Special Emphasis Panels (SEPs) have been established by NIH Institutes, Centers and Divisions to cover all scientific peer review activities formerly provided by ad hoc groups.

The National Institute on Alcohol Abuse and Alcoholism (NIAAA) has established a chartered SEP to provide concept review of proposed contract or grant solicitations and to review grant and cooperative agreement applications and contract proposals for research projects not assigned to the Center for Scientific Review (CSR) or a chartered NIAAA review committee. The NIAAA SEP will perform scientific review for a number of activities, e.g., responses to Requests for Applications or Requests for Proposals, Small Grant applications, Exploratory/Developmental grant applications, Predoctoral Fellowship applications, Institutional Training Grants, program projects, and centers. In addition, the NIAAA SEP will be used for project site visits in situations where the site visit team is also the scientific review group and initial review of applications from members of chartered advisory committees with appointed membership.

Invitation and designation of SEP members are at the Institute level. There will be no standing or appointed members or subcommittees of a SEP. Individuals designated to serve for a particular review meeting will be, upon active participation, members of the SEP for that meeting only. Thus, membership will change with each meeting, and several meetings may occur concurrently.

Establishment of the NIAAA SEP does not preclude use of temporary members on chartered review committees with appointed membership.

Submit requests for additional information on the NIAAA Special Emphasis Panel to the NIAAA Web Master.