Limited Competition: Instrumentation Grant Program for Resource-Limited Institutions (RLI-S10, PAR-27-067)

Limited Competition: Instrumentation Grant Program for Resource-Limited Institutions (RLI-S10, PAR-27-067)

The National Institute of General Medical Sciences (NIGMS), with the participating NIH components named in the notice, runs the Limited Competition: Instrumentation Grant Program for Resource-Limited Institutions (S10 - Clinical Trial Not Allowed). PAR-27-067 is a reissue of the prior announcement and supports one specialized, commercially available scientific instrument or one integrated instrumentation system. The purpose is to strengthen biomedical research and education at institutions with limited NIH Research Project Grant support.

The July 2, 2026 application date has passed. This page remains an active listing because the official notice announces the next application deadline as January 26, 2027. The notice also lists July 2, 2027; January 26, 2028; July 3, 2028; and January 26, 2029 as later application dates. The NOFO expires January 27, 2029. These are scheduled dates in the current reissued announcement, not a promise that NIH will fund every application or that appropriations will remain unchanged.

Key details at a glance

What makes RLI-S10 different from regular S10 and other NIH instrumentation funding

RLI-S10 is narrower than a general equipment request. The proposed purchase must be one specialized instrument or one integrated system, and it must be housed at the recipient institution in a location that supports sharing and collaboration. The notice gives examples including cell sorters, confocal microscopes, ultramicrotomes, gel imagers, mass spectrometers, benchtop NMR spectrometers, fluorimeters, centrifuges, 3D printers, high-throughput optical plate readers, FPLC or HPLC systems, and certain dedicated computer systems.

The program supports research and education in basic, translational, clinical, and biomedically related behavioral fields. A course may use the instrument, but purely instructional equipment that cannot be used for research is non-responsive. The application must connect the requested instrument to current or planned biomedical projects and to a credible educational use where applicable. Reviewers are looking for a capacity benefit, not a general facilities wish list.

The eligibility gate does two jobs at once:

1. It prioritizes institutions with weaker current NIH funding context.
2. It pushes applicants toward shared-access, mission-oriented use, not one-person proprietary buys.

The grant is not just for research output. Every application is expected to show a visible educational role, whether through research labs, graduate-level modules, or major undergraduate modules integrated into curricula.

The review framework asks whether the selected instrument is needed, whether the institution can operate it safely, whether the proposed projects and courses will use it meaningfully, and whether the institution has a workable plan for administration and long-term maintenance. Reviewers also consider institutional commitment and whether the budget is reasonable.

Who can apply

The applicant must be a domestic organization located in the United States or its territories. The eligible organization categories are broad and include public and private higher-education institutions, eligible nonprofits, for-profit organizations, state and local governments, tribal governments and organizations, federal agencies where eligible, independent school districts, and certain community or faith-based organizations. Being in an eligible category is not enough: the institution must also satisfy the RLI-S10 institutional tests.

At the time of application, the institution must have received less than $6 million per year in total-cost NIH Research Project Grant support over each of the previous three fiscal years, calculated with NIH RePORTER. It must award undergraduate B.S. or B.A. degrees and/or graduate degrees in biomedical sciences. It must also enroll at least 35% of undergraduate students supported by Pell grants, calculated as a yearly average over the three most recent academic years. The institution may use either of the two IPEDS reporting options described by the NOFO: all undergraduates, or full-time, first-time, degree- or certificate-seeking undergraduates. An HBCU or Tribal college/university can qualify through the alternative category specified in the notice.

Foreign organizations, non-domestic components of U.S. organizations, and foreign components are not eligible. For a multi-campus institution, an individual campus can be evaluated separately only when it has its own UEI and unique NIH eRA Institutional Profile File number; otherwise the campuses are considered together.

The PD/PI must have a full-time appointment at the applicant institution, and the application permits only one PD/PI. The PD/PI does not need to have an existing NIH award. At least three Major Users are required at submission. A Major User can be a researcher with a scientific need for the instrument or an upper-level undergraduate or graduate laboratory course that will incorporate it into learning objectives. A single course or individual counts only once in the Major User total, although one individual may serve as both a research Major User and a course instructor. Major Users may come from different departments or nearby institutions, but the instrument must be housed at the recipient institution and courses using it are limited to that institution.

