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Use the agency’s review logic as your outline. For most NIH research project grants due on or after January 25, 2025, reviewers organize judgments around Importance of the Research, Rigor and Feasibility, and Expertise and Resources. NIH still expects a recognizable Significance, Innovation, Approach Research Strategy. NSF uses two co-equal tests: Intellectual Merit and Broader Impacts. A proposal can be scientifically excellent and still fail if it leaves the agency’s other required criterion vague.
The shortest useful translation
Write an NIH application to answer two questions: Should this project be conducted? and Can it be conducted? The first question is expressed through the importance of the problem and the project’s innovation; the second is expressed through a rigorous, feasible approach backed by sufficient expertise and resources.
Write an NSF proposal to answer two different, co-equal questions: How will this work advance knowledge? and How will it benefit society or contribute to specific desired societal outcomes? NSF calls those tests Intellectual Merit and Broader Impacts. Both receive full consideration, and neither is sufficient by itself.
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NIH and NSF at a glance
| Writing task | NIH emphasis | NSF emphasis |
|---|---|---|
| Explain why the work matters | Significance and likely scientific or health impact, including the advance expected if the aims succeed | Intellectual Merit: the potential to advance knowledge within or across fields |
| Explain what is new | Innovation, considered with Significance inside the Importance of the Research factor | Creative, original, or potentially transformative concepts, considered under both criteria |
| Show that the plan can work | Approach, scored as Rigor and Feasibility; include design, analysis, risks, alternatives, and rigor of prior research | A well-reasoned, organized plan with a sound rationale and a way to assess success |
| Establish capability | Expertise and Resources factor asks whether investigators and the institution have what the work requires | Reviewer consideration of the qualifications of the individual, team, or organization and the adequacy of resources |
| Express public value | Mission-linked scientific or health significance, plus any population, inclusion, clinical, or other requirements in the specific notice | Broader Impacts is a separately visible, required criterion tied to concrete societal outcomes |
| Handle compliance | Some items are handled administratively rather than as scored peer-review factors; the funding opportunity and Application Guide control | Follow the Proposal and Award Policies and Procedures Guide (PAPPG) and solicitation; noncompliant proposals can be returned without review |
How NIH’s review frame works after January 25, 2025
NIH’s Simplified Review Framework applies to most research project grant applications with due dates on or after January 25, 2025. The framework, announced by NIH in 2023, groups the scientific and technical review into three factors.
1. Importance of the Research
This factor combines the familiar ideas of Significance and Innovation. NIH scores it on a 1–9 criterion scale. Your narrative must establish both the importance of the problem and the contribution your project will make if it succeeds.
- Significance: Define the specific scientific or health problem, identify the knowledge or capability that is missing, and state the advance that the proposed aims will deliver.
- Innovation: Identify the precise conceptual, methodological, or technological change. Explain why it changes what investigators can know or do, rather than merely labeling the project “novel.”
Do not substitute the importance of a disease, population, or broad field for the importance of the proposed work. A serious disease does not automatically make every proposed experiment important; reviewers need to see the advance produced by these aims.
2. Rigor and Feasibility
Approach is now scored through the Rigor and Feasibility factor, also on a 1–9 scale. The section should let a reviewer determine whether the design can answer the stated questions and whether the team has anticipated credible ways it could fail.
- State the design, controls, measurements, analysis, and decision points.
- Explain how biological variables, authentication, reproducibility, and transparency are handled where they apply.
- Discuss weaknesses in prior research and how your design reduces the risk that they will undermine the new work.
- For important risks, give an alternative method, stopping rule, or interpretation path rather than promising that problems will not occur.
- Connect each experiment or task to an aim and to the evidence needed to judge success.
3. Expertise and Resources
NIH assesses Investigators and Environment together as Expertise and Resources. This factor is evaluated for sufficiency rather than with the 1–9 criterion score used for the first two factors. Make the capability argument explicit: identify who has the needed technical expertise, which facilities or datasets are available, and what gaps require a collaborator, subcontract, or new support.
Why NIH still expects Significance, Innovation, and Approach headings
NIH’s current writing guidance continues to recommend the sequence Significance, Innovation, Approach for the Research Strategy. The headings remain useful because they help reviewers locate the evidence, even though the first two headings are considered together as Importance and Approach is judged as Rigor and Feasibility.
Use the headings as a navigation system, not as three isolated essays. The Significance section should state the problem and the promised advance; Innovation should specify the change that makes the advance possible; Approach should demonstrate that the work is rigorous and feasible. Cross-reference aims and evidence so the three sections form one argument.
How NSF’s two-criterion system works
NSF’s Proposal and Award Policies and Procedures Guide (PAPPG) 24-1 defines two mandatory criteria:
Intellectual Merit encompasses the potential to advance knowledge. Broader Impacts encompasses the potential to benefit society and contribute to the achievement of specific, desired societal outcomes.
