Here is a link to relevant text in the Announcement RFA
There are two announcements (RFA-RM-04-003 and RFA-RM-04-022). The original RFA (RFA-RM-04-003) at http://grants1.nih.gov/grants/guide/rfa-files/RFA-RM-04-003.html states:
"These centers, in conjunction with individual investigator awards, will create a networked national effort to build the computational infrastructure for biomedical computing in the nation, the National Program of Excellence in Biomedical Computing (NPEBC)."
"To build the computational infrastructure for biomedical computing in the nation, the National Program will use a combination of NIH funding mechanisms that will be supported by multiple NIH Institutes and Centers. The central constituent of the NPBEC, the NIH NCBC, is the focus of this RFA. The NIH NCBC will provide tools and resources that biomedical and behavioral researchers can use at a variety of levels."
"To meet the infrastructure needs of modern biomedical and behavioral research, the NIH is embarking on a long-term initiative aimed at deploying an integrated national biomedical computing environment. This environment will enable the analysis, modeling, understanding, and prediction of dynamic and complex biomedical systems across time and distance scales and will allow the integration of biomedical and behavioral data and knowledge at all levels of organization. All applications in response to this announcement will be evaluated primarily for the potential of the proposed activities to contribute to this long-term goal."
"The National Centers will be charged with core responsibilities in implementing and coordinating a national project to make, improve, and integrate components of biomedical computing."
"Although these centers as a whole will be aimed at solving a large, long-term problem, each individual center will be focused on solving smaller problems in a 5 to 10 year time frame."
"ADDITIONAL REVIEW CRITERIA: ...
CORES 1-3: Will the work proposed in these cores help establish an integrated national biomedical computing environment? Is the proposed work essential to establishing this environment?"
