Subrata Acharya: Again. Welcome everybody to the Nsf. Size Research expansion program. Solicitation twenty, four, over five hundred and thirty six.
Subrata Acharya: Here is a brief outline of what we are going to cover in the thirty minutes
Subrata Acharya: in the first half of the Webinar presentation
Subrata Acharya: mit ctl. And we'll go through the Nsf. Mission. Give you an overview of the program. Give your details about eligibility and deadlines, and also give you important information about resources such as the Cloud bank and also different workshops that are being one hundred and fifty
Subrata Acharya: held for the program to support submissions and success of investigators and institutions. We leave ample time, as I said, for the question, and answers post that,
Subrata Acharya: as you all know, the goal of the National Science Foundation and its investments up to promote the progress of science to advance the national health, prosperity and welfare and to secure our national defense.
Subrata Acharya: So to that effect
Subrata Acharya: Nanosef invests in fundamental foundational translation and societal research areas. Foundational research includes the basic fundamental work in information gathering analysis and
Subrata Acharya: communication. Nsf: also supports translation research with regards to size-funded research which have worked towards compute systems and communications.
Subrata Acharya: And finally, and the most critical which this solicitation supports is the societal impact with regards to size-funded research that benefits all Americans This is kind of critical to the theme and the vision and mission of the program.
Subrata Acharya: Just to give you a brief view of the director and the computer information, science engineering directed by numbers. And this funds, eighty percent of federally funded computer science in the United States at these academic institutions.
Subrata Acharya: What I would like you to focus on this chart is the institutions which have been supported with regards to being emerging research institutions of minority-serving institutions which have grown over the past few years.
Subrata Acharya: Also, it is important to note the focus of size to impact and support sustainable research towards ep score institutions or institutions which are from the twenty eight Eps for jurisdictions which receive less than zero point, five percent
Subrata Acharya: Nsf. Funding
Subrata Acharya: the vision and priorities for our two thousand and thirty mission is to establish and strengthen Nsf. Priorities in these areas of compute systems. Research, communication and societal impact
Subrata Acharya: inspired the missing millions to join the portfolio, either as investigators, students, institutions, and of course, to accelerate translation, to practice through technology and innovation specifically across the institutions across the jurisdictions and provide regional leadership
Subrata Acharya: in the areas. I'm: Putting
Subrata Acharya: is the key gradient of this
Subrata Acharya: one thing we want to highlight here is focus on what has been the legislation which is the chips and signs. The legislation authorizes a doubling of Nsf. Budget in the upcoming years. The goal is to strengthen fundamental research, to focus on research capacity, building
Subrata Acharya: establish partnerships and innovation as a key key in gradient for fundamental research, invest in stem, diversity and some education, as well as address, national security and research needs for our nation, starting from health, climate, border security, and so on.
Subrata Acharya: The investments are geared at creating a workforce that have prepared for the jobs of today and tomorrow, and filling the gaps which we have understood
Subrata Acharya: from statistics and the national trends, and then, of course, provide technologies and jobs for the future with Ai quantum semiconductors, applications of computing in any discipline
Subrata Acharya: with regards to sustaining workforce, building regional institutional leadership as well as promoting diversity in stem
Subrata Acharya: Now I will change yours and focus on the solicitation which is the Nsf. Twenty, four, over thirty, six,
Subrata Acharya: As I had mentioned before,
Subrata Acharya: The goal and mission of Nsf. Is to build research capacity and to do that. The goal of this solicitation was to build research capacity at so minority serving institutions which are emerging research institutes so that we can have a
Subrata Acharya: for translation to the size Four programs. We'll go detailed into the size four programs in the following slides. The next is to stimulate rigorous research advancement at such institutions, so that we can address stem competitiveness and workforce development throughout the nation.
