External Funding for Equipment Grants

If your research or project requires an expensive piece of equipment you will need to seek funding externally for support. In addition to requesting funding in a grant budget for support, you may also want to seek out those fund ing sources dedicated strictly for the purchase of significant pieces of equipment. Four examples of such funding are:

1. NIH National Center for Research Resources (NCRR) / Shared Instrumentation Grant (SIG) Program: The Objective of the program is to make available to institutions expensive research instruments that can only be justified on a shared-use basis and for which meritorious research projects are described. Appl ications are limited to instruments that cast at least $100,000 per instrument or integrated instrument system. The maximum award is $500,000.

2. NSF Major Research Instrumentation Program (MRI): Eligible project costs for instrument acquisition proposals include instrument purchase, installation, commissioning and calibration. Eligible costs for instrument development proposals include parts and materials needed for the construction of the instru ment, commissioning costs, as well as the direct and indirect costs associated with support of personnel engaged strictly in the instrument development effort. The costs of instrument maintenance and operations are not eligible in either category of proposals.

3. Ohio Board of Regents ACTION Fund – The Action Fund allows Ohio 's universities to compete more effectively for federal and other peer-reviewed research support by providing matching fund s for university research proposals that include capital equipment or facilities. Submissions are made by OHIO 's Vice President for Research on behalf of the Principal Investigator/Project Director.

4. US Department of Defense / Defense University Research Instrumentation Program (DURIP): Awards will be used for the acquisition of major equipment to augment current or develop new research capabilities to support research in the technical areas of interest to the DoD. Proposals to purchase instrumentation may request $50,000 to $1,000,000. Proposals requesting less than $50,000 or more than $1,000,000 will not be considered.

TIP: Many proposals for resea rch equipment require significant cost share. Proposals to the Vice President for Research for such cost share support should be made well in advance of the proposal deadline.

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