Funding Opportunities Announcement & Research News April 11, 2014 National Endowment for the Humanities - Digital Projects for the Public NEH s Division of Public Programs supports activities that engage millions of Americans in understanding significant humanities works and ideas. At the center of every NEH-funded public humanities project is a core set of humanities ideas developed by scholars, matched to imaginative formats that bring humanities ideas alive for people of all ages and all walks of life. The Digital Projects for the Public program supports projects such as websites, mobile applications, games, and virtual environments that significantly contribute to the public s engagement with humanities ideas. Projects must be analytical and deeply grounded in humanities scholarship in a discipline such as history, religion, anthropology, jurisprudence, or art history. Digital Projects for the Public grants support projects that are largely created for digital platforms. While these projects can take many forms, shapes, and sizes, you should apply to this program primarily to create digital projects or the digital components of a larger project. NEH is a national funding agency, so these projects should demonstrate the potential to attract a broad, general audience. Projects can have specific targeted audiences (including K-12 students), but they should also strive to cultivate a more inclusive audience. Deadline: June 11, 2014 website: http://www.neh.gov/grants/public/digital-projects-the-public National Endowment for the Humanities - Humanities Collections and Reference Resources The Humanities Collections and Reference Resources (HCRR) program supports projects that provide an essential underpinning for scholarship, education, and public programming in the humanities. Thousands of libraries, archives, museums, and historical organizations across the country maintain important collections of books and manuscripts, photographs, sound recordings and moving images, archaeological and ethnographic artifacts, art and material culture, and digital objects. Funding from this program strengthens efforts to extend the life of such materials and make their intellectual content widely accessible, often through the use of digital technology. Awards are also made to create various reference resources that facilitate use of cultural materials, from works that provide basic information quickly to tools that synthesize and codify knowledge of a subject for in-depth investigation. HCRR offers two kinds of awards: 1) for implementation and 2) for planning, assessment, and pilot efforts (HCRR Foundations grants). Applications may be submitted for projects that address one or more of the following activities: arranging and describing archival and manuscript collections; cataloging collections of printed works, photographs, recorded sound, moving images, art, and material culture; providing conservation treatment for collections, leading to enhanced access; digitizing collections; preserving and improving access to born-digital sources;
developing databases, virtual collections, or other electronic resources to codify information on a subject or to provide integrated access to selected humanities materials; creating encyclopedias; preparing linguistic tools, such as historical and etymological dictionaries, corpora, and reference grammars (separate funding is available for endangered language projects in partnership with the National Science Foundation); developing tools for spatial analysis and representation of humanities data, such as atlases and geographic information systems (GIS); and designing digital tools to facilitate use of humanities resources. Applicants may request support for implementing preservation measures, such as reformatting (including microfilming), rehousing, or item-level stabilization procedures, in the context of projects that also create or enhance access to humanities collections. This grant program encourages applications that address the preservation and access needs of such sources. Applicants may request funds to establish intellectual and physical control of such materials as well as to digitize them. Deadline: Jul. 17, 2014 website: Humanities Collections and Reference Resources National Endowment for the Humanities - NEH/DFG Bilateral Digital Humanities Program The National Endowment for the Humanities (NEH) in the United States and the German Research Foundation (Deutsche Forschungsgemeinschaft e.v., DFG) are working together to offer support for projects that contribute to developing and implementing digital infrastructures and services for humanities research. In order to encourage new approaches and develop innovative methods in any field of the humanities, these grants provide funding for up to three years in any of the following areas: developing innovative methods as well as standards and best practices for building and merging digital collections that are significant and of major current interest, for use in humanities research; developing and implementing generic tools, methods, and techniques for accessing and processing digital resources relevant to humanities research; creating new digital modes of scholarly communication and publishing that facilitate international cooperation and dissemination of humanities scholarship; and developing models for effectively managing digital data generated in humanities research projects (for example, texts, audio files, photographs, 3D objects) and exemplifying those models in case studies. Collaboration between U.S. and German partners is a key requirement for this grant category. Each application must be sponsored by at least one eligible German individual or institution, and at least one U.S. institution, and there must be a project director from each country. The partners will collaborate to write a single application package. Deadline: Sep. 25, 2014 website: http://www.neh.gov/grants/odh/nehdfg-bilateral-digital-humanities-program
