Copyright © 2020 pubrica. All rights reserved 1
Challenges for Research Scholars in Writing Pharmaceutical Research Grant
Dr. Nancy Agens, Head,
Technical Operations, Pubrica
In Brief
Research proposal grant writing is targeted
primarily to graduate students and faculties
and for research scholars who seek funding
for research. Research grant writing varies
widely across the disciplines from philosophy
or the arts to medicine or policy research.
Writing a successful grant application is a long
and challenging process and requires expert’s
guidance to secure prestigious funding as they
help you develop a quality grant proposal.
I. INTRODUCTION
Critical thinking, creativity and
innovation are the essential factors in carrying
out scientific research. Hence, the primary
objective of any research is to produce new
knowledge and relevant findings leading to
sustainable improvement to the needs of society.
Research is empirical because of the
involvement of serious of observations,
measurements and analysis of data based on the
well-driven experimental design.
Pharmaceutical research is defined as the
development of drugs which emphasize the
discovery and treatment of diseases.
Pharmaceutical scientists discover, develop,
test, and manufacture new medications. A
significant and innovative research question is
the first and primary ingredient in a successful
proposal. The research proposal or academic
writing is to assist in developing a strong
fundamental understanding of developing
pharmaceutical study design/protocol and
communicate the finding for future
development. Research grant writing helps in
getting funds quickly from the funding agency,
and it is highly competitive in securing a
prestigious grant for doing pharmaceutical
research.
II. CHALLENGES DURING THE PHASE OF
WRITING A RESEARCH GRANT
PROPOSAL
1. Identifying your needs and brainstorm
idea: First, the identifying question that needs to be
focused and developing ideas should be clearly
explained, along with alternative methods and
plans. Ideas should satisfy the need of the hour.
Concepts should not be too ambitious, and
technology driven. Lack of proof and low
impact is a big deal.
2. Innovation:
Innovations are critical and must be without
controversy, which is questionable. It should
contain novel concepts, approaches and methods
3. Time:
It takes time to write everything together, which
convinces the reader. The proposal must be
uncompetitive and non-compliant. Outline the
whole proposal clearly before you start writing
and explain science clearly. Use concise and
clear language.
4. Hypotheses:
Hypotheses should give insight into a research
question. Be testable and measurable by the
proposed research methodology. Consistency
while describing the predictions must be
maintained.
5. Research design:
This section should provide details of planned
methods to carry out experiments, and the
supporting explanation should need to justify
Copyright © 2020 pubrica. All rights reserved 2
the selected method is appropriated along with
references.
Fig 1. Research Grant Writing Ptocess
6. Presentation:
Unclear format and incorrect citing lead to
denial. The proposal should clearly state the
problem or hypothesis by avoiding language
errors and clarity problems.
7. Preliminary studies: Challenging to incorporate the results of
preliminary studies need to be focused like not
providing enough data that is mandatory and
providing data which is not stable. Poorly
presented data are difficult to follow and
conclude results by providing too many details
of auxiliary methods.
8. Budget:
Remember the budget limitations and
understand the budget size, which will influence
the score. Include all other sources of funding
for the proposed study and justify all categories
of funds requested. Researchers that do not have
a sound working knowledge of statistics need to
have a consultation with a biostatistician to
ensure the procedures which required sampling,
data collection and data analysis are
scientifically valid. Reviewers can recommend
budget cuts when they think that expenses are
overly high or unwarranted. The budget must
accurately reflect the plan for data collection,
data analysis, and data write up.
III. REVISING THE GRANT PROPOSAL
Developing a grant proposal is a time taking
process and challenging for early researchers as
it requires quality experience in pharmaceutical
research for providing accurate details. Every
proposal must pass through several readers to
get feedback from both pharmaceutical and non-
pharmaceutical specialists to know the
drawbacks and area of improvement. Since it
takes a lot of time, Pubrica offers grant proposal
reviewing and has expertise to complete a
quality and high standard research grant
proposal in no time.
In summary, connecting goals, objectives, and
hypothesis is a big task to the research scholars
as it can be solved by framing the research
problems and developing the hypotheses
properly. The author should know the nature of
the funding agencies and must follow their
instructions and proposal guidelines properly.
Besides, they must know their audience, readers
mission and accomplishment and most
importantly, the author must analyze the
assessment criteria for funding by using the
appropriate disciplinary concepts and methods.
Describing the purpose of the proposal is to
discuss all relevant aspects of the research
process, and it can provide new opportunities
which can serve as your steppingstones. In
addition, the research proposal writing should
have concern over the proper page limit, word
limit and budget limit. The proposed research
grant should have appropriate abstract and
reference format and need to make sure that the
abstract clearly explains the proposed project
and emphasizes why it is essential.
Copyright © 2020 pubrica. All rights reserved 2
To overcome all the challenges and complete
writing a standard and quality research grant
proposal, our experts are available to support
and assist our client in pharmaceutical research
as well as in all therapeutic areas and
engineering fields. We have experience in
writing research proposal for National Institutes
of Health, Human Frontier Science Program,
European Research Council (ERC),
Congressionally Directed Medical Research
Program (CDMRP), National Science
Foundation (NSF), Natural Sciences and
Engineering Research Council (NSERC),
Wellcome Trust, and National Institute for
Health Research (NIHR). Besides, we have a
strong team to support our client with any
customized service like budget planning,
reviewing research grant and suggestions from
our top experts.
REFERENCE
1. Gerard H.Koppelman, John W.Holloway, Successful grant
writing, Paediatric Respiratory Reviews Volume 13, Issue
1, March 2012, Pages 63-66.
2. Otto O Yang, Guide to Effective Grant Writing: How to
Write a Successful NIH Grant application, Springer New
York Heidelberg Dordrecht London.
3. Porter, Robert, Why Academics Have a Hard Time Writing
Good Grant Proposals, Journal of Research Administration,
v38 n2 p37-43.
4. Georges Bordage Beth Dawson, Experimental study
design and grant writing in eight steps and 28 questions,
Medical Education/Volume 37, Issue 4.
5. Jamie Dow Chevis Shannon, Grants and Funding Sources,
A Guide to the Scientific Career: Virtues, Communication,
Research and Academic Writing.