The extramural role of the NIH as a research support agency.

An investigation of the role of the National Institutes of Health (NIH) biomedical research activity is reported, based on counts of research support acknowledgments in 264 biomedical journals covered by the Science Citation Index in 1973. Overall, NIH research support was acknowledged in approximately 25% of the clinical papers and almost 50% of the biomedical research papers. At all levels, NIH support appears to be twice as large as that of all other federal agencies combined. Each of the major institutes of NIH shows a dual pattern of research support, with a specific peak in the appropriate clinical areas and a second peak of supported research in an area of basic research activity.