Funding and allowable costs

The minimum award is $25,000 and the maximum award is $250,000. There is no upper limit on the price of the instrument itself, but the federal request cannot exceed $250,000. If the quoted instrument costs more than the requested federal amount, the application must explain how the balance will be paid and document institutional support. Cost sharing is not required. No indirect costs are allowed.

The award may cover the purchase cost of the single instrument or integrated system, plus allowable accessories, shipping, taxes, tariffs, and service contracts or extended warranties. Up to five years of service contract costs may be included, but those costs must be paid during the one-year award period. Technical personnel salaries, supplies, disposable devices, office furniture, space alterations, and renovation are not allowable. Software is allowed only when it is integrated into instrument operation or necessary to generate high-quality experimental data from the instrument.

The notice identifies several non-responsive requests that can be administratively withdrawn. These include an instrument with a base cost below $25,000; a federal request above $250,000; multiple different instruments bundled into one application; an instrument with fewer than three Major Users; purely instructional equipment; clinical billable-care equipment; non-commercial equipment without a manufacturer’s warranty; administrative or clinical management systems; multiple stand-alone data-processing workstations; general-purpose facility equipment; and space renovation.

• justification of need for the instrument,
• technical expertise to run it,
• integration with research/education projects,
• and administration and institutional governance for access, maintenance, and sustainability.

Who is eligible (institutional, principal, and user-level)

Because this is a limited-competition call with specific inclusion filters, treat eligibility as three layers:

1) Institutional eligibility

The institution itself must be U.S.-based and domestically located and must meet the RPG and Pell constraints above. This is not only a bureaucratic condition; reviewer and pre-screening teams check these eligibility statements against reported data. The organization types listed in the NOFO are broad: higher education institutions, nonprofits (including some without 501(c)(3)), for-profits (including small businesses), local/federal government entities, tribal organizations, and related entities.

However, there is an explicit domestic location rule and a strict eligibility criterion tied to:

• 3-year average of NIH RPG total costs below $6M, and
• program mission to award and/or support BIomedical STEM degrees, and
• measurable Pell impact (or qualifying HBCU/Tribal status).

This is often where teams fail because they use institutional narratives that sound right but do not match exact data used in SAM/NIH systems.

2) PI and project leadership model

The opportunity supports a single PD/PI structure. Multiple PD/PIs are not allowed. The PD/PI must be appointed full-time at the applicant institution. The PD may be a faculty member actively tied to the institution and can coordinate institutional operations.

Not required:

• pre-existing NIH award for each Major User,
• any dedicated lab technical staff budget line in the NOFO narrative.

Required:

• demonstration of technical competence in the institution,
• defined roles for setup, user onboarding, maintenance checks, and quality control.

3) Major User requirement (critical eligibility and score driver)

At submission, you need at least three Major Users attached to the proposed instrument. A “Major User” can be:

• a research user, or
• an upper-level course that will use the instrument as a core teaching component.

You can include more users later, but three at submission is non-negotiable.

This requirement has two consequences:

1. It prevents speculative single-person purchases.
2. It forces teams to document actual capacity-building impact in both research and teaching.

Funding, budget shape, and what can be purchased

Budget construction should follow the vendor quote. The SF424 cover records the federal request, any non-federal funds, and the total instrument cost. The Equipment attachment needs the manufacturer, model, features, accessories, shipping, taxes or tariffs, discounts, training services, warranties, and service contracts. If the quote exceeds the federal request, the difference must be explained in the Equipment section and supported by an institutional letter.

How to prepare and submit

The application package must follow the NIH Research instructions and the program-specific rules in PAR-27-067. Organizations may use NIH ASSIST, an institutional system-to-system solution, or Grants.gov Workspace. The application then proceeds through Grants.gov and eRA Commons. SAM, the UEI, eRA Commons, and Grants.gov registrations must be active before submission. Registration can take six weeks or more, so an organization that has not already completed these registrations should start well before the target cycle. The PD/PI must have an eRA Commons account linked to a valid ORCID ID; the notice also requires accounts for the necessary signing officials.

The application has a tightly defined attachment set:

1. Instrumentation Plan, uploaded as a single PDF titled “Instrumentation Plan.” It must contain three sections: Plan for Research and Education Capacity Building, up to four pages; Technical Expertise, up to one page; and Organizational Plan, up to two pages.
2. Letter(s) of Support, including an institutional letter that confirms eligibility, reports the institution’s RPG support for each of the previous three years and its three-year Pell enrollment average, and describes housing, access, maintenance, and institutional commitment. If federal funds will not cover the full quote, the letter should document the institution’s commitment to the additional amount. A biosafety officer letter is required when the project involves animals or infectious materials that could create a potential biohazard.

