Confidential information If your proposal for a grant or contract contains unpublished information, you may need to protect the information with a confidentiality agreement or by marking the proposal (or specific pages of the proposal) as confidential and proprietary. Confidentiality agreements are appropriate to execute when contacting a company about possible funding and collaboration. They are less often used with academic colleagues but should be considered for sensitive and proprietary information, especially for technologies that are not yet protected by patent. For grant applications to the Government or non-profit organizations, it is recommended that you mark pages containing proprietary information as confidential and proprietary and, when possible, include language in the cover letter to the effect that the proposal contains proprietary and confidential information that is to be used only for the purpose of evaluating the proposed project for funding. Contact Office of Research and Development’s Commercial Ventures and Intellectual Property (CVIP) staff to initiate a confidentiality agreement. If you have received a confidentiality agreement from a company or colleague, provide the agreement to the Center for Clinical Trials for review if it has to do with receipt of a study protocol and materials, and otherwise provide it to your Office of Research and Development point of contact for review. Visitors to your laboratory If you will have researchers from outside UMB visiting your laboratory to participate in a project, learn methods, or otherwise do research using UMB facilities, a Visiting Scientist Agreement is needed. Review the Visiting Scientist Policy for further information. If you have a research agreement with a company, you may be required to keep the research confidential until it is published in accordance with the agreement. As such, the research work, data and materials should be protected from access by visitors. New discoveries and inventions Wondering if you should disclose your invention? Review the FAQs for information about disclosure and protection of your invention. The CVIP staff will also answer questions about copyrighting materials such as survey instruments. Using a UMB technology in your research If you propose to use your own or a UMB colleague’s disclosed invention (whether or not patent-protected) in a research project, contact the CVIP staff prior to submitting the proposal. A confidentiality agreement may be appropriate, and the CVIP staff will ensure that the grant or contract intellectual property terms are consistent with any existing license agreement for the UMB technology. | 
