NIH eSNAP
Elimination of the Proposal Summary Form and the
Conflict of Interest Certification for NIH eSNAP Progress Reports

NIH has begun a formal software development process to enhance the discrete exchange of essential information between NIH and applicant organizations. Central to these improvements is the concept of the "Commons," the information interface where NIH and the grantee community will conduct their business electronically. The Commons is a system that provides alternative means by which grantee organizations can communicate with the NIH electronically for the purposes of extramural research administration. Once grantee organization and/or applicant information is received in the Commons and the information is validated, the Commons interacts with the NIH enterprise database (IMPAC II). Through this database-to-database interface the information will be provided to NIH staff for further processing. The systematic development and implementation of the Commons to the extramural research community constitutes a crucial link in the line of communication necessary to make NIH's ERA efforts a success.

NIH Commons Version 2 is now available. Over the past several weeks, OSP has been verifying all MIT NIH investigators and establishing for each a commons user ID. Once OSP creates the PI's account, the PI is notified by NIH with his/her password. At that time, the PI may use the Commons. Currently, the NIH Commons provides:

• Status - This facility allows a Principal Investigator to review the current status of all their grant applications and review detailed information associated with the grant. Institution Officials [i.e. Signing Official (SO) or Administrative Official (AO) associated with the institution] are able to see a summary view of grant applications, review the Notice of Grant Award, and access the Progress Report face page.
• eSNAP - This facility allows an institution to review non-competing grant data and perform a progress report submission online.
• X-Train - Through the Commons, our X-Train application is available for institutions registered to use X-Train.
• Personal Profile - Account data maintained by the NIH such as Degrees, Addresses, and Publications.

eSNAP, the electronic Simplified Non-competing Award Process, is a component of the NIH eRA Commons. ESNAP allows principal investigators to submit an electronic version of a Type 5 (non-competitive) grant to the grants management community via an individualized web interface.

As part of NIH's streamlining activities, the eSNAP application can now, at the discretion of the Institution, be treated as progress report eliminating the requirements for institutional sign-off. In keeping with the spirit of NIH's streamlining activities, MIT has delegated submission authority for the eSNAP (Type 5) to all of NIH/MIT PIs. Since these reports are now treated like progress reports (similar to the NSF model), there is no requirement to complete the Proposal Summary Form for signatures nor is there a need to route the non-competing application to OSP for review and sign-off.

Additionally, when using eSNAP, the conflict of interest certifications are no longer required since the new streamlined process treats these as reports rather than applications. The PI will disclose any potential conflicts during the normal annual review process.

The following links provide some useful guides to using the NIH Commons:

First Time Commons Login
Using the Commons to Check Status
eSnap Process for PI's
Delegating Update Authority

Last updated 6/25/03