, 2025—Nucleate, in partnership with Genentech , is bringing back one of our most in-demand programs: BD101. This free, virtual course is designed for graduate-level trainees (PhD, MBA, JD) who want to understand what a career in business development (BD) looks like. Each year the course fills quickly, reflecting the high demand for structured, insider exposure to life...