By Kristen McIntyre

Justin Sarkis, Research Development Lead for the Charlie Dunlop School of Biological Sciences, has found an innovative way to streamline the research grant proposal process using a tool from UCI’s ZotGPT suite. ZotGPT Creator, a customizable AI chatbot platform that allows you to create your own AI assistant, is helping Sarkis and his team optimize their workflow by shortening the time it takes to complete and submit proposals.

Sarkis first learned about ZotGPT through campus emails and was immediately intrigued by its potential for process improvement. He completed some classes through ZotGPT Academy, a free, homegrown learning platform for the UCI community, and decided he’d try his hand at applying the tool to an often tedious portion of the grant proposal process: development details for non-scientific facility descriptions. 

For readers not familiar with the grant process, proposals often ask for descriptions of campus facilities and resources that will be used for the proposed studies. This component demonstrates to the funder that, if funded, the work can in fact be carried out at the university. Crafting descriptions for these grants would often take 30+ minutes to write. With dozens of proposals written every month, the time adds up and every minute saved means time available to focus on more creative aspects of proposal development and ultimately, for additional grant submissions. 

Utilizing ZotGPT Creator, Sarkis designed a chatbot that can sift through facility websites and generate a concise paragraph in roughly 30 seconds. “We’ve gone from 30 minutes to 30 seconds for one description,” Sarkis notes. “Imagine how that adds up when you’re helping multiple faculty members among our 130 faculty.” The time saved allows Sarkis and his team to focus on more creative aspects of proposals, such as document design and graphics. 

ZotGPT Creator has also revolutionized the school’s bi-weekly newsletter process. Twice a month a newsletter is sent out to researchers informing them of new policies and funding opportunities. Sarkis utilized the tool to assist with this otherwise time-consuming process that now helps summarize content and formats it with specified HTML tags he’s assigned. This not only saves time but ensures consistency across the newsletter. “Our formatting is more consistent, it’s more professional. Our summaries are more streamlined now,” Sarkis explains.

Looking ahead, Sarkis and his team are exploring even more innovative applications of ZotGPT, including the development of web apps to match faculty members with funding opportunities.

By embracing ZotGPT Creator, Sarkis and the Charlie Dunlop School of Biological Sciences are setting a new standard for efficiency and innovation in research development at UCI.

---