Research

Limit: 2 // Tickets Available: 1

M. Chertkov (Applied Math)

Applicant institutions are limited to both:
• No more than two pre-applications or applications as the lead institution.
• No more than one pre-application or application for each PI at the applicant institution.

The DOE SC program in Advanced Scientific Computing Research (ASCR) hereby announces its interest in research applications to explore potentially high-impact approaches in the development and use of data reduction techniques and algorithms to facilitate more efficient analysis and use of massive data sets produced by observations, experiments and simulation.

Scientific observations, experiments, and simulations are producing data at rates beyond our capacity to store, analyze, stream, and archive the data in raw form. Of necessity, many research groups have already begun reducing the size of their data sets via techniques such as compression, reduced order models, experiment-specific triggers, filtering, and feature extraction. Once reduced in size, transporting, storing, and analyzing the data is still a considerable challenge – a reality that motivates SC’s Integrated Research Infrastructure (IRI) program [1] and necessitates further innovation in data-reduction methods. These further efforts should continue to increase the level of mathematical rigor in scientific data reduction to ensure that scientifically-relevant constraints on quantities of interest are satisfied, that methods can be integrated into scientific workflows, and that methods are implemented in a manner that inspires trust that the desired information is preserved. Moreover, as the scientific community continues to drive innovation in artificial intelligence (AI), important opportunities to apply AI methods to the challenges of scientific data reduction and apply data-reduction techniques to enable scientific AI, continue to present themselves [2-4].

The drivers for data reduction techniques constitute a broad and diverse set of scientific disciplines that cover every aspect of the DOE scientific mission. An incomplete list includes light sources, accelerators, radio astronomy, cosmology, fusion, climate, materials, combustion, the power grid, and genomics, all of which have either observatories, experimental facilities, or simulation needs that produce unwieldy amounts of raw data. ASCR is interested in algorithms, techniques, and workflows that can reduce the volume of such data, and that have the potential to be broadly applied to more than one application. Applicants who submit a pre-application that focuses on a single science application may be discouraged from submitting a full proposal.

 Limit: 1 // K. Lutrick (Research, Family & Community Medicine) & K. Ellingson (Epidemiology and Biostatistics)

Only one application per institution (normally identified by having a unique entity identifier [UEI] number) is allowed. 

The purpose of this Notice of Funding Opportunity (NOFO) is to establish: 1) a multi-site community-based cohort study that would allow close monitoring of the burden of acute respiratory illness in the community, contributions of various respiratory viruses to this burden, and the impact of vaccination and other interventions on risk of infection and/or severe outcomes, and 2) a case-ascertained household transmission study (or multi-site study) that would support ongoing assessment of transmission dynamics of respiratory viruses of interest and factors (i.e., demographic, clinical, or household-level factors) that may impact transmission.

While hospital-based platforms are key to assessing frequency and risk factors for severe disease, community-based platforms are essential for understanding age-specific incidences of infection, risk factors for infection, socioeconomic burden of infections (such as days of work/school lost), and the clinical spectrum of illness. They are important for characterizing the immune response to infection or reinfection and long-term outcomes, and they are key to understanding the impact of individual- and household-level mitigation factors (including but not limited to vaccination) on all of these measures. This type of network may be especially useful for detecting changes in any of these factors when a new virus or viral variant begins circulating.

Case-ascertained household transmission studies are well-positioned to quickly and efficiently enable us to understand transmission dynamics of respiratory viruses (or sublineages/types of existing viruses that undergo frequent mutation, such as SARS-CoV-2 and influenza) and assess potential mitigation factors. These studies can also be valuable for characterizing viral shedding dynamics and infectiousness. These studies were key during the COVID-19 pandemic to understanding if changes in hospitalization rates were due to changes in transmissibility/infection rates versus changes in severity of illness. They are also great resources for assessing how history of vaccination or prior history of infection effect transmission to close contacts.

