Legal

Terms of Service

Version 2.0
Effective Date: September 1, 2026

Welcome to SubmissionClarity.

These Terms of Service (“Terms”) govern your access to and use of the SubmissionClarity website, software, applications, and related services (collectively, the “Service”). By creating an account, accessing the Service, or using SubmissionClarity in any manner, you agree to be legally bound by these Terms. If you do not agree to these Terms, you may not use the Service.

Please read these Terms carefully before using SubmissionClarity.

1. What SubmissionClarity Is

SubmissionClarity is an artificial intelligence-assisted editorial review platform designed to help researchers improve the clarity, organization, structure, and persuasive presentation of grant applications submitted to the National Institutes of Health (“NIH”) and other biomedical funding organizations.

SubmissionClarity analyzes written grant materials and provides editorial observations, rhetorical analysis, writing suggestions, structural recommendations, and other feedback intended to assist authors in strengthening their applications.

SubmissionClarity does not:

• determine the scientific merit of proposed research
• replace peer review
• predict funding decisions
• guarantee improved review scores
• certify compliance with NIH requirements
• provide legal advice
• provide regulatory advice
• provide scientific consultation
• replace the professional judgment of investigators, mentors, institutional officials, or grant reviewers.

The Service is intended to assist—not replace—the judgment and expertise of experienced researchers.

2. Eligibility

You must be at least eighteen (18) years of age and legally capable of entering into a binding agreement to use the Service.

If you create an account on behalf of an institution, company, university, or other organization, you represent that you have authority to bind that organization to these Terms.

3. Account Registration

To use portions of the Service you must create an account.

You agree to provide accurate and complete registration information and to keep that information current.

You are responsible for maintaining the confidentiality of your login credentials and for all activity occurring under your account.

You agree to notify SubmissionClarity promptly if you believe your account has been accessed without authorization.

SubmissionClarity reserves the right to suspend or terminate accounts that contain false information, violate these Terms, or are used in a manner that threatens the security or integrity of the Service.

4. AI-Generated Analysis

SubmissionClarity uses one or more artificial intelligence systems to analyze grant applications and generate feedback.

Artificial intelligence is an evolving technology. Although SubmissionClarity strives to provide useful, thoughtful, and professionally informed feedback, AI systems have important limitations.

Accordingly, you acknowledge and agree that:

• AI-generated analyses may contain factual errors
• AI-generated analyses may contain incomplete or inaccurate recommendations
• AI systems may overlook strengths or weaknesses in a proposal
• AI systems may misunderstand scientific content
• AI systems may generate recommendations that conflict with accepted grant-writing practices
• Different AI models may produce different analyses of the same document
• The same AI model may produce different analyses when reviewing the same document on different occasions
• Recommendations generated by SubmissionClarity should be independently evaluated before being incorporated into any grant application

You understand that AI-generated feedback is advisory in nature and should not be relied upon as the sole basis for decisions regarding grant preparation or submission.

5. No Guarantee of Funding

SubmissionClarity does not guarantee that use of the Service will improve the quality of a grant application or increase the likelihood of receiving funding.

Funding decisions are made by human reviewers and funding agencies using numerous scientific, technical, administrative, and programmatic considerations beyond the scope of SubmissionClarity.

Using recommendations generated by SubmissionClarity does not guarantee:

• a favorable peer review
• an improved impact score
• funding by NIH or any other organization
• invitation to revise or resubmit
• any other particular outcome

You acknowledge that you assume all risks associated with deciding whether and how to use SubmissionClarity’s recommendations.

6. Compliance with Sponsor Policies

You are solely responsible for ensuring that your preparation and submission of grant applications complies with all applicable laws, institutional requirements, funding opportunity announcements, sponsor policies, and ethical standards.

Policies governing the use of artificial intelligence in grant preparation may evolve over time.

You are solely responsible for determining whether your use of SubmissionClarity complies with all current requirements of the National Institutes of Health, your institution, and any other applicable funding organization.

SubmissionClarity makes no representation that use of the Service complies with any particular sponsor policy.

7. Your Responsibility for Submitted Applications

You retain full responsibility for every grant application you prepare and submit.

