Project Description: The SBIR program is intended to support scientific excellence and technological innovation through the investment of federal research funds to build a strong national economy by stimulating technological innovation in the private sector; strengthening the role of small business in meeting federal research and development needs; increasing the commercial application of federally supported research results; and fostering and encouraging participation by socially and economically disadvantaged and women-owned small businesses.

The SBIR program at NSF solicits proposals from the small business sector consistent with NSF's mission to promote the progress of science; to advance the national health, prosperity, and welfare; and to secure the national defense.

The program is governed  by Public Law 114-328 (SBIR/STTR Reauthorization Act of 2017). SBIR/STTR policy is provided by the Small Business Administration (SBA) through the SBIR Policy Directive. A main purpose of the legislation is to stimulate technological innovation and increase private sector commercialization. The NSF SBIR/STTR program is therefore in a unique position to meet both the goals of NSF and the purpose of the SBIR/STTR legislation by transforming scientific discovery and innovation into both social and economic benefit, and by emphasizing private sector commercialization.

Because the program has no topical or procurement focus, the NSF offers very broad solicitation topics that are intended to encourage as many eligible science- and technology-based small businesses as possible to compete for funding. The topics are detailed on the program website. In many cases, the program is also open to proposals focusing on technical and market areas not explicitly noted in the aforementioned topics.

Project Description: The National Science Foundation’s Small Business Technology Transfer (STTR) program provides small businesses with equity-free funding to conduct research and development (R&D) work and de-risk technology for commercial success. The NSF STTR program accepts innovative proposals that show promise of commercial and societal impact in almost all areas of technology. STTR Phase I proposals are expected to undertake R&D with the aim of establishing technical feasibility or proof of concept. Successful applicants will receive a grant of up to $225,000 over a period of 6 to 12 months (the period to be decided by the company). Successful STTR proposers will receive funding about 6 months after the solicitation deadline. Companies that receive a Phase I award are eligible to apply for a Phase II award (award amount up to $750,000; duration 2 years). STTR Program Directors host webinars in the weeks leading to the proposal deadline. Further information about the program, including the webinar schedule, short videos and Q&A, is also available at www.nsf.gov/SBIR.

Project Description: A new funding track, Partnerships for Documentary Linguistics Education (PADLE), is offered collaboratively by this program and the Documenting Endangered Languages program (DEL) in the Directorate for Social, Behavioral, and Economic Sciences (SBE). The strand provides support for collaborations that will improve TCUP institutions' instructional capacity in documentary linguistics (descriptive linguistics, computational methodology, archiving and preservation); attract, retain and support TCUP students in internships and research endeavors deemed to be necessary for a complete curriculum offering; and engage partner universities to provide an academic grounding and a successful transition for students who wish to study or attain degrees in documentary linguistics.

Project Description: The CRI Irvington Postdoctoral Fellowship Program is CRI's longest-standing continuous program. Postdoctoral fellowships provide support to fund and train young immunologists and cancer immunologists at top universities and research centers around the world. Fellows work and continue their training under the guidance of a world-renowned immunologist, who mentors the fellow and prepares him or her for a productive and successful career in cancer immunology. Fellows receive up to $175,500 over three years to cover the cost of salary, insurance, and other research-related expenses, such as travel to conferences and meetings.

Project Description: With an emphasis on two-year colleges, the Advanced Technological Education (ATE) program focuses on the education of technicians for the high-technology fields that drive our nation's economy. The program involves partnerships between academic institutions and industry to promote improvement in the education of science and engineering technicians at the undergraduate and secondary school levels. The ATE program supports curriculum development; professional development of college faculty and secondary school teachers; career pathways to two-year colleges from secondary schools and from two-year colleges to four-year institutions; and other activities. Another goal is articulation between two-year and four-year programs for K-12 prospective STEM teachers that focus on technological education. The program invites research proposals that advance the knowledge base related to technician education.

Project Description: The EHR Core Research (ECR) program establishes a mechanism in the Directorate for Education and Human Resources to provide funding in foundational research areas that are broad, essential and enduring. EHR seeks proposals that will help synthesize, build and/or expand research foundations in the following core areas: STEM learning, STEM learning environments, workforce development, and broadening participation in STEM. We invite researchers to identify and conduct research on questions or issues in order to advance the improvement of STEM learning in general, or to address specific challenges of great importance. Two types of proposals are invited: Core Research Proposals (maximum 5 years, $1.5 million) that propose to study a foundational research question/issue designed to inform the transformation of STEM learning and education and Capacity Building Proposals (maximum 3 years, $300,000) intended to support groundwork necessary for advancing research within the four core areas.

