Circadian Mechanisms Contributing to Obesity, Diabetes Metabolism, and Underlying Heart, Lung, and Blood Disorders (R01) | RFA HL 17 020

Opportunity Information: Apply for RFA HL 17 020

The NIH funding opportunity "Circadian Mechanisms Contributing to Obesity, Diabetes Metabolism, and Underlying Heart, Lung, and Blood Disorders (R01)" (RFA-HL-17-020) supports mechanistic clinical research that explains how circadian biology influences human obesity, diabetes-related metabolic dysfunction, and the downstream risks obesity creates for heart, lung, and blood disorders. The central goal is to move beyond simple associations and instead clarify circadian-dependent causal pathways in people, identifying the physiological and molecular mechanisms through which disrupted sleep-wake timing, misaligned light exposure, altered feeding schedules, shift work patterns, or other circadian disturbances may contribute to metabolic disease processes and related cardiopulmonary and hematologic consequences. Alongside mechanism-focused studies, the announcement also encourages work that can point toward new therapeutic approaches specifically aimed at improving circadian rhythm or circadian alignment as a strategy for primary prevention (preventing disease onset) or secondary prevention (reducing complications or progression in people already at risk or affected).

This FOA is aimed at clinical research that is explicitly mechanistic in nature. Proposed projects should be designed to elucidate how circadian timing systems interact with biological pathways relevant to obesity and metabolism, such as glucose regulation, insulin sensitivity, energy expenditure, appetite signaling, adipose tissue function, inflammation, autonomic activity, vascular function, or other integrative physiology that could plausibly link circadian disruption to heart, lung, and blood disease risk. The program is particularly interested in research that tests and refines models of causality in humans, for example by using controlled circadian or sleep protocols, intensive phenotyping, repeated biomarker sampling across time-of-day, or other designs that can disentangle circadian effects from behavioral and environmental confounders. A major emphasis is on understanding the relationship between circadian rhythm and the underlying pathophysiology that drives obesity-related conditions rather than on broad population-level correlations.

The opportunity strongly encourages multi-disciplinary and multiple-investigator teams, reflecting the complexity of circadian research in clinical settings. Competitive applications would typically bring together expertise in circadian physiology, endocrinology/metabolism, cardiology or pulmonary medicine, hematology, sleep medicine, biostatistics, clinical study operations, and potentially technologies for assessing circadian phase and rhythmicity (for example, melatonin timing, actigraphy, continuous glucose monitoring, metabolomics, or other time-resolved measures). The intent is to support rigorous, integrative clinical studies capable of mapping how circadian mechanisms connect to disease-relevant biological systems and identifying potential points for intervention.

At the same time, the FOA draws a clear boundary around what it will not fund. Studies focused primarily on epidemiological risk (for example, observational studies that mainly estimate associations between shift work and disease outcomes) are considered out of scope. Likewise, clinical trials whose main purpose is to evaluate therapeutic efficacy, real-world effectiveness, or implementation strategies are not the target of this announcement. In other words, the program is not positioned as a pragmatic clinical trial mechanism; it is positioned as a mechanistic clinical science program where the primary deliverable is an explanation of how circadian disruption contributes to disease pathways and how circadian improvement might plausibly reduce risk based on demonstrated mechanisms.

The funding instrument is an NIH R01 research project grant, categorized under discretionary grant funding within the broad activity areas of food and nutrition and health. The CFDA numbers associated with the opportunity include 93.233, 93.837, 93.838, 93.839, and 93.847, reflecting NIH institute and center programmatic authorities that can support related biomedical and clinical research. The listed award ceiling is $500,000 (as provided in the source data), and the original closing date for the solicitation was March 14, 2017, with a creation date of October 25, 2016.

A wide range of applicant organizations are eligible. Eligible applicants include state, county, and local governments; special district governments; independent school districts; public and state-controlled institutions of higher education; private institutions of higher education; federally recognized Native American tribal governments; tribal organizations other than federally recognized tribal governments; public housing authorities/Indian housing authorities; nonprofits with or without 501(c)(3) status (other than institutions of higher education); for-profit organizations other than small businesses; small businesses; and other organizations as allowed by NIH policy. The announcement also explicitly highlights additional eligible applicant types such as Alaska Native and Native Hawaiian Serving Institutions, AANAPISISs, faith-based or community-based organizations, Hispanic-serving institutions, HBCUs, Indian/Native American tribal governments that are not federally recognized, regional organizations, Tribally Controlled Colleges and Universities, eligible federal agencies, and U.S. territories or possessions. However, non-domestic (non-U.S.) entities and non-domestic components of U.S. organizations are not eligible to apply as applicants. Foreign components, as defined in the NIH Grants Policy Statement, may be included when allowable, meaning a U.S. applicant organization can propose certain foreign activities or collaborations as part of the project if they meet NIH definitions and policy requirements.

Overall, this FOA is best understood as an NIH initiative to fund human mechanistic studies that explain the biological "why" and "how" behind circadian contributions to obesity, diabetes-related metabolic dysfunction, and obesity-linked heart, lung, and blood disorders, with an eye toward identifying circadian-targeted therapeutic directions grounded in demonstrated mechanism rather than broad epidemiology or late-stage clinical trial evaluation.

• The National Institutes of Health in the food and nutrition, health sector is offering a public funding opportunity titled "Circadian Mechanisms Contributing to Obesity, Diabetes Metabolism, and Underlying Heart, Lung, and Blood Disorders (R01)" and is now available to receive applicants.
• Interested and eligible applicants and submit their applications by referencing the CFDA number(s): 93.233, 93.837, 93.838, 93.839, 93.847.
• This funding opportunity was created on 2016-10-25.
• Applicants must submit their applications by 2017-03-14. (Agency may still review applications by suitable applicants for the remaining/unused allocated funding in 2026.)
• Each selected applicant is eligible to receive up to $500,000.00 in funding.
• Eligible applicants include: State governments, County governments, City or township governments, Special district governments, Independent school districts, Public and State controlled institutions of higher education, Native American tribal governments (Federally recognized), Public housing authorities/Indian housing authorities, Native American tribal organizations (other than Federally recognized tribal governments), Nonprofits having a 501 (c) (3) status with the IRS, other than institutions of higher education, Nonprofits that do not have a 501 (c) (3) status with the IRS, other than institutions of higher education, Private institutions of higher education, For-profit organizations other than small businesses, Small businesses, Others.

Apply for RFA HL 17 020

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