Subrata Acharya: And of course, as I have mentioned, to fill the gaps in funding of these institutions, as they are central and critical, to promote inclusive excellence, and thus enabling
Subrata Acharya: the diversity and portfolio of distribution across all research, access, and inclusion for the Directorate
Subrata Acharya: just to give you a little history. The program was launched in three years ago, three to three and a half years ago in two thousand and twenty one,
Subrata Acharya: the through a series of workshops which placed focus on minority-serving institutions and institutions which have limited research, infrastructure, engaging faculty and institutions from them, and encouraging collaborations and partnerships for ideation.
Subrata Acharya: The face led to wonderful outcomes. We just wanted to highlight that we have over
Subrata Acharya: one hundred and five awards over the past three years, with the investment of over forty million dollars to date these awards range from three hundred thousand up to one point, five billion to provide the partnerships and the capacity building for these institutions.
Subrata Acharya: The representation of these awards are across all the programs and divisions and offices for the directorate,
Subrata Acharya: a key thing which we would like. Nsf: Ah Staff. Response to this solicitation is to understand and explain to our investigators the transition to the core.
Subrata Acharya: The program supports the success of institutional research, capacity, building and investigator research carrier pathways towards inclusion into the Size four and participating programs. The programs which are supportive of this are the division of computer and communication fundamental Ccf.
Subrata Acharya: Where Jim is from
Subrata Acharya: Cns, which is the computer and network systems which the Michelle and me have worked, and Iis, which is the information and intelligence systems, which is another division as part of size and office, of advanced cyber infrastructure.
Subrata Acharya: At this point I will request Michelle to come in and share details about the solicitation.
Michelle Rogers: Sorry as was just mentioned. These these
Michelle Rogers: divisions are those that are participating in this solicitation. And so Ah, Jim will pick up on this when we talk about eligibility. But the goal of this program, as Sabrata mentioned is that
Michelle Rogers: institutions would participate in size and aside, but that the next step would not to continue to apply for this award. But the goal is for you to then become more prepared to to apply to the size
Michelle Rogers: that your next application you would be well qualified to apply to Ccf Cns is in Oac.
Michelle Rogers: Now there are other programs that we are allowed that we look to to support. So if your research falls into the enter of cyber physical systems, secure and trustworthy cyberspace, smart and connected communities as well as smart and connected health. We also encourage you to apply for those they apply for those last four divisions do not a program do not take you out of being eligible for the overall award.
Michelle Rogers: These are just other programs that support the size. Core, if you notice these are just programs about what that means is that they're not at the level of division. So a division is a can include several different programs. And so this
Michelle Rogers: solicitation is supported by the core solicitations. The four core divisions, and
Michelle Rogers: also supported by these programs. So they're at a different level of the
Michelle Rogers: funding because they span multiple divisions. So they're not in one division so secure and trustworthy. Cyberspace includes program officers and awards that fall under both Cns and Iis and Ccf. So they fall under a lot. But their program crosses all of those divisions. It's not directly anyone
Michelle Rogers: next slide.
Michelle Rogers: So this solicitation has the updated solicitation now has four threads. So if you've applied for this solicitation in the past with the February deadline, you notice that this is now a new solicitation, which is why most of you are probably here to learn more about the new solicitation. What changes were made. One of the biggest changes is that we broke up the first threat, and so that now we have four threads, where in the last year we only had three,
Michelle Rogers: we um, and these three threads will go into, but they range in Project lift as well as award sizes.
Michelle Rogers: Um, Just so. You know that we ask that if you already have one of these awards that is active, we ask that you not apply again, because we would like to spread the support across a number of institutions next slide.
Michelle Rogers: So threat number one is the Research Capacity Building planning Project, meaning that we're looking for development of infrastructure elements to support research. So you would describe how those funds
Michelle Rogers: would support that infrastructure, and how the work will provide new or some an ongoing research opportunity for the students at these Emsis or across some partner that you've engaged. We ask that as part of this solicitation, if you would detail and talk about the sustainability of your outcome. So once you have built this really these partnerships, you can then
Michelle Rogers: talk about where you would get further support, and we would hope that further support would be in size. Core.