Project Description: The NSF Division of Electrical, Communications and Cyber Systems (ECCS) supports enabling and transformative research at the nano, micro, and macro scales that fuels progress in engineering system applications with high societal impacts.

ECCS programs encompass novel electronic, photonic, and magnetic devices — and the integration of these devices into circuit and system environments, intelligent systems, control, and networks — for applications spanning communications and cyber technologies, energy and power, healthcare, environment, transportation, manufacturing, and other systems-related areas.

ECCS strongly emphasizes the integration of education into its research programs to ensure the preparation of a diverse and professionally skilled workforce. ECCS also strengthens its programs through links to other areas of engineering, science, industry, government, and international collaborations.

Division Programs

The Division has three program clusters, managed by teams of program directors, that reflect the increasing convergence of traditional disciplinary topics and the need for interdisciplinary approaches to emerging technological challenges.

• Electronics, Photonics and Magnetic Devices (EPMD)
• Communications, Circuits, and Sensing-Systems (CCSS)
• Energy, Power, Control and Networks (EPCN) (formerly EPAS)

Program Description: The Historically Black Colleges and Universities - Excellence in Research (HBCU-EiR) program was established in response to direction provided in the Senate Commerce and Justice, Science and Related Agencies Appropriations Subcommittee Report (Senate Report 115-139), and is built on prior and continuing efforts by the National Science Foundation (NSF) to strengthen research capacity at Historically Black Colleges and Universities (HBCUs). This report provided guidance to NSF to establish the HBCU Excellence in Research program "to provide opportunities for both public and private HBCUs, particularly for those who have not been successful in larger NSF Research & Related Activities competitions, in order to stimulate sustainable improvement in their research and development capacity" (https://congress.gov/congressional-report/115th-congress/senate-report/139/1). EiR supports such capacity building by funding research projects aligned with NSF's research programs. The program aims to establish stronger connections between researchers at HBCUs and NSF's research programs.

Program Description: Historically Black Colleges and Universities (HBCUs) have awarded a large share of bachelor's degrees to African American students in science, technology, engineering and mathematics (STEM), and nine of the top ten baccalaureate institutions of African American STEM doctorate recipients from 2008-2012 are HBCUs.[1] In 2012, 8.5% of black undergraduates attended HBCUs,[2] and HBCUs awarded 16.7% of the bachelor's degrees and 17.8% of the S&E bachelor's degrees to black students that year.[1] To meet the nation's accelerating demands for STEM talent, more rapid gains in achievement and successful degree completion in STEM for underrepresented minority populations are needed. The Historically Black Colleges and Universities Undergraduate Program (HBCU-UP) is committed to enhancing the quality of undergraduate STEM education and research at HBCUs as a means to broaden participation in the nation's STEM workforce. To this end, HBCU-UP provides awards to develop, implement, and study evidence-based innovative models and approaches for improving the preparation and success of HBCU undergraduate students so that they may pursue STEM graduate programs and/or careers. Support is available for Targeted Infusion Projects, Broadening Participation Research Projects, Research Initiation Awards, Implementation Projects, Achieving Competitive Excellence Implementation Projects, and Broadening Participation Research Centers; as well as other funding opportunities.

Project Description: The Discovery Research PreK-12 program (DRK-12) seeks to significantly enhance the learning and teaching of science, technology, engineering and mathematics (STEM) by PreK-12 students and teachers, through research and development of STEM education innovations and approaches. Projects in the DRK-12 program build on fundamental research in STEM education and prior research and development efforts that provide theoretical and empirical justification for proposed projects. Projects should result in research-informed and field-tested outcomes and products that inform teaching and learning. Teachers and students who participate in DRK-12 studies are expected to enhance their understanding and use of STEM content, practices and skills.

Program Description:This program seeks to enhance and expand the national resource of digital data documenting existing vouchered biological and paleontological collections and to advance scientific knowledge by improving access to digitized information (including images) residing in vouchered scientific collections across the United States. The information associated with various collections of organisms, such as geographic, paleogeographic and stratigraphic distribution, environmental habitat data, phenology, information about associated organisms, collector field notes, and tissues and molecular data extracted from the specimens, is a rich resource providing the baseline from which to further biodiversity research and provide critical information about existing gaps in our knowledge of life on earth. The national resource is structured at three levels: a central coordinating organization, a series of thematic networks based on an important research theme, and the physical collections. The national resource builds upon a sizable existing national investment in curation of the physical objects in scientific collections and contributes vitally to scientific research and technology interests in the United States. It will become an invaluable tool in understanding contemporary biological issues and challenges.

