Proposal Form
To participate in the program, researchers should submit a non-confidential research proposal using the Syngenta Gene Expression Proposal Form.

The research proposal should include: (1) research background and objectives, (2) proposed experiments, (3) significance of the research and its potential impact in agriculture, (4) research timeline, (5) selected references, and (6) Detailed sample description.

Research Topics
We are especially interested in those proposals studying subjects in the areas of grain and fruit quality improvement, tolerance to biotic and abiotic stress and using crops as model systems. Innovative proposals in other area of plant science will be considered.

Process
All proposals should be sent electronically to Tong Zhu. Please note that while the proposals will be kept internal to Syngenta, we cannot accept any proposal labeled ‘confidential’. Any such proposals will be returned as soon as they are identified and will need to be resubmitted before consideration. The proposals will be evaluated and prioritized bimonthly by a steering committee. Criteria include scientific merit, potential applications in agricultural and related fields, and relevance to Syngenta’s research and product development priorities. Additional criteria may include the preliminary research conducted to-date and the number of arrays required. In order to facilitate the review process, the proposal should include the project research area. Principal investigators will be notified immediately upon proposal evaluation. For approved projects, Syngenta will bear the cost of chip experiments and data analysis conducted by Syngenta.

Agreement
Once a project has been accepted for funding, the collaboration will be governed by a written collaboration agreement between SBI and the principal investigator’s institution. An agreement will be drafted and sent to the institution after the project is approved. No materials for the microarray experiments should be sent to SBI until the agreement is officially signed by the institution and SBI. The collaboration agreement is summarized as follows.

• Syngenta and the collaborator have exclusive access to the data and analyzed results generated during the collaboration for the first three months after Syngenta provides the initial results to the collaborator. This will facilitate the effort by the two parties to get maximum benefit from joint mining of the data.


• Syngenta retains ownership of any data and other results generated by Syngenta scientists. The institution/collaborator retains ownership of any data and subsequent research results generated by the collaborator.


• After the three month exclusive period, the collaborator and Syngenta will work together to publish and patent results from the collaboration. To avoid jeopardizing intellectual property and its protection, the collaborator will provide proposed publications (manuscripts, presentations, etc.) to Syngenta for approval 60 days prior to submission for publication. Publications by either party will acknowledge the other and include the other party scientists as co-authors as appropriate.


• The collaborator will notify Syngenta of any inventions it makes as a result of the collaboration. Syngenta will cover all reasonable patent costs for inventions of interest to Syngenta.


• The collaborator and Syngenta each get use of all results and intellectual property (IP) from the collaboration for research purposes.


• Syngenta has the first right to a commercial license (exclusive or non-exclusive) to any new IP solely owned by the collaborator. For jointly owned IP, Syngenta has the right to use it non-exclusively for commercial purposes but also has an option to an exclusive commercial license. Syngenta has a limited period of time within which to notify the collaborator of its interest in obtaining a commercial license. For all commercial licenses for Syngenta, the parties will agree in good faith on a reasonable terms standard for the industry [financial return to the collaborators institution].


• The GeneChip technology that Syngenta uses in these collaborations is from Affymetrix, so the agreement includes some additional terms that are required under SBIs separate agreement with Affymetrix.


• Data release will follow Syngenta Microarray Data Publication Guidelines.