This NOFO would build on the lessons learned during the COVID-19 pandemic and establish a consolidated network of community cohorts to monitor a range of respiratory viruses among community members who develop symptoms of acute respiratory illness. Incorporation of multi-pathogen testing will allow us to better understand the relative contribution of various viruses to the overall community burden of respiratory disease now in the post-pandemic setting, and how the clinical spectrum of these illnesses compare, in a setting in which multiple new preventive products are becoming available. This would also support the establishment of a case-ascertained transmission study (or multi-site study) that would be able to assess SARS-CoV-2, Respiratory Syncytial Virus (RSV), and other prioritized respiratory viruses on an ongoing basis.

The combination of these studies will generate much greater visibility on risk factors for infection and the effectiveness of various interventions in reducing infections and viral transmission, factors that are relevant to reducing overall morbidity and mortality related to respiratory viruses. Should a new variant or virus arrive, this platform would be well positioned to further expand testing to better understand potential concerns like proportion symptomatic, timing of transmission, likelihood of asymptomatic transmission and other related questions. Such questions may be key to developing public health guidance should additional mitigation measures become necessary.

Limit: 2 // Tickets Available: 1

G. Sutphin (Molecular and Cellular Biology)

The mission of Breast Cancer Alliance is to improve survival rates and quality of life for those impacted by breast cancer through better prevention, early detection, treatment and cure. To promote these goals, we invest in innovative research, breast surgery fellowships, regional education, dignified support and screening for the underserved.

The research project must be directly related to the field of breast cancer. Areas of relevant research may include but are not limited to: diagnosis, etiology, immunology, genetics and epigenetics, therapies, prevention and clinical studies.

No applicants // Limit: 1 // Tickets Available: 1 

The University of Arizona Cancer Center (UACC) can nominate one application for this funding program.
For more information, please contact: UACC-PreAward.

UACC Limited Submission Information:

The University of Arizona Cancer Center (UACC) can nominate one applicant for the V Foundation Women Scientists Innovation Award for Cancer Research 2024.

Purpose of Award:

The UACC is seeking nominations for the Women Scientists Innovation Award for Cancer Research which supports women cancer researchers and is restricted to adult cancer research. 

Sustaining the careers of women in research and preventing the loss of women from academic careers focused on cancer is paramount to accomplishing the V Foundation’s mission. Women are underrepresented in many STEM fields and this disparity becomes more pronounced further along the career continuum. To make significant progress towards Victory Over Cancer®, we need all voices at the table. The V Foundation’s Women Scientists Innovation Award for Cancer Research helps promote inclusion for women in cancer research while supporting the most cutting-edge proposals.

Applicant Eligibility

Nominee must meet all of the following criteria by the nomination due date:

• Self-identify as a woman
• Nominated by their Cancer Center Director or similar high ranking research official.
• Employed at a non-profit research institution (e.g., 501c3, Section 170).
• See additional criteria for Translational and V Scholar mechanisms listed in corresponding RFA and Supporting Documents.

If you have any question concerning eligibility and details regarding the opportunity, please contact the Grants Team at Grants@v.org in advance of applying.

For any other questions, please contact UACC-PreAward@arizona.edu.

No Applicants  // Limit: 1 proposal per priority area

Applicants may submit multiple applications that uniquely address one or more of these program priority areas. However, applicants may not submit multiple applications addressing the same program priority area. 

This notice announces the availability of funds and solicits applications from eligible entities to advance national policy or systems-level change to reduce indoor air risks and yield measurable environmental and public health outcomes. The EPA has identified and characterized significant risks to public health from indoor environmental contaminants that are commonly found in homes, schools, and offices or commercial non-industrial buildings where Americans spend up to 90 percent of their time. Levels of air pollution indoors are often two to five times higher, and occasionally 100 times higher than outdoor levels. Common indoor air contaminants include:
• Radon
• Environmental asthma triggers (e.g., secondhand smoke; cockroaches and other pests; chemical irritants; dust mites; pet dander; nitrogen dioxide; wood smoke; and mold)
• Pathogens transmitted through the air (e.g., SARS-COV-2, Influenza)
• Particulate matter
• Combustion byproducts
• Volatile organic compounds

Estimates of the economic costs in the US associated with adverse health and productivity effects of poor indoor air quality (IAQ) fall between $13 and $32 billion annually. Additionally, the annual sales of IAQ products and services are valued at $18–$30 billion and are associated with approximately 150,000–250,000 current jobs in the US.