This includes responsibility for:

• scientific accuracy
• originality
• citations
• data integrity
• compliance with sponsor requirements
• compliance with institutional policies
• accuracy of all factual statements
• every revision incorporated into your application.

SubmissionClarity does not assume responsibility for any grant application or any funding decision resulting from use of the Service.

8. Ownership of Your Materials

You retain all ownership rights in the grant applications, research plans, figures, tables, data, and other materials you submit to SubmissionClarity.

By uploading materials to the Service, you grant SubmissionClarity a limited, non-exclusive, revocable license to process those materials solely for the purpose of providing the requested analysis and operating the Service.

Except as described in these Terms and our Privacy Policy, SubmissionClarity claims no ownership interest in your submitted materials.

9. Processing of Uploaded Documents

SubmissionClarity is designed to process uploaded grant documents for the purpose of generating requested analyses.

Except where necessary to provide the Service, troubleshoot technical problems, comply with legal obligations, or protect the security and integrity of the Service, SubmissionClarity does not permanently retain uploaded grant documents.

Temporary processing or short-term storage necessary to complete or deliver a review does not constitute permanent retention. For signed-in paid reviews, an encrypted ZIP containing generated outputs may be retained for 72 hours for account-based recovery and is then deleted. The uploaded PDF is not included in that recovery ZIP.

Details regarding data handling are described in the SubmissionClarity Privacy Policy.

10. Intellectual Property

The SubmissionClarity software, review methodologies, prompts, scoring systems, visual designs, documentation, trademarks, logos, and all related intellectual property are owned by SubmissionClarity or its licensors and are protected by applicable intellectual property laws.

Except as expressly permitted by these Terms, you may not:

• copy
• reproduce
• reverse engineer
• decompile
• redistribute
• scrape
• commercially exploit
• create derivative works based upon the Service

Nothing in these Terms transfers ownership of SubmissionClarity intellectual property to you.

11. Acceptable Use

You agree not to use SubmissionClarity to:

• violate any law or regulation
• infringe the intellectual property rights of others
• upload malicious software
• interfere with operation of the Service
• attempt unauthorized access to systems or accounts
• conduct automated scraping or extraction of Service content
• interfere with security measures
• use the Service in any manner that could damage SubmissionClarity or other users

SubmissionClarity reserves the right to suspend or terminate accounts engaged in prohibited activities.

12. Fees and Subscription Services

Certain features of SubmissionClarity may require payment.

If paid subscriptions or one-time purchases are offered, applicable pricing, billing practices, renewal terms, and cancellation policies will be presented at the time of purchase.

Failure to pay required fees may result in suspension or termination of access to paid features.

13. Third-Party Services

SubmissionClarity may use third-party providers to deliver portions of the Service, including providers of artificial intelligence, cloud hosting, authentication, messaging, payment processing, analytics, and related services.

Your use of SubmissionClarity may therefore involve the processing of information by trusted third-party service providers acting on SubmissionClarity’s behalf.

14. Disclaimer of Warranties

THE SERVICE IS PROVIDED “AS IS” AND “AS AVAILABLE.”

TO THE MAXIMUM EXTENT PERMITTED BY LAW, SUBMISSIONCLARITY DISCLAIMS ALL WARRANTIES, WHETHER EXPRESS, IMPLIED, OR STATUTORY, INCLUDING WARRANTIES OF MERCHANTABILITY, FITNESS FOR A PARTICULAR PURPOSE, TITLE, NON-INFRINGEMENT, ACCURACY, AVAILABILITY, AND RELIABILITY.

SUBMISSIONCLARITY DOES NOT WARRANT THAT:

• THE SERVICE WILL BE ERROR-FREE
• THE SERVICE WILL BE UNINTERRUPTED
• AI OUTPUT WILL BE ACCURATE
• AI OUTPUT WILL BE COMPLETE
• AI OUTPUT WILL BE CURRENT
• ANY PARTICULAR RESULT WILL BE ACHIEVED THROUGH USE OF THE SERVICE.

