All of these changes will allow Landi's office to focus on "critically important activities," Greiner said.

The "first and foremost" of these activities will be supporting UB faculty members in preparing and submitting grant and contract applications, and securing grants and contracts to support their research.

"That is 'job one' for the vice president for research," said Greiner. "We want service for principal investigators to be prompt, supportive and effective, even better than it has been in the past."

During the active life span of individual grants and contracts, Landi will be the ombudsman for principal investigators and will work with Provost Thomas E. Headrick, Senior Vice President Robert J. Wagner, the deans and other university offices to facilitate the work of principal investigators.

Landi will continue to oversee UB's compliance with federal and state regulations regarding the protection of human research subjects, responsible conduct in research, investigator disclosure and other ethical issues associated with research.

Landi also will be UB's strategic analysis and planning officer regarding sponsored research.

"This is a function which is crucial to our future and which has been subordinated to the polyglot of responsibilities heretofore imposed on the vice president for research," Greiner said. "We intend that the shift in responsibilities� will allow service to principal investigators and strategic planning for sponsored research to become the primary foci of the research office."

Greiner praised Landi for "the manner in which he has managed an extraordinarily complex array of responsibilities."

The business-services aspects of sponsored programs administration, such as purchasing and payroll, have been moved to the Office of the Senior Vice President. These functions are being integrated with their counterparts on the state side, with a goal of creating a single business-operations unit for UB serving all state and Research Foundation accounts, and ultimately, all auxiliary services, including the Faculty Student Association and the UB Foundation.

Units that previously reported to Elizabeth Kopra, assistant vice president for sponsored program services, now report to Kevin Seitz, university controller.

Management of indirect cost-recovery revenues paid to UB through the Research Foundation also has been assigned to Wagner's office. The move is "part of our long-term plan to operate on the basis of an all-funds budget, which will coordinate all UB income and expenditures, regardless of the source of funds," Greiner said.

Wagner will take responsibility for these business functions as Research Foundation operations manager.

The Office of Technology Transfer Services has been assigned to the new University Business Alliance, along with the Center for Industrial Effectiveness (TCIE), the Greater Regional Industrial Technology program (GRIT) and the Strategic Partnership for Industrial Resurgence (SPIR) program.

Landi's office will take over responsibility for the Laboratory Animal Facility from the vice president for health affairs. Assigning the facility-an all-university research facility serving primarily the health-sciences schools and departments in the social sciences-to Landi's office "puts it in a neutral forum" and frees the vice president for health affairs "to focus fully on other complex and challenging issues regarding teaching, biomedical research and clinical practice," Greiner said.

Transfer of the facility will not begin until a new director of the facility is hired this summer, he added.