The goal of the EPA’s Indoor Environmental Division is to reduce the environmental health risks posed by contaminants in indoor environments. This is achieved by understanding the science of both environmental health risks and effective prevention and control methods. This knowledge then is used to promote appropriate, evidence-based environmental risk reduction activities through voluntary actions by the general public and key stakeholders to improve IAQ.

The EPA is soliciting applications from eligible entities (as described in Section III.A) to conduct demonstration, technical assistance, training, education, and/or outreach projects that seek to reduce exposure to indoor air contaminants by advancing national policy and systems-level initiatives.

Limit: 1 // PI: D. Soh (Wyant College of Optical Sciences)

The DOE SC program in Biological and Environmental Research (BER), through its Bioimaging Research effort, hereby announces its interest in receiving innovative applications to advance fundamental research or use-inspired technologies of new bioimaging or sensing approaches. Fundamental research to enhance spatial and temporal resolution, measurement speed, long-term sample stability, selectivity, sensitivity, or chemical specificity of bioimaging technologies are desirable. Proposed research should demonstrate a comparative advantage over state-of-the-art techniques or identify biological characteristics that cannot currently be measured. Quantum-enabled technologies are allowed but not required in this FOA. Applications can be submitted under one of two subtopics: 1) Novel research concepts proceeding through technical validation that are not required to evaluate new biological hypotheses; 2) Innovative experimental prototype research proceeding through hypothesis-driven biological experimentation; proposals submitted under this subtopic are encouraged to coordinate with biological collaborators if domain expertise is not in-house. All applications are expected to describe how, if realized, they would advance biological knowledge of plant and microbial systems relevant to bioeconomy or environmental research in fields of study supported by BER.

Program Objective

BER is soliciting applications in the following subtopic areas: 1) fundamental imaging or sensing research from concept to validation or 2) evaluation of biological hypotheses or questions with feasible, use-inspired prototypes. Under subtopic 1) applications could evaluate, untested concepts, and theoretical models, develop novel experimental prototypes and validate measurement accuracy against known technical or biological validation standards. Under subtopic 2) research of experimental prototypes of instruments and methods that will include demonstration of feasibility leading to hypothesis-driven biological experimentation to demonstrate value to the user community. This FOA does not solicit late-stage optimization after initial prototype research, or engineering development of resources, or equipment.

Subtopic 1: Concept to Validation

Projects can begin at the conceptual (pre-experimental) stage and move through validation by comparing technical performance and biological measurements against accepted standards. This stage is too early to investigate new biological questions until proven accurate and reproducible. The intent of the first subtopic is to include applications that might not yet have experimental demonstration of feasibility but hold promise of significant impact if successful. These high-risk high-reward applications might reside completely within a scientific and technical field of research and are not required to demonstrate novel biological utility. However, validation against already characterized synthetic or biological samples in BER-supported bioenergy and environmental research should be included. Measurement should be compared to known or “gold-standard” targets measured by competing methods.

Demonstration in living systems is not required, but systems must have future impact on in situ imaging, measuring, or modeling for plant- and microbial-based bioenergy research. Proposed projects should hold promise for significant advances in imaging or sensing and must include plans to manage the high risk inherent in testing novel concepts and techniques. These “high-risk/high reward” projects might have no preliminary data to support the concept making feasibility challenging to evaluate for scientific merit. However, reviewers will be instructed to evaluate merit based on the future significance of the potential for success and the risk-reward balance when evaluating the applications for consideration of funding. In all applications it is expected that the future significance for biological investigations in fields of study supported by BER will be described.

