Grants Announced for Instrumentation, Collaborations with FSU Scientists

NSF INSTRUMENTATION GRANTS: The National Science Foundation is soliciting proposals for academic instrumentation acquisition and development. As part of its Academic Research Infrastructure Program, NSF will award a total of $50 million in FY 1996 to support purchase, upgrade, or development of major, state-of-the-art research instrumentation that is not usually provided for by other NSF programs.

The grants, which will be announced next fall, will range from $100,000 to $2 million, and require cost sharing by the awardee of 30 to 50 percent of total project costs. Proposals for single instruments, large systems of instruments, or multiple instruments sharing a common research focus will be considered. All proposals will be evaluated according to research merit, infrastructure need, project impacts, and plans and funding. NSF hopes to stimulate development of next-generation research equipment by encouraging collaborations between academic researchers and private-sector experts in instrument manufacture. According to the solicitation, “such partnerships have the potential to create new products with wide scientific and commercial impact.”

The deadline for proposals is February 1, 1996. The proposal success rate for the last round of instrumentation awards was 42 percent. For further information on the grants, inquiries should be directed to the NSF Office of Science and Technology Infrastructure, Phone: 703-306-1040; Email: ari@nsf.gov

COLLABORATIVE R&D GRANTS: A private, non-profit U.S. foundation is offering collaborative grants to assist scientists and engineers in the Former Soviet Union (FSU). In 1992, Rep. George Brown (D-CA), then-Senator Al Gore (D-TN), and Senator Joseph Lieberman (D-CT) sponsored legislation establishing the U.S. Civilian Research and Development Foundation (CRDF). Its purpose is to help support the science and technology enterprise in the FSU, to encourage productive civilian employment opportunities for FSU scientists and engineers, particularly former defense workers, and to promote democracy and a market economy in the FSU states.

Philanthropist George Soros provided one-half of the initial $10 million funding for CRDF; the other half came from the Department of Defense under the “Nunn-Lugar” program to encourage demilitarization in the FSU states. The first activity of the foundation is a series of cooperative grants to be given to teams of FSU and U.S. researchers. The CRDF plans to award a total of over $6 million in funds; individual grants will range from $10,000 to $80,000 for a two-year period. All teams must have one FSU and one U.S. co-investigator meeting specific professional qualifications, and projects may be in any area of non-defense R&D. Both basic and applied research are acceptable, as is pre-competitive technology development. Special consideration will be given to proposals including participation by former FSU defense workers. The proposals will be reviewed by expert CRDF panels, and the first awards will be announced by July 1, 1996.

Proposals, in English, are due by March 1, 1996. To obtain more details on the CRDF Cooperative Grants Program, contact CRDF at: WWW: http://www.internext.com/crdf ; Email: information@crdf.org ; Phone: 703-526-9720; Fax: 703-526-9721.