Multi-Omics for Health and Disease - 'Omics Production Centers (U01 Clinical Trial Not Allowed) | RFA HG 22 009

Opportunity Information: Apply for RFA HG 22 009

This NIH funding opportunity (RFA-HG-22-009) supports the creation of one or more Omics Production Centers (OPCs) under a U01 cooperative agreement mechanism, with clinical trials not allowed. The program sits inside a larger, tightly coordinated consortium focused on pushing multi-omics approaches forward for studying health and disease in diverse populations. In practical terms, the OPCs are meant to function as high-capacity, high-throughput laboratory hubs that can reliably generate large volumes of high-quality omics data from human biospecimens, while also helping the broader consortium agree on how those data should be produced, standardized, integrated, and shared for maximum scientific value.

The core purpose is not to run a traditional disease-discovery project aimed at proving one specific biological hypothesis. Instead, the emphasis is on validating, refining, and generalizing multi-omic methods and workflows so they can be applied across diseases, settings, and populations. The consortium will intentionally work in clinical contexts where multi-omics is expected to be especially informative, then combine molecular measurements with rich phenotypic information and environmental exposure data, including social determinants of health (SDOH). The overarching idea is to see how well integrated multi-omic profiles can characterize healthy versus disease states, and to determine what technical, analytical, and operational practices are needed for these approaches to be reliable, comparable, and broadly useful.

Within the consortium structure, the OPCs partner directly with Disease Study Sites (DSS; RFA-HG-22-008), which are responsible for clinical recruitment and biosample collection, and with a Data Analysis and Coordination Center (DACC; RFA-HG-22-010), which supports harmonization, integration, analysis coordination, and data sharing. The OPCs primary job is to take the biosamples provided by the DSS and generate omics datasets using high-throughput molecular assays. While the FOA does not list every assay type in the excerpt provided, the intent of an "omics production" center in this context typically covers scalable molecular profiling workflows that may span multiple modalities (for example, genomic, transcriptomic, epigenomic, proteomic, metabolomic, or related platforms), so long as the outputs can be standardized and integrated across sites and conditions.

Beyond raw data generation, the OPCs are expected to be active consortium partners rather than fee-for-service labs. That means contributing to consortium-wide protocol development (how samples are processed, how assays are run, what quality control thresholds apply, what metadata must accompany each dataset), supporting the development of harmonization and integration strategies, and participating in methods development and best-practices work that will help the field apply multi-omics consistently. A major deliverable for the entire initiative is a multi-dimensional, community-available dataset, meaning the program is explicitly designed to create a resource that other researchers can use after appropriate sharing processes. The production centers role is central to making that dataset coherent, comparable, and technically trustworthy across different study sites and populations.

The funding opportunity is categorized as discretionary and uses a cooperative agreement instrument, which typically implies substantial NIH involvement in governance, coordination, and milestone-based collaboration. The agency is the National Institutes of Health, and the activity aligns with health-related research infrastructure and methods advancement. The opportunity lists multiple CFDA numbers (93.113, 93.172, 93.396, 93.399), indicating participation or alignment across relevant NIH programs and institutes. The original closing date shown is November 18, 2022, and the award ceiling is listed as $2,700,000, with the expected number of awards not specified in the provided text.

A wide range of applicants are eligible, including state, county, and local governments; public and private institutions of higher education; federally recognized tribal governments and other tribal organizations; public housing authorities; nonprofits (both 501(c)(3) and non-501(c)(3)); for-profit organizations (other than small businesses); and small businesses. The FOA also explicitly calls out eligibility for several mission-driven institution types and community-centered organizations, such as Historically Black Colleges and Universities (HBCUs), Hispanic-serving Institutions, Tribally Controlled Colleges and Universities (TCCUs), Alaska Native and Native Hawaiian Serving Institutions, and Asian American Native American Pacific Islander Serving Institutions (AANAPISIs), as well as faith-based or community-based organizations and regional organizations. In terms of foreign involvement, non-domestic (non-U.S.) entities and non-U.S. components of U.S. organizations are not eligible to apply as applicants, but foreign components are allowed as defined under the NIH Grants Policy Statement, meaning portions of the work can involve foreign collaborators under NIH rules even though the applicant organization must be domestic.

Taken together, this FOA is essentially building the laboratory production backbone of a national multi-site effort: generate high-quality, high-throughput multi-omics data from shared biosamples; help define and enforce standards so results are comparable; work with coordinating and analysis partners to integrate omics with phenotype, exposure, and SDOH data; and ultimately deliver a well-documented, multi-dimensional dataset and a set of transferable methods and best practices that improve how multi-omics is applied to questions of health and disease across diverse populations.

• The National Institutes of Health in the education, environment, health sector is offering a public funding opportunity titled "Multi-Omics for Health and Disease - 'Omics Production Centers (U01 Clinical Trial Not Allowed)" and is now available to receive applicants.
• Interested and eligible applicants and submit their applications by referencing the CFDA number(s): 93.113, 93.172, 93.396, 93.399.
• This funding opportunity was created on 2022-09-07.
• Applicants must submit their applications by 2022-11-18. (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 $2,700,000.00 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 HG 22 009

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