Department of Justice - Social Science Research on Implementation, Dissemination, and Translation FY 2014 NIJ seeks proposals for funding for research and a research fellowship to examine how scholarly research influences criminal justice implementation practices through dissemination and translation. NIJ proposes two distinct research activities under this solicitation: Incorporating the Use of Research in Policy Decisions: NIJ seeks to support up to five case studies on incorporating the use of research evidence into criminal justice practice and policy decisions. A Translational Criminology Research Fellowship: NIJ seeks a Research Fellow to examine the dissemination of NIJ-funded research. Applicants may apply to one or both sections of the solicitation; however, proposal titles should clearly identify the section of the solicitation for which the proposal is being submitted. For the case studies research, NIJ anticipates that up to a total of $250,000 may become available for awards under this solicitation. From the total amount, NIJ anticipates that it will make one to five awards for a 12-month project period. For the fellowship, NIJ anticipates that up to a total of $150,000 maybe become available for awards under this solicitation. From the total amount, NIJ anticipates that it will make one award for a 12-month project period Deadline: Jun. 9, 2014 website: http://www.grants.gov/web/grants/view-opportunity.html?oppid=253642 Department of Education - Office of Elementary and Secondary Education (OESE): Turnaround School Leaders Program The Turnaround School Leaders Program supports projects to develop and implement or enhance and implement a leadership pipeline that selects, prepares, places, supports, and retains school leaders (which may include leadership teams) for School Improvement Grant (SIG) schools (as defined in this notice) and/or SIG-eligible schools (as defined in this notice) in a local educational agency (LEA) or consortium of LEAs. Eligible Applicants: (1) An LEA or consortium of LEAs with at least five SIG schools and/or SIG-eligible schools; (2) A State educational agency (SEA) in partnership with an LEA or consortium of LEAs with at least five SIG schools and/or SIG-eligible schools; (3) An institution of higher education (IHE) in partnership with an LEA or consortium of LEAs with at least five SIG schools and/or SIG-eligible schools; (4) Another public or private nonprofit or for-profit organization in partnership with an LEA and/or consortium of LEAs with at least five SIG schools and/or SIG-eligible schools; and, (5) A combination of the above eligible applicants in partnership. Deadlines: Notice of Intent to Apply: Apr. 25, 2014 Applications: May 23, 2014 website: http://www.grants.gov/web/grants/view-opportunity.html?oppid=253108
National Geographic Society - Committee for Research and Exploration Grant (for Scientific Field Research and Exploration) The National Geographic Society awards grants for scientific field research and exploration through its Committee for Research and Exploration. All proposed projects must have both a geographical dimension and relevance to other scientific fields and be of broad scientific interest. Applications are generally limited to the following disciplines: anthropology, archaeology, astronomy, biology, botany, geography, geology, oceanography, paleontology, and zoology. In addition the committee is emphasizing multidisciplinary projects that address environmental issues (e.g., loss of biodiversity and habitat, effects of human-population pressures). Deadline: Continuous. website: http://www.nationalgeographic.com/explorers/grants-programs/cre-application/ National Aeronautics and Space Administration - Game Changing Opportunities In Technology Development The primary goal of this Appendix is to solicit proposals for the maturation of promising energy storage technologies that can enable NASA s human exploration and science missions of the future. NASA requires high specific energy storage systems for multiple mission applications associated with both robotic science and human exploration of space. The energy storage technologies requested in this solicitation will also supply other government agencies and commercial space interests with transformative capabilities. These systems are not only required to store significant amounts of energy per unit mass, but they must also function across a wide temperature range, maintain capacity after frequent charge/discharge cycles, and maintain safe operation in close proximity to humans and mission critical equipment. Deadlines: NOIs Due: Apr. 25, 2014 Proposals Due: May 27, 2014 website: Game Changing Opportunities In Technology Development National Science Foundation - International Research Network Connections (IRNC) The International Research Network Connections (IRNC) program supports high performance network connectivity required by international science and engineering research and education collaborations involving the NSF research community. NSF expects to make a set of awards to: (1) link U.S. research networks with peer networks in other parts of the world and leverage existing international network connectivity; (2) support U.S. infrastructure and innovation of open network exchange points; (3) drive innovation and state-of-the-art capabilities for Research and Education (R&E) Network Operation Centers (NOC); (4) stimulate the development, application and use of advanced network measurement capabilities and services across international network paths; and (5) support community engagement in training and human and network capacity building, and coordination in advanced network engineering.
