To explore the funding pattern of Ophthalmology applied for general projects of National Natural Science Foundation of China.

In the National Natural Science Foundation funded project information sharing service website hereinafter referred to as NSFC sharing service network(http: //npd.nsfc.gov.cn). The project information of general program ophthalmology of NSFC from 2015 to 2019 was retrieved by using the key words of project query code h1201 to h1211, project approval year and general project. Record the application code, project name, research start and end year, supporting unit name, funding amount, approval year and person in charge of the approved project item by item. The total number of approved projects and the total amount of funding, and the application codes, i. e. the percentage of research direction in the total number of approved projects, are described in the form of text, table, pie chart and column chart. For the top three approved projects, the total number of approved projects in each year is described by linear graph. All supporting units shall be arranged in descending order according to the total number of approved projects in 2015 to 2019, and the total number of approved projects and the name of supporting units of the top ten units shall be taken for description in a table. The project leaders with more than one project approval number from 2015 to 2019 are selected and described in words.

From 2015 to 2019, the total number of Ophthalmology projects supported by NSFC was 433, with a total of 241.52 million yuan; the number of retinal, choroidal and vitreous related diseases was 119, as the highest proportion was 28% of the total number of funded projects, followed by corneal and ocular surface diseases, accounting for 17% of the total number of funded projects; 65 items of glaucoma, optic nerve and optic pathway related diseases ranked third, accounting for 15% of the total supported projects; the rest of 9 research fields received less than 10% of the total funded projects; fundus diseases, cornea, ocular surface and glaucoma are the main research directions of ophthalmology supported by General Projects funded by the National Natural Science Foundation of China, and the sum of 3 accounts for more than 60% of the total funding each year; the funding for lens, cataract and hereditary eye diseases has increased significantly, and the funding for new ophthalmic diagnosis and treatment technologies has been significantly increased. There were 57 institutions funded by general programs of National Natural Science Foundation of China, among of which Sun Yat-Sen University had the largest number of funded projects; one scholar had received 3 projects, and 68 scholars had received 2 projects.

It is suggested that the key supporting fields and emerging fields should be selected as the research project points when applying for the general projects of NSFC, and suggestions such as strengthening accumulation and active innovation are put forward.