News & Updates

NSF-funded Engineering Research Visioning Alliance (ERVA) seeks your assistance in identifying participants for their visioning event, Sustainable Transportation Networks, Nov 2-3.

The Biden-Harris Administration, through the DOE, has issued a Request for Information (RFI) to help guide the implementation of $335 million in investments from President Biden’s Bipartisan Infrastructure Law for lithium-ion battery recycling programs. Batteries are critical to powering clean energy technologies — from providing energy storage for the electric grid to zero-emissions transportation options, such as electric trucks, buses, or personal vehicles. Expanding options for domestic production of zero-emissions transportation will allow more Americans to benefit from clean transportation, while adding jobs to the clean energy workforce and supporting President Biden’s decarbonization goals. Responses to the RFI are due Oct 14, by 5 pm ET.

The DOE has awarded $29.5 million to 15 projects to improve the current science and infrastructure for utilizing waste streams, often disproportionately located in underserved communities, and support the development of improved organisms and inorganic catalysts for the production of valuable biofuels and bioproducts that can benefit the local energy economy. This effort will advance the Biden Administration’s goals to deliver an equitable, clean energy future, and put the US on a path to achieve net-zero emissions, economy-wide, by no later than 2050.

NSF has awarded a new round of grants under the Navigating the New Arctic (NNA) program. The awards support research projects to study the Arctic's changing natural, built and social environments. Through NNA, researchers in science, engineering and education disciplines are working together to address some of the most pressing challenges on the planet. Research grants are focused on actionable results; incubator grants will allow teams to carry out projects of a larger scope in the future.

US coastlines are heavily populated areas with critical public resources, such as housing, transportation infrastructure, freshwater supplies, and electricity generation and distribution facilities. These coastlines are also increasingly vulnerable to extreme weather events, sea-level rise, coastal flooding, algal blooms and tectonic hazards.

To reduce the barriers to entry into careers in the biological sciences and produce a more diverse workforce, NSF has made 12 new awards totaling more than $35 million through its Research and Mentoring for Postbaccalaureates in the Biological Sciences program, known as RaMP. The awards will support the creation of networks providing research experiences and mentoring to recent college graduates who have had few or no research and related training opportunities during college.

Flood mitigation measures, rural transportation systems and pharmaceutical supply chains are among the subjects being examined by nine new research projects receiving backing from the NSF. NSF is investing more than $8 million in the projects through its Strengthening American Infrastructure program. The program supports research that utilizes advances in behavioral and social science to improve the value and usefulness of infrastructure in people’s lives, from US roads and highways to state and local power grids.

The Engineering Research Visioning Alliance (ERVA), launched by NSF in April 2021, provides the engineering research community with a process for identifying bold and societally impactful engineering research directions that will place the United States in a leading position to realize a better future for all. For its inaugural visioning event, ERVA convened more than 100 experts from academia, industry, and government to identify priorities for engineering research that address one of the world’s most vexing challenges: climate change.

US Government Accountability Office (GAO)’s report examines (1) the effects of the NSF EPSCoR program on jurisdictions’ competitiveness in obtaining NSF and other federal research funding, (2) jurisdiction officials’ perspectives on the program’s effects, and (3) NSF’s efforts to assess the effects of the program and identify opportunities for improvement. GAO is making one recommendation that NSF enhance its annual reporting to Congress on the EPSCoR. More

The NSF is investing more than $7.5 million in new research focused on empowering more reliable prediction of the spread of infectious diseases, the effects of mitigation measures and other critical aspects of national health crises. The funding will support eight interdisciplinary research projects aimed at incorporating the complexities of human behavior into epidemiological models.