Especially over the past several years, the
NIH has worked to dispel some of that mys-
tery and to make the review process more
transparent. Still, the best way to learn how
study sections work is to serve on one. The
ways of serving effectively—getting the most
out of the experience and in turn making the
most significant contribution to peer
review—are happily congruent with the
ways of making study sections work well.The Mechanics
Different study sections operate differently,
but the following description will fit many of
them. Most study sections are organized
around relatively contiguous areas of
research, and its members are selected for
their relevant expertise. Ideally, panel mem-
bers will share sufficient common knowl-
edge that they will be able to assess propos-
als in areas that are at least fairly closely
related. That said, the range of proposals
each study section must consider requires
considerable breadth.
A term on study section is usually four
years. The NIH officer assigned to the study
section, the Scientific Review Administrator
(SRA), is a fixture. The chair, selected by the
SRA from among the roughly twenty mem-
bers, usually serves in that role for the last
two years of the term.
NIH study sections meet three times a year
(somewhere near Washington, DC, in most
cases). Each meeting may deal with 70 to 100
or more proposals. Principal investigators
can indicate which study section they want to
review their proposal, based on experience—
their own or their colleagues’—and the mem-
bership rosters are posted by the NIH Center
for Scientific Review for each study section.^1
Those lists are not a guarantee; at any given
session, some regular members may be
absent, and substitutes not on the roster may
be present.Commonly, the SRA assigns primary
responsibility for each proposal to two mem-
bers, who write detailed reviews in a form
and tone suitable for transmission to the
applicant. A third person, the reader, may
write a shorter set of comments. These write-
ups are prepared before the study section
meets. The SRA identifies formal conflicts—
when the applicant is at the same institution
as a prospective reviewer, for example—but
it is up to the reviewer to notify the SRA of
other conflicts that may interfere with objec-
tive evaluation.
Study sections meet for about 12 hours—
one full day until dinner time and then as
much time as needed on the second day.
Nearly everyone arrives the night before the
first session, and the proceedings conclude in
time to allow people on the West Coast to get
home that evening.
The sessions are intense. The review of each
proposal begins, once the members with con-
flicts leave the room, with a report from the
reviewers and the reader. Frequently, each
reviewer will declare a level of enthusiasm for
the proposal, and then present the findings
and analyses that justify that opinion. There
follows a discussion involving everyone on
the panel. Of course, proposals that are unani-
mously viewed as terrific, or as deeply flawed,
do not require a lot of discussion. But for the
many proposals that are somewhere between
those poles, or about which there are signifi-
cantly divergent opinions among the review-
ers or other members, a full discussion is nec-
essary for the system to work. The discussion
can help resolve differences among the
reviewers, sometimes by going back and forth
between themselves, sometimes in response to
questions asked by other members. It is not
uncommon for reviewers to change their posi-
tions significantly as a result of these discus-
sions, helping the panel to reach a consensus
view. Some differences simply do not resolve.THE AMERICAN SOCIETY FOR CELL BIOLOGY
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