The Equipment section must contain a detailed instrument description and an itemized vendor quote combined in one uploaded document. The quote must show the instrument, accessories, discounts, training services, warranty, service contract, shipping, and tariffs when applicable. An application without the required quote is incomplete and will be withdrawn without review. The notice says not to provide R&R budget or subaward budget forms. A Data Management and Sharing Plan is not applicable to this NOFO.

The capacity-building section should identify the specific bottleneck the purchase addresses, compare reasonable commercial alternatives, describe at least three Major User projects or courses, and explain expected effects on biomedical research and student training. The technical section should identify people who can install, operate, train users, assess performance, and handle relevant sample preparation or analysis. Dedicated technical staff are not required, and technical personnel salaries cannot be budgeted. The organizational section should explain housing, scheduling, user access, maintenance, training, oversight, and how the instrument will remain usable after the warranty or service contract.

Applications are due by 5:00 PM local time of the applicant organization. Submit early enough to inspect the application in eRA Commons and correct any errors before the deadline. The official schedule for the next cycle is January 26, 2027, followed by July 2, 2027. Later dates listed in the notice are January 26, 2028; July 3, 2028; and January 26, 2029. The review and award columns in the NOFO place the January 26, 2027 cycle in July 2027 scientific merit review, October 2027 advisory council review, and December 2027 earliest start date.

What reviewers will look for

Reviewers score justification of need, technical expertise, research and education projects, administration, institutional commitment, and budget reasonableness. A competitive case explains why the exact instrument is necessary now, why existing equipment or shared access is insufficient, and why the requested features and accessories match the named projects. It also makes the three-user requirement concrete: each Major User should have a defined scientific or course need and a credible role in the shared resource.

The institution should show where the instrument will be housed, who will oversee safe operation, how users will be trained, how access will be coordinated, and how maintenance will continue after the service period. Because the award is for one instrument, the proposal should resist unrelated facility requests. The educational argument should identify actual upper-level or graduate laboratory learning objectives rather than simply saying students will benefit. The research argument should tie the instrument to specific projects, expected measurements, and a realistic access plan.

After an award

The award lasts one year and is not renewable. The PD/PI is responsible for administrative and scientific oversight, communication with NIH and vendors, safe and accessible placement, evaluation of research and course use, and ensuring that publications benefiting from the instrument cite the S10 award. A final RPPR is required. NIGMS may request an Annual Instrument Usage Report two years after the Final RPPR, so the institution should track users, research and teaching use, publications, and other outcomes from installation onward. The notice also requires the usual NIH award and closeout policies; it does not create a multi-year project period for this opportunity.

Practical checklist for the January 26, 2027 cycle

First, confirm the institution’s RPG and Pell calculations against the sources specified in the NOFO and confirm that its organization and campus identifiers support eligibility. Second, select one commercially available instrument or integrated system and obtain a complete quote. Third, name at least three Major Users and document the research or course need for each. Fourth, assign the single PD/PI and confirm the required eRA Commons and ORCID records. Fifth, draft the three-part Instrumentation Plan within the seven-page combined limit and obtain the institutional and any required biosafety letters. Finally, submit through ASSIST, S2S, or Grants.gov Workspace, complete the eRA Commons tracking step, and review the assembled application before 5:00 PM local time on the due date.

This is an active next-cycle listing, not an expired archive entry. The July 2, 2026 round is closed, but the January 26, 2027 deadline is announced in the current PAR-27-067 notice. Applicants should use the official NIGMS page and full NOFO for any later amendment, correction, or system instruction before submitting.

Official links and source documents

• NIGMS program page: https://www.nigms.nih.gov/instrumentation-grant-program-for-resource-limited-institutions/Pages/rli-s10
• Official PAR-27-067 full announcement: https://files.simpler.grants.gov/opportunities/ca93b895-6ca4-4379-b016-ff97bbb6ce41/attachments/5aa86a1a-782e-410d-8856-f139b4a9ab84/PAR-27-067-Full-Announcement.html
• Submission systems: NIH ASSIST, an institutional system-to-system solution, or Grants.gov Workspace, followed by eRA Commons tracking.