High performance network connections funded by this program are intended to support science and engineering research and education applications, and preference will be given to solutions which provide the best economy of scale and demonstrate the ability to support the largest communities of interest with the broadest services. Funded projects will assist the U.S. research and education community by enabling state-of-the-art international network services and access to increased collaboration and data services. Through extended international network connections, additional research and production network services will be enabled, complementing those currently offered or planned by domestic research networks. Deadlines: Full Proposal: July 7, 2014 website: http://www.nsf.gov/pubs/2014/nsf14554/nsf14554.htm National Science Foundation - NSF 14-054 Dear Colleague Letter - Support for Natural Hazards Engineering Research Infrastructure and Research during FY 2015-FY 2019 March 20, 2014 Dear Colleagues: The purpose of this Dear Colleague Letter (DCL) is to inform the natural hazards engineering research community of two forthcoming program solicitations anticipated to be issued by the National Science Foundation s (NSF) Directorate for Engineering, Division of Civil, Mechanical and Manufacturing Innovation, between April and June 2014, for the following: (1) operations of natural hazards engineering research infrastructure for FY 2015-FY 2019 and (2) research on multi-hazard resilient and sustainable civil infrastructure. NSF does not intend to provide additional information beyond this DCL until the program solicitations and any accompanying Frequently Asked Questions are issued, as those will be the official issuances for these competitions and take precedence over the information in this DCL. The anticipated due dates for full proposals submitted to these solicitations will be 90 days following the publication date. Operations of Natural Hazards Engineering Research Infrastructure (NHERI) for FY 2015-2019 NHERI will be an NSF-supported multi-user facility operating earthquake engineering and wind engineering research infrastructure. The NHERI solicitation will replace solicitation NSF 13-537, George E. Brown, Jr. Network for Earthquake Engineering Simulation Operations FY 2015-FY 2019 (NEES2 Ops), to broaden support for natural hazards research infrastructure. NEES2 will now be recompeted as part of the larger NHERI. NSF will support up to 10 awards to establish NHERI as follows: a. NHERI Coordination Office (NCO) - one award. The NCO will coordinate NHERI-wide activities and awardees, such as, but not limited to, setting policies and procedures for NHERI, running quarterly meetings of the council of NEHRI awardees, coordinating transparent scheduling of facility users, and convening the natural hazards engineering research community to develop a decadal science plan for FY 2020-2029. b. Cyberinfrastructure - one award. This awardee will operate a production quality, cyberinfrastructure platform with near 100% uptime, which includes middleware, an open source curated and archival repository for earthquake and wind engineering experimental and simulation data and post-disaster, rapid response research data, and access to high performance computing
resources, and delivers and supports community-driven computational, simulation, collaborative, and educational tools. c. Computational Simulation Center - one award. The center will develop community-driven, open source computational and simulation tools for natural hazards engineering research. These tools will be integrated by the cyberinfrastructure awardee into the cyberinfrastructure platform for delivery and community use. d. Post-disaster, rapid response research facility - one award. This facility will be supported for: (1) equipment, instrumentation, and other resource acquisition to build the experimental, information technology, and support capabilities to collect perishable research data following a natural hazards disaster and (2) subsequent operations of the facility to assist researchers with national and global deployment. e. Experimental research facilities, to include a mix of earthquake engineering and wind engineering facilities - up to six awards. Support will be provided for multi-user ready facilities with: (1) unique, fully operational equipment, instrumentation, and data acquisition, (2) qualified staffing to train and serve a broad external user base, (3) capability in real-time/near real-time to upload experimental metadata and data to the cyberinfrastructure data repository, and (4) demonstrated facility excellence in management, safety, and service to users. NHERI will be part of NSF s multi-user facilities portfolio. More information about NSF-supported facilities is available at http://www.nsf.gov/bfa/lfo/lfo_documents.jsp: Large Facilities Manual, NSF13-038, and NSF/BFA Business Systems Review (BSR) Guide, NSF 13-100. Research on Multi-hazard Resilient and Sustainable Civil