Subtopic 2: Prototypes for Biological Hypothesis Research

Projects can begin with use-inspired experimental prototypes that will be tested for technical and biological validation but cannot include development to field-ready demonstration prototypes. In addition to technical research and testing, projects must include research to evaluate an untested biological question or hypothesis. Optionally, collaboration with external biological investigators can be included towards evaluating biological hypotheses. The intent of the second subtopic is for technically feasible research that can be tested to demonstrate utility for biological users. Public dissemination of research results can provide demonstration of value to the BER research community and generate interest in adoption of new technologies.

Demonstration in living systems is not required, but technical systems must have future impact on in situ imaging, measuring, or modeling of plant- and microbial-based bioeconomy or environmental research. Applications should demonstrate an advantage over current techniques or measure new biological characteristics that could not be accessed with existing approaches. Further, evaluating untested biological hypotheses is required to demonstrate project significance to bioenergy, bioeconomy, or environmental research. Multidisciplinary teams of physical and chemical scientists, plant biologists, microbiologists, and engineers are encouraged to develop high impact imaging and sensing approaches that are inspired by well-defined biological hypotheses. Optional funding for collaboration with investigators outside of the PIs laboratory can be requested in the application for out years two and three. In all applications it is expected that the future significance for biological investigations in fields of study supported by BER will be described.

No Applicants  // Limit: 1 // Tickets Available: 1 

Each academic institution can hand in only ONE PROJECT PROPOSAL. In case of several applications submitted from a single institution, all applications would be disqualified.

Digitalization has enabled tremendous progress in economy and society over the past decades. Global connectivity through the internet and underlying network infrastructure has further accelerated this development. Like with any advance in technology, risks have evolved as well – in case of digitization in the shape of cyber risks.

Cyber risk manifests itself in our everyday lives. Cyber-attacks, espionage, operational errors occur daily, causing loss to the economy at a significant level. Recently, there has been also growing concern about “systemic cyber risk”— the possibility that a single incident could cause ripple effects with potentially catastrophic consequences. A systemic cyber fallout could threaten the digital infrastructure that societies, economies, and governments rely on. Consequently, it comes as no surprise, that cyber risks are identified as one of the top risks over the past years in the AXA 2022 Future Risk Report as well as the Swiss Re Institute SONAR Report 2023..

However, research progress on this subject has been described as modest and the availability of data limited, leading to many questions remaining unanswered. This can largely be attributed to the novelty of the topic, and its constantly evolving threat profile.

To reinforce cyber resilience, more understanding is needed. In light of this, the Swiss Re Institute and the AXA Research Fund have decided to collaboratively support academic research projects investigating how to increase cyber resilience for companies, governments and society looking at different resilience building approaches.. The Partnership has an overall budget of 1M€, which will be distributed to different research projects over 3 years. 

The Call for research Proposals ‘Building Resilience against Systemic Cyber Risk’ seeks to improve the understanding of economic resilience against cyber catastrophes (including around strengthening protection, reducing impact and improving recovery protocols). Project teams will be required to make choices around specific cyber catastrophe scenarios as well as the methodology used.

The results of the work should contribute to industries and societies understanding of economic and business resilience against certain cyber risk scenarios by providing inputs on how to assess resilience and suggest best ways to improve it.

 Limit: 1 // R. Schomer (School of Plant Sciences)

Institutions may submit one nominee to the New Innovator Award program.

*Deadline note: This selection process is running with an anticipated deadline. We will inform all applicants of relevant updates in the guidelines, submission deadlines, and eligibility as soon as more information becomes available.

