Component of the NATIONAL INSTITUTES OF HEALTH. It conducts and supports basic biomedical research that is not targeted to specific diseases and funds studies on genes, proteins, and cells, as well as on fundamental processes like communication within and between cells and metabolism. It was established in 1962.

An operating division of the US Department of Health and Human Services. It is concerned with the overall planning, promoting, and administering of programs pertaining to health and medical research. Until 1995, it was an agency of the United States PUBLIC HEALTH SERVICE.

The study of natural phenomena by observation, measurement, and experimentation.