New Informatics Tools and Methods to Enhance US Cancer Surveillance and Research (UG3/UH3) | PAR 16 349

Opportunity Information: Apply for PAR 16 349

The NIH funding opportunity "New Informatics Tools and Methods to Enhance US Cancer Surveillance and Research (UG3/UH3)" (PAR-16-349) is a cooperative agreement aimed at modernizing and strengthening the informatics backbone of US cancer surveillance. The central purpose is to advance "surveillance science" by funding the creation and testing of new tools and methods that help cancer registries collect data more efficiently and with better quality. The opportunity is focused on making registry data collection more detailed, more timely, and more accurate, with the larger goal of improving how registry-derived data can be used for high-quality cancer research.

A key feature of this FOA is that projects must be grounded in real-world partnerships with US population-based central cancer registries. The partnership requirement is not symbolic: an application must involve at least two different registries, meaning teams need to demonstrate coordination across multiple registry settings and workflows. This emphasis reflects the practical reality that surveillance improvements must work across jurisdictions and systems, not just in a single pilot environment. The expectation is that applicants will work directly with registries to ensure the proposed innovations can be implemented, maintained, and adopted within existing registry operations.

What NIH is looking to support includes projects that develop, adapt, apply, scale up, and validate informatics tools and methods. In practice, this means the FOA is open to both brand-new solutions and strong adaptations of existing approaches, as long as they meaningfully improve registry data collection and integration. The scope explicitly includes methods to improve how registry data are collected and linked or integrated with other data sources, and it also encourages expansion of the types of data items registries collect. The underlying idea is that registries should be able to capture richer information without creating unsustainable burdens on registry staff or reporting facilities, and without sacrificing quality or timeliness.

The FOA also makes clear that the innovations should enhance the "core infrastructure" of cancer registries, not just produce a standalone research dataset. In other words, the tools and methods are expected to strengthen the foundational systems registries rely on (for example, data capture, processing, abstraction support, quality control, linkage pipelines, and other operational components), so that the improvements continue to benefit routine surveillance and can support a broader range of research uses over time. By improving the infrastructure, the resulting registry data should become more useful to researchers who depend on large-scale, population-based cancer data for studies of incidence, outcomes, disparities, and trends.

This opportunity uses the UG3/UH3 funding structure under a cooperative agreement mechanism. While the text provided does not spell out the phase details, the UG3/UH3 format generally signals a two-stage approach where an initial planning or development phase (UG3) transitions to an implementation or expansion phase (UH3) if milestones are met. The cooperative agreement structure also implies substantial involvement from the funding agency compared to a standard grant, typically meaning NIH program staff may have an active partnership role in shaping progress, coordination, and milestone accountability.

Eligibility is broad and spans many organization types that could contribute to registry-focused informatics and surveillance innovation. Eligible applicants include various levels of government (state, county, city/township, special districts), independent school districts, public and private institutions of higher education, federally recognized Native American tribal governments, tribal organizations that are not federally recognized, public housing authorities/Indian housing authorities, nonprofits with or without 501(c)(3) status (outside of higher education), for-profit organizations (other than small businesses) as well as small businesses, and other categories. The FOA also explicitly calls out additional eligible groups such as Alaska Native and Native Hawaiian Serving Institutions, AANAPISIs, Hispanic-serving Institutions, HBCUs, Tribally Controlled Colleges and Universities, faith-based or community-based organizations, regional organizations, eligible federal agencies, and US territories or possessions. At the same time, it draws firm boundaries around foreign participation: non-domestic (non-US) entities and non-domestic components of US organizations are not eligible to apply, though foreign components (as NIH defines them in its Grants Policy Statement) are allowed, which usually means certain discrete foreign activities can be included if justified and permitted under NIH policy.

Administratively, the opportunity is listed as discretionary funding, categorized under education and health, and associated with CFDA numbers 93.394, 93.395, and 93.399. The sponsoring agency is the National Institutes of Health. The original closing date shown is April 16, 2019, and the record creation date is June 29, 2016. The provided source data does not specify an award ceiling or the expected number of awards, which suggests those details were either not set in this excerpt or were available elsewhere in the full FOA.

Overall, the grant is designed for teams that can blend informatics, registry operations, and cancer surveillance expertise, and then prove their approach works across multiple central cancer registries. The emphasis is on practical, scalable improvements that strengthen registry infrastructure, expand the depth and utility of captured data, and ultimately make population-level cancer surveillance more responsive and more powerful for research.

• The National Institutes of Health in the education, health sector is offering a public funding opportunity titled "New Informatics Tools and Methods to Enhance US Cancer Surveillance and Research (UG3/UH3)" and is now available to receive applicants.
• Interested and eligible applicants and submit their applications by referencing the CFDA number(s): 93.394, 93.395, 93.399.
• This funding opportunity was created on 2016-06-29.
• Applicants must submit their applications by 2019-04-16. (Agency may still review applications by suitable applicants for the remaining/unused allocated funding in 2026.)
• 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 PAR 16 349

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