About Coeus
1. What is Coeus, in a nutshell?
| Coeus is a computer system that stores information about proposals, awards, sponsors, and more. This information can be searched and sorted in many useful ways. It is all maintained in a centralized database at ASU, which Coeus accesses over a network. Coeus does more than just store information, however. It can also be used to generate documents like award notices and cover letters, obtain approvals electronically, and even send proposals directly to a sponsor. |
2. What's the difference between the Coeus desktop application and the Coeus web application?
| There are two ways to use Coeus: the desktop application and the web application. The desktop application is a software program that must be installed on your computer before you can use it. Currently, most Coeus features are only available through the desktop application. The web application does not need to be installed on your computer and can be accessed from any computer that has access to the web. Currently, the web application is only being used by investigators to maintain conflict of interest information. In the future it will be able to perform many of the same functions as the desktop application. |
Currently, ASU uses Coeus to perform many functions, including:
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4. What will Coeus do in the future?
ASU is exploring other Coeus functions that it may utilize in the future. Some of the functions Coeus may perform in the future are:
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Each distinct area of Coeus is called a module. Some of the Coeus modules are listed below.
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| At ASU, Coeus was first implemented in ORSPA on July 1, 2003. ORSPA uses most of the available features and is responsible for entering most of the data into Coeus. Coeus is also gradually being introduced to other ASU departments and centers. The departments and centers will primarily use Coeus to obtain information or to print reports. Coeus will eventually be made available to all departments and centers at the university.
Outside of ASU, there are over 50 colleges and universities that also use Coeus. These include MIT, Purdue, Princeton, Berkeley, Stanford, and more. |
| ASU licensed Coeus from MIT, where it was originally developed. While most of the Coeus features were created by MIT, much of it has also been customized by ASU to meet our specific needs. |
8. Can you tell me more about each of the modules?
Proposal Development Module (not yet implemented)The Proposal Development Module has been designed to allow departmental administrators and investigators to construct full proposals from the desktop. First, the user is required to create a proposal shell, which includes the basic header information typically found on ASU’ proposal routing form. Once this piece is done, work on the proposal can be distributed by function and managed through use of system roles. The Proposal Development Module also contains a robust tool for creating budgets. It stores all approved Employee Benefit and F&A rates, inflation factors, and ensures compliance with the Cost Accounting Standards (CAS) by allowing the user to budget in the same manner in which expenditures will be incurred. After the budget has been created and the science appended, the proposal gets marked complete. The user then submits the proposal for on-line approvals. The system applies business rules created at the department, Dean’s Office, and VP Research levels, securing appropriate approvals along the way. When complete, the proposal will go through a final Institutional review before it is submitted electronically to those sponsors that can accept an electronic proposal. Alternatively, the proposal can be printed for those sponsors that will require a paper proposal. The Proposal Development Module also is integrated with the Sponsor table (list of all sponsors) and Rolodex table (list of sponsor contacts). Proposal ModuleThe Proposal Module contains those works that have been submitted to sponsoring organizations for funding. Where works in progress are stored and edited in the Proposal Development Module, only completed works are stored in the Proposal Module. Each proposal that has been officially submitted by the organization to the external sponsor is assigned a unique identifier. Through this identifier, the user can view basic data on funding source, title, department, principal investigators, and amount proposed. Also in this module, the user is able to generate a Current and Pending Support Report for any investigator listed in the proposal. Current and Pending information can be downloaded in a variety of formats for subsequent modification to conform to individual sponsor's requirements. Once a proposal is funded, the information in the Proposal Module forms the basis of the actual award. Award ModuleThe Award Module maintains detailed information on awards and subcontracts including a complete history of every change made to an award and subcontract from notice through closeout. The Coeus system stores all agency contacts (in the electronic rolodex), maintains all reporting requirements (financial, technical, property, patents), maintains the terms and conditions, required cost sharing, special reviews (animals, human subjects, biohazards, etc.), F&A rates (whether limited by agency of fixed for the life on Federal awards), as well as the required approvals for the equipment, foreign travel, and subcontracts. Subcontract ModuleThe Subcontract Module is maintained under the awards that fund the agreement and contains detailed information on subrecipient agreements. Data in this module includes: the amount, the start and end date, the investigator at the receiving organization, other administrative contacts, and all required close out information. Historical information is captured as the subcontract is modified to allow tracking of change orders to the subrecipient agreement. Additionally, funds released from incoming invoices are also maintained. Note that the tracking of funds released from incoming invoices is part of the RIS Phase 2 plan. Negotiation Module (not yet implemented)The Negotiation Module allows ORSPA to track negotiations for individual proposals. It provides administrators/officers with tools to keep notes and track the progress of the negotiation, facilitates sharing of electronic files, and generates status reports for negotiations. Person Module (not yet implemented)The Person Module is the central repository for information regarding employees and students that may be associated with proposal or awards. The person module allows for multiple degree records to be stored, allows for biosketch information in Word and PDF format to be stored, allows the user to produce current and pending support lists for any investigator, and tracks all required training. Conflict of Interest ModuleThe Conflict of Interest module allows authorized users to check and maintain all conflict of interest and financial interest disclosures that may compromise professional judgment in carrying out research work. ORSPA will maintain the investigators’ financial interest disclosures in the Coeus database, track the apparent conflicts through their resolution, and maintain the required annual conflict of interest disclosure reports for individual investigators on existing proposals and awards. Report Tracking ModuleThe Report Tracking Module tracks due dates and maintains the report status for required reports for an award. This module has sophisticated grouping and sorting capabilities to allow custom reports to be generated directly from the application that are relevant to the PI, department administrators and/or central offices. Three views are available at the click of an icon for the most useful views of the data. These views can be subsequently modified to tailor the report to the desired user specification. Once the reports are sorted and grouped, the information can be downloaded. |