Emeritizing scientist issues the same unsubstantiated complaints and I am delighted

An opinion piece in The Scientist issues the same old complaints about the NIH grant review system that are familiar to my Readers. In this case, the author Les Costello (website; Research Crossroads Report) takes particular aim at the recent efforts of the NIH to prioritize funding of younger / transitioning investigators.

Moreover, the NIH policy introduces and justifies a form of age discrimination, which guarantees that grant proposals from senior investigators and longtime-funded investigators will be denied based on age, not on scientific merit. This policy will introduce, exacerbate, and even justify covert and overt discriminatory tendencies of reviewers, when it is essential to suppress such influences from a scientifically credible and objective peer review process.

I couldn’t be happier.

I am a total homer, I like to win and would you puhleeez help a sister out?

I am weak. You probably figured this out already. I like competition. I like to watch ’em and I like to join ’em. I like to back factions for essentially arbitrary reasons and I like the best woman to win as well.
This time, the best woman has been putting up a class campaign and is coming down the homestretch in close competition for the win. She needs you to bring this home.
The beauty is, if she wins, YOU win DearReader.
Let’s get to work.

Your Grant in Review: Research Support

It is my conclusion that the section on Research Support in the NIH Biosketch is one of the less-understood portions of the NIH application. I have come to this in the course of trying to learning how to write (successful) NIH research grants, talking shop with colleagues and ultimately a series of experiences reviewing NIH grants. Also, through blogging.
Although I have much less support for the contention, I also believe that this section is actually important to the review outcome for the proposal..thus it behooves the PI to get the strategy right for her particular application.

Should retractions be listed on the academic CV?

A comment on PhysioProf’s recent post about a retracted paper raises an interesting issue.

Do people list their retractions in their CVs? If so, is it career suicide? If not, would hiring committees or other panels that review CVs (like for grants or awards) go looking to see if the scientist under consideration has ever retracted a paper?