The Foundation for Food and Agriculture Research (FFAR)  New Innovator Program,  will allow investigators to explore new avenues of inquiry that arise during their research. Therefore, FFAR is interested in the program of research to be explored and its impact as opposed to a list of very specific aims. The review process emphasizes the individual’s creativity, the innovativeness of the research approaches, and the potential of the program; collaborations are encouraged. While this award is made to an outstanding early career investigator, applicants should include information regarding any essential collaborators and include letters of support from those collaborators. Each applicant can receive from FFAR up to $150,000 per year for a maximum of three years totaling $450,000 investment.

Research programs should fall within one of FFAR’s Challenge Areas

• Advanced Animal Systems
• Health-Agriculture Nexus
• Next Generation Crops
• Soil Health
• Sustainable Water Management
• Urban Food Systems
•  Climate change  

No Applicants // Limit: 1 // Tickets Available: 1 

The foundation will consider more than one application per institution per year, but only one application per laboratory/mentor per year.

The Lalor Foundation postdoctoral fellowship program supports promising new researchers in establishing scientific and teaching careers. The program’s mission is to support these researchers early in their work so that they can become independently funded in the field of mammalian reproductive biology as related to the regulation of fertility. The Lalor Foundation will award fellows $55,000 per year to cover a fellowship stipend, fringes, and institutional overhead. Other expenses are not allowed. Institutional overhead may not exceed 10 percent of the total fellowship award. Renewal for one additional year is possible; please refer to specific renewal information under Application Instructions. 

 Limit: 4 //

M. Verhougstraete (Community, Environment & Policy)
J. Schroeder (Molecular and Cellular Biology)
H. Cai (Neuroscience)
J. Bibb (Translational Neurosciences)
 

The mission of The G. Harold and Leila Y. Mathers Foundation is to advance knowledge in the life sciences by sponsoring scientific research that will benefit mankind. The foundation’s grants program seeks to support basic science, ideally with potential translational applications. Immunology, microbiome, genomics, structural biology, cellular physiology, neuroscience, etc., are some noteworthy examples of current research support. 

For many years the Foundation has enjoyed special recognition in the research community for supporting “basic” scientific research, realizing that true transformative breakthroughs usually occur after a thorough understanding of the fundamental mechanisms underlying natural phenomena. More recently, and with the advent of newer investigative methodologies, technology, and tools, the Foundation now embraces innovative translational research proposals.

The grant duration must be three years. The budget should be reasonable based on the aims of the project. Indirect costs may not exceed 10%. Preliminary Budgets are required during the LOI phase. A detailed budget justification is not required until the proposal phase.  The Foundation’s grant award is not intended to be utilized for purchasing capital equipment (“bricks-and-mortar”) for the lab and is intended only to support the actual investigation. The Foundation assumes and expects that capital equipment must be provided by the research institution or university.
 

Application Guidance:

• Grant budgets cannot exceed $600-750K 
• The Foundation primarily supports basic science, ideally with potential translational applications.
• Immunology, microbiome, genomics, structural biology, cellular physiology, neuroscience, etc., are some noteworthy examples of current research support.
• Covid-19-related research projects (aims or sub-aims) will not be considered for support.
• Medical imaging technology-related projects and/or electrical engineering technology development projects will not be considered for support.
• Plant Biology Research, Oceanography, Space Exploration. and Global warming-related research will not be considered for support.
• As technology continues to advance, it is apparent that investigations in the area of basic science and translational research may become more and more reliant on collaborative, interdisciplinary projects. It is important to note that any interdisciplinary project proposals may require additional information regarding the collaborator(s)’ achievements and relevant expertise.
• Feedback for declined LOI Requests will not be provided; LOIs or Formal Proposals that have been declined should not be resubmitted at a later date for consideration.
• Renewal applications for the same or related research will not be accorded priority consideration. It is strongly advised that any re-application for grant renewal consider a new direction based on prior research or emphasize some new potential translational aspects and not merely an extension of previously funded research.
• Requests for funding previously federally supported research and/or applications pending federal approval will not be accorded priority consideration.
• Requests for support of clinical trials or drug discovery will not be approved. The Foundation will not support projects which we consider pre-clinical drug development.