Research & Scholarship
Disclaimer: The UF Faculty Handbook is provided as a general reference rather than the official source of university policies and guidelines. For your convenience, links to official UF documents are provided.
Office of Research and Graduate Programs
Research and Graduate Programs (RGP) provides a full range of financial, administrative, and information services for identifying, obtaining, and administering external research funds, and administering graduate education.
Sponsored Research
Division of Sponsored Research (DSR) staff members are available to assist UF faculty and staff with all stages of a grant application, award acceptance, and administration. DSR provides assistance in identifying appropriate funding sources, completing budgets and other agency forms, contract negotiation, and assistance with all forms of post-award administrative requirements.
Technology Licensing
The Office of Technology Licensing (OTL) handles the patenting, marketing and licensing of all UF-developed intellectual property. OTL works closely with UF inventors in the identification and protection of new inventions. All patents, copyrights, trademarks, and materials transfer agreements are processed and managed by OTL. Faculty can find detailed information on technology licensing at the OTL website.
Graduate School
The Graduate School is responsible for enforcing minimum general standards of graduate work at the University and for the coordination of the graduate programs of various colleges and schools.
Research Foundation
The University of Florida Research Foundation (UFRF) administers certain contracts and grants (non-state and non-federal sponsors) as an alternative to administration through the University of Florida. Principal Investigators should contact the Division of Sponsored Research to determine which route to use in accepting and administering their award.
Other Campus Research Offices
The College of Engineering has two offices to assist its faculty with proposal submissions and administration of awards: the Office of Engineering Research (OER) and the Engineering Fiscal and Personnel Office-Contracts and Grants Accounting Section (C&G).
IFAS Sponsored Programs is responsible for processing all research, training, and extension proposals for the Institute of Food and Agricultural Sciences and the post award administration of the resultant contracts. The office acts as a liaison between the IFAS faculty and Research & Graduate Programs (RGP).
The Office of the Dean for Research and Director of the Florida Agricultural Experiment Station (FAES) coordinates research activities of IFAS faculty both in Gainesville, and at research and education centers across the state.
The Office for Research Affairs (ORA) serves faculty and staff in the College of Medicine for research-related matters. The Office reviews and approves grant proposals (budgets and formats) to ensure compliance with University of Florida, Health Science Center, College of Medicine, and sponsoring agency rules and regulations.
University of Florida faculty in the Colleges of Medicine, Pharmacy, Nursing and Dentistry located at the Jacksonville Urban Campus of the Health Science Center are served by the Jacksonville Research Office.
UF Policies Related to Research and Graduate Education
- Policy for Dealing with Conduct in Research
- Guidelines, Policies, and Procedures on Outside Activities and Conflict of Interest
- Indirect Cost Recovery Policy
- Intellectual Property Policy
- Tuition Payment Policy
- Guidelines for the Establishment and Assessment of Centers and Institutes
- Graduate Catalog
- Graduate Council Policy Manual
The Research Process
The Researcher's Handbook contains the policies and procedures for conducting research at the University of Florida and Getting Started in Research - A Guide for New Faculty is a comprehensive source of information to guide the research process from idea to publication. Selected information from these two publications is included below.
Funding opportunities
RGP offers a limited number of funding programs for support of research, conferences, and graduate student travel.
RGP publishes a funding opportunity newsletter in both electronic and printed versions. FYI Online is posted every two weeks and features full-text articles on upcoming grant opportunities and keyword searching of the text and proposal deadlines sections. An email version is also available (click here to subscribe)
DSR Funding Opportunities provides additional resources including free grant alerts services and access to online searchable grants databases.
RGP's Program Information Office provides a funding search service to help faculty members identify external support for their specific research projects.
Proposal Writing
Careful development and rigorous writing of a detailed research proposal are necessary for success in the highly competitive research funding environment at most sponsoring agencies. Members of national review panels state repeatedly that it is no longer good enough to write a solid proposal. It has to be a "great" proposal. Applicants must be prepared to sell their ideas with professional finesse. The Proposal Development section of the RGP Researcher's Handbook is a useful guide. Additional links are listed below.
- NIH "All About Grants" tutorials
- EPA grant writing tutorial
- The Foundation Center proposal writing short course
Use of Human or Animal Subjects
Primary responsibility for safeguarding the rights and welfare of human or animal subjects in research rests with the faculty or staff member who conducts the research.
All projects involving human subjects must be reviewed and approved by the appropriate UF Institutional Review Board (IRB) before the planned research may begin.
All faculty, staff, and students using vertebrate animals or their tissues, regardless of location or funding, must obtain approval from the Institutional Animal Care and Use Committee (IACUC) before funds can be released, or teaching laboratories or experiments begun.
Use of Hazardous Materials
The use and storage of biohazards (infectious agents, transformed cell lines, primary human tumors, and regulated biological materials) and recombinant DNA is monitored by the Biological Safety Office within the Environmental Health & Safety Division. Regulated biological agents fall into two major categories: Hazardous Biological Materials and Recombinant DNA (including transgenics).
When radioactive materials or radiation-producing devices are involved in research, the procurement, storage, utilization and safety have to be cleared by the Radiation Control & Radiological Services (RC&RS) Department within the Environmental Health & Safety Division. It is the responsibility of the PI to obtain these approvals. There are separate application procedures for human and non-human research projects.
Working with Graduate and Undergraduate Student Research Assistants or Volunteers
General information about Graduate Education can be obtained from Research and Graduate Programs. Each college and/or academic department has specific information about research requirements for graduate degrees.
Each college, school, division, and operational unit is authorized and encouraged to utilize volunteers to assist in carrying out its programs. Faculty may choose to involve undergraduate students in their research and scholarship activities in either paid (OPS) or volunteer positions. Rule 6C1-3.0031 covers the responsibilities of the unit regarding volunteers.
The UF Honors Program maintains an Undergraduate Research Database. The purpose of this database is to match undergraduates with researchers in all fields at the university. Faculty may add projects to this database at any time.
The University Scholars Program permits selected undergraduate students to work one-on-one with a chosen faculty member on a research/creative project of mutual interest. University Scholars are award a $2,500 stipend for research during the summer. An additional $500 will be available for research support such as travel to a relevant scholarly conference. Faculty mentors receive $500 in research support in recognition of their direction and guidance of the student. Applications for University Scholars Program are available early in the spring semester. All University Scholars Program participants are expected to publish a research paper in the Journal of Undergraduate Research.