NSF states that both criteria receive full consideration and that each is necessary but neither, by itself, is sufficient. Give them visible, appropriately developed treatment in the proposal instead of treating Broader Impacts as a closing paragraph added after the technical work.
Intellectual Merit
Explain the gap in knowledge, the idea that could close it, and the evidence that will test it. Reviewers look for a plausible advance within a field or across fields, not simply a list of activities. If the concept could change an established way of thinking or enable a new capability, explain the mechanism of that change and what observations would support it.
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Broader Impacts is not a general statement that the work will “benefit society.” The PAPPG expects clear goals, described activities, and documentation of outputs. Identify:
- Beneficiary or audience: who is expected to benefit and why that group is connected to the project.
- Activity: what the team will actually do, such as a training program, open dataset, curriculum, public engagement activity, technology transfer effort, or participation pathway.
- Intended outcome: the specific change sought for the audience or community.
- Assessment method: how you will know whether the activity produced the intended result, including a measure, baseline, milestone, or documented output.
Choose activities that the team can execute and evaluate. A small, well-defined program with a named audience and credible measure is stronger than a long list of aspirational benefits.
The five NSF reviewer prompts
NSF reviewers use the same five kinds of questions for both criteria. Use them as a drafting checklist for Intellectual Merit and again for Broader Impacts:
- What potential advance or benefit does the project offer?
- How creative, original, or potentially transformative is the idea?
- Is there a well-reasoned, organized plan, and how will success be assessed?
- Are the individual, team, and organization qualified?
- Are the necessary resources available?
The prompts do not turn Broader Impacts into a second technical-methods section. They require the same level of specificity about rationale, execution, capability, and evaluation while the desired outcome differs.
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What “research priority” means at each agency
NIH: importance, rigor, and context
NIH priority is primarily expressed through the importance of the proposed scientific or health advance, the rigor and feasibility of the plan, and the sufficiency of the investigators and environment. Health relevance can be central to the NIH mission, but the notice of funding opportunity (NOFO) may add requirements about populations, inclusion, clinical relevance, or other program objectives.
Innovation helps establish importance, but NIH guidance also recognizes that important work need not be highly innovative. Do not inflate novelty claims when the contribution is instead a definitive test, a rigorous replication, a new application of a sound method, or a resource that fills a critical gap.
NSF: knowledge advancement plus societal outcomes
NSF priority is expressed through the combination of knowledge advancement and societal benefit. A technically excellent project with no credible Broader Impacts case is incomplete, just as an outreach-heavy project with no convincing Intellectual Merit case is incomplete. NSF solicitations can also identify portfolio objectives, capacity-building aims, transformational potential, or other program-specific considerations.
For NSF, “priority” therefore cannot be reduced to a topic label. The proposal must show how the project advances understanding and how its planned activities contribute to a defined societal outcome.
How to draft an NIH application
Use the following sequence for a proposal subject to the Simplified Review Framework. Confirm the exact requirements in the applicable NOFO and current NIH Application Guide before submission.
- Start with the review question. Write one sentence describing why the proposed research should be conducted and one describing why your team can conduct it. These sentences become the logic for Importance and Rigor and Feasibility.
- Build Significance around an advance. Define the problem, explain what is unknown or inadequate, and state what knowledge, method, or health-relevant capability will exist if the aims succeed. Distinguish the importance of the work from the seriousness of the underlying condition.
- Make Innovation precise. Name the conceptual, methodological, or technological change. Explain what current approaches cannot do and what your approach makes possible. If the project is important but not highly innovative, say what makes it decisive, rigorous, or enabling instead of adding unsupported novelty language.
- Organize Approach by aims and decisions. For each aim, give the rationale, design, controls, measurements, analysis, expected interpretation, and criteria for success. Show how the evidence answers the question posed in Significance.
- Expose rigor and reproducibility. Make biological variables, authentication, prior-research limitations, transparency practices, and reproducibility safeguards easy to find. Treat these as part of the argument for feasibility, not as boilerplate.
- Plan for failure. Identify the assumptions most likely to be wrong. Provide alternatives, risk thresholds, and interpretation paths. A credible contingency is more persuasive than an assertion that every method will work as planned.
- Close the capability loop. Map each demanding task to investigator expertise, facilities, equipment, data, or collaborators. State how an identified gap will be covered.
- Check the NOFO separately. NIH review criteria vary by application type and funding opportunity. Verify required attachments, page limits, review language, population or inclusion requirements, and any items handled outside peer review.
How to draft an NSF proposal
- Write an Intellectual Merit claim. State the knowledge gap, the central idea, and the advance that would result. Explain why the project could alter understanding, methods, or capability rather than merely produce another dataset.
- Write a separate Broader Impacts claim. Name the beneficiary, activity, intended outcome, schedule or milestone, and assessment method. Tie the activity to the project’s actual expertise and resources.
- Apply the five prompts to each criterion. Check potential benefit, creativity or transformative potential, plan and success assessment, qualifications, and resources for Intellectual Merit and for Broader Impacts.