Project Description: The goals of the Accelerating Research through International Network-to-Network Collaborations (AccelNet) program are to accelerate the process of scientific discovery and prepare the next generation of U.S. researchers for multiteam international collaborations. The AccelNet program supports strategic linkages among U.S. research networks and complementary networks abroad that will leverage research and educational resources to tackle grand scientific challenges that require significant coordinated international efforts. The program seeks to foster high-impact science and engineering by providing opportunities to create new collaborations and new combinations of resources and ideas among linked global networks.

Project Description: We remain focused on growing, nurturing and propelling groundbreaking women leaders. We believe that by caring for women in our global community, we will continue to fuel innovation in human health.

Project Description: The Division of Physics (PHY) supports physics research and the preparation of future scientists in the nation’s colleges and universities across a broad range of physics disciplines that span scales of space and time from the largest to the smallest and the oldest to the youngest. The Division is comprised of disciplinary programs covering experimental and theoretical research in the following major subfields of physics: Accelerator Science; Atomic, Molecular and Optical Physics; Computational Physics; Elementary Particle Physics; Gravitational Physics; Integrative Activities in Physics; Nuclear Physics; Particle Astrophysics; Physics of Living Systems; Plasma Physics (supported under a separate solicitation); and Quantum Information Science.

Project Description: The purpose of the Mathematical Sciences Postdoctoral Research Fellowships (MSPRF) is to support future leaders in mathematics and statistics by facilitating their participation in postdoctoral research environments that will have maximal impact on their future scientific development. There are two options for awardees: Research Fellowship and Research Instructorship. Awards will support research in areas of mathematics and statistics, including applications to other disciplines.

Project Description: The purpose of the NSF Graduate Research Fellowship Program (GRFP) is to help ensure the vitality and diversity of the scientific and engineering workforce of the United States. The program recognizes and supports outstanding graduate students who are pursuing research-based master's and doctoral degrees in science, technology, engineering, and mathematics (STEM) and in STEM education.  The GRFP provides three years of support for the graduate education of individuals who have demonstrated their potential for significant research achievements in STEM and STEM education.  NSF especially encourages women, members of underrepresented minority groups, persons with disabilities, and veterans to apply. NSF also encourages undergraduate seniors to apply.

Program Description: The Cyberinfrastructure for Sustained Scientific Innovation (CSSI) umbrella program seeks to enable funding opportunities that are flexible and responsive to the evolving and emerging needs in cyberinfrastructure. This program continues the CSSI program by removing the distinction between software and data elements/framework implementations, and instead emphasizing integrated cyberinfrastructure services, quantitative metrics with targets for delivery and usage of these services, and community creation.

The CSSI umbrella program anticipates four classes of awards:

• Elements: These awards target small groups that will create and deploy robust services for which there is a demonstrated need that will advance one or more significant areas of science and engineering.
• Framework Implementations: These awards target larger, interdisciplinary teams organized around the development and application of common services aimed at solving common research problems faced by NSF researchers in one or more areas of science and engineering, resulting in a sustainable community framework providing Cyberinfrastructure (CI) services to a diverse community or communities.
• Planning Grants for Community Cyberinfrastructure: Planning awards focus on the establishment of long-term cyberinfrastructure services, which would serve a research community of substantial size and disciplinary breadth.
Community Cyberinfrastructure Implementations: These Community Software
• Cyberinfrastructure Implementations focus on the establishment of long-term hubs of excellence in cyberinfrastructure services, which will serve a research community of substantial size and disciplinary breadth.

Project Description: The Science Education Alliance supports faculty members to engage thousands of beginning undergraduate students in authentic scientific discovery, primarily through Course-based Research Experiences (CREs; also known as Course-based Undergraduate Research Experiences, or CUREs).

The Science Education Alliance (SEA) supports a community of faculty members and institutions who embed research as a fundamental component of early undergraduate science curricula. By doing so, SEA supports educators to develop their students as contributors of scientific discoveries and integrate their students in the research ecosystem as part of an engaging educational experience that promotes their persistence in the sciences.

Phage Hunters Advancing Genomic and Evolutionary Science (PHAGES)

Gene-function Exploration by a Network of Emerging Scientists (GENES)

SEA PHAAGES & SEA GENES Program Announcement