15. Limitation of Liability

TO THE MAXIMUM EXTENT PERMITTED BY LAW, SUBMISSIONCLARITY SHALL NOT BE LIABLE FOR ANY INDIRECT, INCIDENTAL, SPECIAL, CONSEQUENTIAL, EXEMPLARY, OR PUNITIVE DAMAGES ARISING OUT OF OR RELATED TO THE USE OF THE SERVICE.

THIS INCLUDES, WITHOUT LIMITATION:

• LOSS OF FUNDING
• REJECTED GRANT APPLICATIONS
• LOST RESEARCH OPPORTUNITIES
• LOST PROFITS
• LOSS OF DATA
• REPUTATIONAL HARM
• BUSINESS INTERRUPTION
• ANY OTHER DAMAGES RESULTING FROM RELIANCE UPON AI-GENERATED ANALYSES.

IN NO EVENT SHALL SUBMISSIONCLARITY’S TOTAL LIABILITY EXCEED THE GREATER OF ONE HUNDRED U.S. DOLLARS ($100) OR THE AMOUNT PAID BY YOU TO SUBMISSIONCLARITY DURING THE TWELVE (12) MONTHS PRECEDING THE EVENT GIVING RISE TO THE CLAIM.

16. Indemnification

You agree to defend, indemnify, and hold harmless SubmissionClarity, its owners, employees, contractors, licensors, affiliates, and service providers from any claims, liabilities, damages, losses, costs, and expenses arising from:

• your use of the Service
• your violation of these Terms
• your violation of applicable law
• your submitted materials.

17. No Affiliation with the National Institutes of Health

SubmissionClarity is an independent commercial software product.

SubmissionClarity is not affiliated with, endorsed by, sponsored by, authorized by, approved by, reviewed by, certified by, or operated on behalf of the United States Government.

SubmissionClarity is not affiliated with or endorsed by the National Institutes of Health (“NIH”), including but not limited to:

• National Cancer Institute (NCI)
• National Heart, Lung, and Blood Institute (NHLBI)
• National Human Genome Research Institute (NHGRI)
• National Institute on Aging (NIA)
• National Institute on Alcohol Abuse and Alcoholism (NIAAA)
• National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases (NIAID)
• National Institute of Arthritis and Musculoskeletal and Skin Diseases (NIAMS)
• National Institute of Biomedical Imaging and Bioengineering (NIBIB)
• Eunice Kennedy Shriver National Institute of Child Health and Human Development (NICHD)
• National Institute on Deafness and Other Communication Disorders (NIDCD)
• National Institute of Dental and Craniofacial Research (NIDCR)
• National Institute of Diabetes and Digestive and Kidney Diseases (NIDDK)
• National Institute on Drug Abuse (NIDA)
• National Institute of Environmental Health Sciences (NIEHS)
• National Eye Institute (NEI)
• National Institute of General Medical Sciences (NIGMS)
• National Institute of Mental Health (NIMH)
• National Institute on Minority Health and Health Disparities (NIMHD)
• National Institute of Neurological Disorders and Stroke (NINDS)
• National Institute of Nursing Research (NINR)
• National Library of Medicine (NLM)
• National Center for Advancing Translational Sciences (NCATS)
• Fogarty International Center (FIC)
• Center for Scientific Review (CSR)
• NIH Clinical Center (CC)
• Center for Information Technology (CIT)

References within the Service to NIH, its Institutes and Centers, funding mechanisms, review criteria, or grant programs are used solely to describe the subject matter of the Service and do not imply any governmental affiliation, endorsement, sponsorship, approval, or participation.

18. Changes to These Terms

SubmissionClarity may revise these Terms from time to time.

Updated versions will become effective upon posting unless otherwise stated.

Material changes may require users to accept the revised Terms before continuing to use the Service.

19. Governing Law

These Terms shall be governed by and construed in accordance with the laws of the State of Illinois, without regard to its conflict-of-law principles.

Any legal action arising from these Terms shall be brought in the state or federal courts located within the State of Illinois, and you consent to the jurisdiction of those courts.

By creating an account or using SubmissionClarity, you acknowledge that you have read, understood, and agree to be bound by these Terms of Service.