Infrastructure Interdisciplinary research is needed to advance the fundamental engineering science base for our nation s next generation civil infrastructure (e.g., buildings and other structures) to achieve lifecycle performance goals for multi-hazard resilience and sustainability. Such research involves the integration of research on single- and multi-hazard resilience of civil infrastructure with research on sustainable civil infrastructure such as green design, construction, maintenance, operations, and deconstruction for recycle/reuse; alternative energy resources and efficiencies for civil infrastructure; and sustainable construction materials. This research may use NHERI experimental facilities and cyberinfrastructure resources when operational. This solicitation will replace solicitation NSF 13-544, NEES Research (NEESR) Planning Grants, and support up to 10 awards. Program Contact: Questions or comments should be directed to Joy Pauschke, NEES Operations and Research Program Director, 703-292-7024, jpauschk@nsf.gov. Sincerely, George Hazelrigg Acting Director, Division of Civil, Mechanical and Manufacturing Innovation National Science Foundation website: http://www.nsf.gov/pubs/2014/nsf14054/nsf14054.jsp National Science Foundation - Biomedical Engineering (BME) The mission of the Biomedical Engineering (BME) program is to provide opportunities to develop novel ideas into discovery-level and transformative projects that integrate engineering and life science principles in solving biomedical problems that serve humanity in the long-term. The Biomedical Engineering (BME) program supports fundamental research in the following BME themes: Neural engineering (brain science, computational neuroscience, brain-computer interface, neurotech, cognitive engineering) - Semahat Demir
Cellular biomechanics (motion, deformation, and forces in biological systems; how mechanical forces alter cell growth, differentiation, movement, signal transduction, transport, cell adhesion, cell cytoskeleton dynamics, cell-cell and cell-ecm interactions; genetically engineered stem cell differentiation with long-term impact in tissue repair and regenerative medicine) - Kaiming Ye The BME projects must be at the interface of engineering and life sciences, and advance both engineering and life sciences. The projects should focus on high impact transforming methods and technologies. The project should include methods, models and tools of understanding and controlling of living systems; fundamental improvements in deriving information from cells, tissues, organs, and organ systems; new approaches to the design of structures and materials for eventual medical use in the longterm; and new novel methods of reducing health care costs through new technologies. The projects should emphasize the advancement of fundamental engineering knowledge, possibly leading to the development of new methods and technologies in the long-term; and highlight multidisciplinary nature, integrating engineering and the sciences. The long-term impact of the projects can be related to disease diagnosis and/or treatment, improved health care delivery, or product development. The BME program does not support clinical studies. Full Proposal Window: August 15, 2014 - September 17, 2014 website: http://www.nsf.gov/funding/pgm_summ.jsp?pims_id=501023 American Heart Association - National Mentored Clinical and Population Research Award To encourage early career investigators who have appropriate and supportive mentoring relationships to engage in high quality introductory and pilot clinical studies that will guide future strategies for reducing cardiovascular disease and stroke while fostering new research in clinical and translational science, and encouraging community- and population-based activities. This grant does not fund basic science or support senior researchers, but encourages mentoring of early career investigators. Funding is available for research related to cardiovascular disease and stroke prevention or treatment, or to related clinical and public health problems, including multidisciplinary efforts. Proposals are encouraged on provider behavior, patient behavior, behavioral outcomes, risk factor outcomes, disease outcomes, cost benefit analyses, efforts to evaluate outcomes of patient care delivery and patient/provider and/or system compliance and adherence to recommendations, as well as pilot clinical research studies that may provide preliminary data for larger-scale investigation. Studies using existing databases are also encouraged. Ancillary studies or a clearly defined sub-study of an ongoing clinical research study are also encouraged. There must, however, be clear justification that the proposal is a sub-study and not a piece of an already funded project. Deadline: Jul. 24, 2014 website: National Mentored Clinical and Population Research Award
