The National Association of IDeA Principal Investigators (NAIPI) is the collective voice of the IDeA community. NAIPI aims to protect and promote the IDeA programs.  It fosters interactions, promotes resource sharing, enhances the national visibility of the INBREs, COBREs, and CTRs, develops consensus on priorities, identifies and disseminates best practices, identifies opportunities and develops strategies for the support and betterment of the IDeA network.

NAIPI

President’s Welcome:

I would like to thank you for your interest in the NIH Institutional Development Award (IDeA) Program and National Association of IDeA Principal Investigators (NAIPI). The congressionally mandated IDeA Program was established in 1993 to build biomedical research capacity in the 23 IDeA-eligible states and Puerto Rico, which have historically received low levels of NIH funding. Through its various funding mechanisms, the IDeA program supports all facets of competitive biomedical research, including basic, clinical, behavioral and translational research as well as supporting faculty development and infrastructure improvements. These mechanisms are designed to strengthen an institution’s capacity to support biomedical research, enhance investigators’ competitiveness in securing national research funding, and enable clinical and translational research to meet the needs of all communities across the United States.
There are four main components of the IDeA program: (i) Centers of Biomedical Research Excellence (COBRE), (ii) IDeA Networks of Biomedical Research Excellence (INBRE), (iii) IDeA Clinical and Translational Research (CTR) Programs, and (iv) IDeA Co-funding. The COBRE program enables the establishment and development of innovative biomedical research centers through junior faculty mentoring and infrastructure development. The INBRE program promotes a statewide biomedical research development network in each IDeA-eligible state, partnering research-intensive institutions with primarily undergraduate institutions. The CTR program supports clinical and translational research by developing research infrastructure and human resources, enhancing investigators’ and institutions’ ability to develop competitive clinical research programs, and strengthening collaborative research that addresses health conditions prevalent in IDeA states. IDeA Co-funding supports R01 and R15 applications from investigators in IDeA-eligible states assigned to any NIH institute or Center that were not funded by an Institute or Center.
NAIPI is a 501c3 with a rich history of serving as the collective voice of the IDeA grant Principal Investigators. The mission of NAIPI is to provide leadership and communication for the development, promotion, and improvement of biomedical research through the INBRE, COBRE, CTR, and all future grant mechanisms of the IDeA Program. NAIPI communicates with the EPSCOR/IDeA Coalition and Foundation to support direct congressional advocacy in partnership with Van Scoyoc Associates – a government affairs firm in D.C.
I have been involved with the IDeA Program for my entire professional career. I started my faculty appointment over 20 years ago in Arkansas as a COBRE junior faculty and have maintained involvement with IDeA-associated funding ever since as a COBRE and INBRE Core Director, COBRE Principal Investigator, and director of the IDeA National Resource for Quantitative Proteomics. Accordingly, it will be my honor to represent all IDeA grant Principal Investigators by supporting advocacy efforts for increasing federal funding and longevity of the IDeA Program. Please do not hesitate to reach out to me with questions and suggestions.

Sincerely,
Alan Tackett, PhD

NAIPI President Alan Tackett

Dr. Tackett obtained a degree in chemistry with distinction from Hendrix College in 1998, and subsequently received a Doctor of Philosophy degree in Biochemistry and Molecular Biology from the University of Arkansas for Medical Sciences (UAMS) in 2002. Dr. Tackett performed postdoctoral training in cancer epigenetics and proteomics at The Rockefeller University in New York City from 2002-2005. He joined the faculty at UAMS in 2005 and has risen the ranks to a tenured distinguished professor of Biochemistry and Molecular Biology. Dr. Tackett received the Sharlau Family Endowed Chair for Cancer Research in 2016, was nominated into the Arkansas Research Alliance in 2021, and received the Odyssey Medal for Research from Hendrix College in 2024. He currently serves as Deputy Director of the Winthrop P. Rockefeller Cancer Institute, Executive Associate Dean for Research in the College of Medicine, and Executive Director of the Arkansas Biosciences Institute.

Dr. Tackett has been involved with the IDeA Program for his entire professional career. He started his faculty appointment twenty years ago in Arkansas as a COBRE junior faculty and has maintained involvement with IDeA-associated funding ever since as a COBRE and INBRE Core Director, COBRE Principal Investigator, and director of the IDeA National Resource for Quantitative Proteomics.

As a faculty member at UAMS, Dr. Tackett has built an internationally-recognized research team that is focused on uncovering new therapeutic strategies to treat metastatic melanoma and developing the next generation of molecular profiling technologies to identify cancer biomarkers. He has published over 150 scientific articles and holds multiple patents in these areas; and has received over 40 million dollars of funding from the government to support his research endeavors. Dr. Tackett serves as director of two National Institutes of Health (NIH) research centers in Arkansas. First, he directs a NIH Center of Biomedical Research Excellence in systems biology that has enabled critical infrastructure development for large data generating technologies and has provided tailored mentoring to numerous early career faculty resulting in their acquisition of over 25 million dollars of research funding from the government. Second, Dr. Tackett directs a NIH National Resource for Quantitative Proteomics that has supported biomedical research in over 1,500 laboratories across every state in the United States and has provided training and workforce development to over 500 faculty and students.

The National Association of IDeA Principal Investigators (NAIPI) is the collective voice of all of us in the IDeA community.

NAIPI aims to protect and promote the IDeA programs.  It fosters interactions, promotes resource sharing, enhances the national visibility of the INBREs, COBREs, and CTRs, develops consensus on priorities, identifies and disseminates best practices, identifies opportunities and develops strategies.

History of IDeA:

The National Institutes of Health (NIH) Institutional Development Award (IDeA) was established in 1993 to broaden the geographic distribution of NIH funding for biomedical and behavioral research.  The program fosters health-related research and enhances the competitiveness of investigators at institutions located in states in which the aggregate success rate for applications to NIH has historically been low.  The program also serves unique populations—such as rural and medically underserved communities—in these states.

NAIPI Mission

The mission of NAIPI is to provide leadership and communication for the development, promotion and improvement of biomedical research through the INBRE, COBRE, and CTR IDeA programs.

Specific Objectives:

  • To foster interactions between the IDeA Program and its constituencies
  • To promote resource sharing among the INBRE, COBRE, and CTR Programs
  • To enhance the visibility of the IDeA Program
  • To develop a consensus on priorities and new directions for the IDeA Program
  • To identify and disseminate best practices within the IDeA Program
  • To identify opportunities and develop strategies to achieve the common goals of the IDeA Program

NAIPI Bylaws are available for download here: Naipi Bylaws 2026