- Make assessment operational. Define outputs and outcomes separately. For example, a workshop count is an output; a measured change in participant capability is an outcome. State how data will be collected and when the team will review it.
- Integrate, then label. The technical plan may support both criteria, but reviewers should not have to infer which activities serve which criterion. Use explicit headings and cross-references.
- Read the solicitation for additions. NSF programs may add criteria or portfolio objectives. Follow the solicitation and PAPPG instructions exactly; a compliance defect can result in return without review.
Translating one project for both agencies
Suppose a team proposes a new method for detecting an environmental contaminant and plans to train community laboratories. The core science can be shared, but the framing should change.
NIH-style framing
Under Significance, describe the health problem and the specific diagnostic or exposure-assessment advance. Under Innovation, identify the methodological change that improves detection. Under Approach, document validation design, controls, analysis, reproducibility, risks, and alternatives. Explain which investigators, facilities, and partnerships provide the required expertise and resources. Any community component should be tied to the health significance and to requirements in the applicable NOFO.
NSF-style framing
Under Intellectual Merit, explain how the method advances measurement science or environmental knowledge and what evidence will establish that advance. Under Broader Impacts, identify the community laboratories as the audience, describe the training and open-resource activities, state the intended capability gained, and specify assessment measures such as demonstrated proficiency or documented adoption. The two arguments should be equally visible.
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The example illustrates why copying an NIH Research Strategy into an NSF proposal, or adding an outreach paragraph to an NIH application, misses each agency’s decision structure.
Quick Recap
Common drafting mistakes and fixes
| Mistake | Why it weakens the proposal | Fix |
|---|---|---|
| Using only “Significance, Innovation, Approach” for NIH without adapting to the new factors | Reviewers may not see how the narrative answers Importance or Rigor and Feasibility | Keep the familiar headings, but explicitly connect Significance and Innovation to Importance and Approach to rigor, feasibility, and risk control |
| Claiming that a major disease or broad field makes the project important | The importance of the context does not establish the advance produced by the aims | Name the specific knowledge or health improvement expected if the work succeeds |
| Calling a project innovative without identifying the change | A label does not show what current methods cannot do | Describe the conceptual, methodological, or technological difference and its consequence |
| Listing methods without decision rules | Reviewers cannot judge whether results will answer the question or what happens when assumptions fail | Add controls, analysis, success criteria, risks, alternatives, and interpretation paths |
| Giving NSF Broader Impacts a generic societal-benefit paragraph | There is no defined audience, activity, outcome, or evidence of success | Specify beneficiary, activity, intended outcome, outputs, and assessment method |
| Treating NSF Broader Impacts as optional because the science is strong | NSF requires full consideration of both criteria | Give Broader Impacts its own visible argument with realistic activities and measures |
| Assuming one agency’s criteria apply to every opportunity | NIH NOFOs and NSF solicitations can add requirements or criteria | Read the exact notice, application guide, and current policy version for the intended due date |
| Hiding capability gaps | Missing expertise or resources can undermine feasibility | Identify the gap and name the collaborator, facility, data source, or support that addresses it |
Version and compliance checks before submission
NIH checks
- Confirm that the application is covered by the Simplified Review Framework and that its due date is on or after January 25, 2025.
- Read the NOFO’s stated review criteria; NIH criteria vary by application type and opportunity.
- Use the current NIH Application Guide and verify page limits, attachments, required plans, and any administrative-review items.
- Ensure every major claim in Significance and Innovation is supported by a corresponding aim and evidence in Approach.
NSF checks
- Use PAPPG 24-1 unless the applicable solicitation directs otherwise.
- Check whether a program-specific solicitation adds review criteria, portfolio objectives, or special instructions.
- Verify the policy version and any supplement tied to the intended award or submission date. NSF’s policy page lists supplements 26-200 and 26-202 for specified awards after December 8, 2025, and January 22, 2026, respectively.
- Make Intellectual Merit and Broader Impacts separately findable and assessable.
- Check formatting and submission compliance; NSF may return a noncompliant proposal without review.
A practical choice when a project could fit either agency
- Choose the agency whose mission matches the promised advance. A health-centered advance may fit NIH’s importance framework; a knowledge advance paired with defined societal outcomes may fit NSF’s two-criterion structure.
- Inventory the evidence you already have. If your strongest material is disease relevance, experimental rigor, and clinical or biological capability, an NIH-shaped narrative may be more natural. If you can articulate a field-level knowledge advance and a measurable societal-outcome plan, NSF may be the better rhetorical fit.
- Test the weak criterion early. For NIH, look for an unconvincing advance, unaddressed feasibility risk, or missing expertise. For NSF, look for a thin Intellectual Merit case or Broader Impacts activities without a beneficiary and metric.
- Rewrite the opening and section labels for the chosen agency. Do not submit a generic introduction and expect reviewers to translate it.
- Recheck the live notice immediately before submission. Policy dates, supplements, and program-specific requirements can change.
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