American Heart Association - National Scientist Development Grant Program The American Heart Association accepts applications for the National Scientist Development Grant to support highly promising beginning scientists in their progress toward independence by encouraging and adequately funding research projects that can bridge the gap between completion of research training and readiness for successful competition as an independent investigator. Research broadly related to cardiovascular function and disease and stroke, or to related clinical, basic science, bioengineering or biotechnology, and public health problems, including multidisciplinary efforts. Proposals are encouraged from all basic disciplines as well as epidemiological, behavioral, community and clinical investigations that bear on cardiovascular and stroke problems. Deadline: Jan. 18, 2014; July 24, 2014 website: National Scientist Development Grant Program Department of Defense - Congressionally Directed Medical Research Programs -- Breast Cancer Research Program -- Breakthrough Award -- Levels 1 and 2 The intent of the Breakthrough Award is to support promising research that has the potential to lead to or make breakthroughs in breast cancer. The critical components of this award mechanism are: Impact: Research supported by the Breakthrough Award will have the potential for a major impact and accelerate progress toward ending breast cancer. The impact may be near-term or long-term, but must be significant and move beyond an incremental advancement. Applications must articulate the pathway to making an impact for breast cancer patients, even if clinical impact is not an immediate outcome. Research Scope: Research proposed under this award mechanism may be small- to large-scale projects, at different stages of idea and research development. Two different funding levels, based on the scope of the research, are available under this Program Announcement/Funding Opportunity. Funding Levels 3 and 4 are available under a different Program Announcement (W81XWH-14-BCRP- BREAKTHROUGH34). It is the responsibility of the Principal Investigator (PI) to select the funding level that is most appropriate for the research proposed. The following are general descriptions, although not all-inclusive, of the scope of research projects that would be appropriate to propose under each funding level: Funding Level 1: Innovative, high-risk/high-reward research that is in the earliest stages of idea development. Research with potential to yield new avenues of investigation. Proof of concept. No preliminary data required. Funding Level 2: Research that is already supported by preliminary data and has potential to make significant advancements toward clinical translation. Demonstration of efficacy in in vivo models, as applicable. Partnering PI Option: The Breakthrough Award encourages applications that include meaningful and productive collaborations between investigators. The Partnering PI Option is structured to accommodate two PIs, each of whom will each receive a separate award. One partner is identified as the Initiating PI, and the other partner is identified as the Partnering PI. The Initiating and Partnering PIs have different submission requirements; however, both PIs should contribute to the preparation of a single application. The collaborative partners may have expertise in similar or disparate scientific disciplines, but each partner is expected to bring different strengths to the application. New collaborations are encouraged, but not required. It is the responsibility of the collaborating investigators to describe how their combined
expertise in the collaboration will better address the research question and explain why the work should be done together rather than through separate efforts. Considering the current breast cancer landscape and the BCRP s vision to end breast cancer, each FY14 BCRP Breakthrough Award application must address at least one of the following overarching challenges. Alternatively, with adequate justification, applications may identify and address another overarching challenge related to the breast cancer landscape. Justification must be provided in the pre-application. Prevent breast cancer (primary prevention) Identify what makes the breast susceptible to cancer development Determine why some, but not all, women get breast cancer Distinguish aggressive breast cancer from indolent cancers Conquer the problems of overdiagnosis and overtreatment Identify what drives breast cancer growth; determine how to stop it Identify why some breast cancers become life-threatening metastasis Determine why/how breast cancer cells lay dormant for years and then re-emerge (recurrence); determine how to prevent recurrence Revolutionize treatment regimens by replacing interventions that have life-threatening toxicities with ones that are safe and effective Eliminate the mortality associated with metastatic breast cancer Deadlines: Pre-Application Submission Deadline: 5:00 p.m. Eastern time (ET), May 14, 2014 Application Submission Deadline: 11:59 p.m. ET, May 28, 2014 website: http://www.grants.gov/web/grants/view-opportunity.html?oppid=253179