Program Description: The worldwide growth of wireless communication, navigation, and telemetry has provided immense societal benefits including mobile broadband data, Internet of Things (IoT), mobile healthcare, and intelligent transportation systems. These and other applications call for innovations that can circumvent the challenges of radio spectrum scarcity and interference, and foster the growth of ubiquitous, high speed, low latency connectivity. Commercial applications like the above must operate in harmony with scientific uses of spectrum (e.g., radio astronomy, Earth and atmospheric sciences, and polar research) and other nationally vital spectrum-dependent services (e.g., weather prediction). The National Science Foundation (NSF) continues to support wireless spectrum research and the scientific uses of the electromagnetic spectrum through multiple programs that enable fast, accurate, dynamic coordination and usage of the limited spectrum resource. These programs have created an opportune ground to build and create a large center-based ecosystem for spectrum research, which is the target of this SII-Center program.

NSF’s goal is to promote transformative use and management of the electromagnetic spectrum, resulting in profound benefits for science and engineering, industry, and other national interests. The focus of a spectrum research SII-Center must chart out a trajectory to ensure United States leadership in future wireless technologies, systems, and applications in science and engineering through the efficient use and sharing of the radio spectrum. The SII-Center should also seek to foster scientific and technical collaboration. The establishment of an SII-Center will have a transformational impact on wireless spectrum research by serving as a connecting point for the biggest and most challenging questions in spectrum management that the nation is facing. The SII-Center is expected to educate and develop an agile workforce needed to support industries of the future which will rely heavily on wireless technologies.

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)

Project Description: The Industry-University Cooperative Research Centers (IUCRC) program develops long-term partnerships among industry, academe, and government. The Centers are catalyzed by an investment from the National Science Foundation (NSF) and are primarily supported by industry Center members, with NSF taking a supporting role in the development and evolution of the Center. Each Center is established to conduct research that is of interest to both the industry members and the Center faculty. An IUCRC contributes to the nation's research infrastructure base and enhances the intellectual capacity of the engineering and science workforce through the integration of research and education. As appropriate, an IUCRC uses international collaborations to advance these goals within the global context.

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: With the generosity of the DaRin Butz Foundation, the Grainger College of Engineering Illinois Scholars Undergraduate Research (ISUR) Program offers women undergraduate students funding to do research in the summer. The foundation’s support of the ISUR summer program is aimed to encourage women to pursue careers in science and engineering.

DaRin Butz Foundation Research Scholars conduct research in the areas of computer science, aerospace, electrical, computer, materials science, nuclear engineering, physics, or astronomy. Scholars will work with faculty mentors who will supervise, guide, and instruct them on their research during the course of the project. They are expected to do research 30 – 35 hours per week for 10 weeks in summer. Through the learning-by-apprenticeship model, the scholars will not only develop their research skills but also their science communication skills (verbal and written) and presentation skills as a researcher in the undergraduate research seminar ENG 199 UGR, which they will take in the fall semester. DaRin Butz Foundation Research Scholars will also present their work in the Fall Engineering Research Fair or the annual ISUR poster expo in the spring semester.

Interested applicants must submit a two-page research project proposal as part of their application. Applicants are encouraged to work with their mentor on the project proposal.

Benefits

• $5000 research scholarship for 10 weeks in the summer on campus
• Close working relationship with a research mentor
• Gain an understanding of what graduate school entails

Eligibility

• Must be a University of Illinois woman undergraduate student in the Grainger College of Engineering
• U.S. citizen or permanent resident
• Rising sophomore, junior, or senior
• Majoring in computer science, aerospace, electrical, computer, materials science, nuclear engineering, physics, or astronomy
• University of Illinois GPA of 3.0 or higher

Project Description: Candidates must be faculty members who are eligible to serve as principal investigators engaged in research in the natural and physical sciences or engineering and must be within the first three years of their faculty careers. Disciplines that will be considered include physics, chemistry, mathematics, biology, astronomy, computer science, earth science, ocean science, and all branches of engineering. Candidates engaged in research in the social sciences will not be considered. The Fellowship Program provides support for highly creative researchers early in their careers; faculty members who are well established and well-funded are less likely to receive the award. Packard Fellows are inquisitive, passionate scientists and engineers who take a creative approach to their research, dare to think big, and follow new ideas wherever they lead. The Foundation emphasizes support for innovative individual research that involves the Fellows, their students, and junior colleagues, rather than extensions or components of large-scale, ongoing research programs.

Project Description: The Innovations in Graduate Education (IGE) program is designed to encourage the development and implementation of bold, new, and potentially transformative approaches to STEM graduate education training. The program seeks proposals that explore ways for graduate students in research-based master's and doctoral degree programs to develop the skills, knowledge, and competencies needed to pursue a range of STEM careers.

IGE focuses on projects aimed at piloting, testing, and validating innovative and potentially transformative approaches to graduate education. IGE projects are intended to generate the knowledge required for their customization, implementation, and broader adoption. The program supports testing of novel models or activities with high potential to enrich and extend the knowledge base on effective graduate education approaches.

The program addresses both workforce development, emphasizing broad participation, and institutional capacity building needs in graduate education. Strategic collaborations with the private sector, non-governmental organizations (NGOs), government agencies, national laboratories, field stations, teaching and learning centers, informal science centers, and academic partners are encouraged.

Project Description: The National Science Foundation (NSF) Scholarships in Science, Technology, Engineering, and Mathematics program (S-STEM) addresses the need for a high quality STEM workforce in areas of national priorities. The program seeks to increase the success of low-income academically talented students with demonstrated financial need who are pursuing associate, baccalaureate, or graduate degrees in science, technology, engineering, and mathematics (STEM). The program provides awards to Institutions of Higher Education (IHEs) to fund scholarships, and to enhance and study effective curricular and co-curricular activities that support recruitment, retention, student success, and graduation in STEM. The S-STEM program encourages collaborations among different types of partners: Partnerships among different types of institutions, collaborations of STEM faculty and educational and social science researchers, or partnerships among institutions of higher education and business and industry. The program seeks: 1) to increase the number of low-income academically talented students with demonstrated financial need obtaining degrees in STEM and entering the STEM workforce or graduate study; 2) improve the education of future scientists, engineers, and technicians, with a focus on academically talented low-income students; and 3) advance understanding of the factors or curricular and co-curricular activities affecting the success of low-income students.

Project Description: This funding opportunity announcement (FOA) is designed to support highly integrated research teams of three to six PD/PIs to address ambitious and challenging research questions that are important for the mission of NIGMS and are beyond the scope of one or two investigators. Collaborative program teams are expected to accomplish goals that require considerable synergy and managed team interactions. Project goals should not be achievable with a collection of individual efforts or projects. Teams are encouraged to consider far-reaching objectives that will produce major advances in their fields.

Applications that are mainly focused on the creation, expansion, and/or maintenance of community resources, creation of new technologies or infrastructure development are not appropriate for this FOA.