NASA To Expand Cutting-Edge Science At Emerging Research Institutions

By Padi Boyd

NASA has announced two new funding programs to support, enhance, and enable cutting-edge science at emerging research institutions. These institutions include primarily undergraduate institutions, community colleges, minority-serving institutions, such as historically black colleges and universities, hispanic serving institutions, and tribal colleges and universities. Combined, these institutions enroll ~75% of undergraduate students across the United States.

The new SMD Bridge Seed Funding (BPSF) solicits proposals to provide support for faculty investigators and their students at the kinds of institutions above to carry out NASA-relevant research. Through the BPSF program, NASA aims to boost research capacity across a broader range of institutions, and to forge enduring collaborations. 

NASA's Research Initiation Awards aim to enable investigators at emerging research institutions to initiate activities to provide catalyzing funding support for a competitive, sustainable, and productive research program. It will also make it possible for undergraduate students affiliated with the successful teams to perform cutting-edge research.  

In total across both programs, NASA expects to award up to $6 million per year.

A joint informational webinar about these funding opportunities will be on May 24 at 1-2:30 p.m. ET via Zoom. Those who register will receive a Zoom calendar invitation that will get updated with connection information.

Text and due dates for the Bridge Program Seed Funding call can be found here

Text and due dates for the Research Initiation Awards can be found here.

Read more about both programs here.