Michelle Rogers: This is one where a lone P. I would not apply. This is about partnerships next slide,
Michelle Rogers: So threat number two is a demonstration project, a thread asking for understanding of developing research collaborations involving multiple departments that may be at your own institution or multiple institutions.
Michelle Rogers: We ask that this one focus on research aligned with one or more of the size programs, meaning that we ask you to identify which core program you would like to your work aligns with,
Michelle Rogers: and that your research will fall under, and that this demonstration that you're doing would strengthen the partnership amongst the researchers that you're involved with as well as engaging undergraduate or graduate students from the minority-serving institution. That's participating
Michelle Rogers: thread number three.
Michelle Rogers: Next time
Michelle Rogers: this one is to enhance partnerships so this is looking at enhancing partnerships between an Msi and either an Nsf. Funded Research center, some other research, intensive organization or a national laboratory. So this is looking at those partnerships that can be developed across the nation across the State.
Michelle Rogers: Um, We want it to be someone who doesn't have any previous support from size programs,
Michelle Rogers: and that they will take the lead on this project, As we've said earlier, This is about building up the research infrastructure at these minority-serving institutions, once again including undergraduate and graduate students in the research activities and conferences,
Michelle Rogers: showing that the collaborative project team will enhance the research capacity at the minority-serving institutions So this does not say that other institutions can't participate.
Michelle Rogers: All we ask is that the minority serving institution be the lead, and that the research capacity is being built at that institution.
Michelle Rogers: And finally, we would like to hope that the research team could eventually compete in the size core at the medium and large level.
Michelle Rogers: Next slide.
Michelle Rogers: The new thread is a research planning project. So this is not a prerequisite, but
Michelle Rogers: or participating in anything else. But it's designed for those institutions that don't feel like they could meet either of the first three threads.
Michelle Rogers: This would allow you to. If you don't have an existing partnership, to establish that partnership, to plan or expand efforts at the Msi describe how the funds would help build that research capacity, and then we really would like
Michelle Rogers: um a plan that would elaborate on the feasibility of this partnership, and how this partnership would have plans that would continually develop the capacity.
Michelle Rogers: And finally, for this thread we ask that you describe the research, infrastructure, the plans to establish these relationships, and the inclusion of any faculty, training, or research experiences that could possibly be needed to diversify the number of investigators, the types of investigators, the research areas. The investigators come from
Michelle Rogers: next slide.
Michelle Rogers: And so now i'm going to turn these over to Jim, to kind of talk about how you can get direction for completing
Michelle Rogers: a um proposal if you have not. Um, submitted one in the past, Jim. All right. Thanks, Michelle.
Jim Fowler: So the general proposal and award process is described in what we call a cap. G. That's document in Sf. Twenty, four, one, and you see the link here, so that gives you all of the general rules and regulations and policies, and such that you need to follow for any proposal submitted to and Nsf.
Jim Fowler: Next slide, please.
Jim Fowler: So
Jim Fowler: we also have additional criteria that must be satisfied for submitting to the size Msi solicitation.
Jim Fowler: Um. Proposals may be submitted by only universities and colleges or nonprofit non-academic organizations or nsf sponsored federally funded research and development centers
Jim Fowler: with this last one Well, with the caveat that they are not including costs which Federal funds have already been awarded or expected to be awarded.
Jim Fowler: There is also a limitation on the number of proposals per pi copi or senior personnel. That is, two. That means that an individual may participate as a principal investigator, a co-principal investigator or a senior personnel in at most two full proposals, and this is regardless of the category, the Rf. Or the Dp. Categories that Michelle just outlined before. As across all categories.
Jim Fowler: So we asked that an Msi faculty member serve as the lead principal investigator on any proposal submission,
Jim Fowler: and you can refer to the complete details of the at the Size Msi. Solicitation. Twenty, four point, five, thirty, six. Okay. Next slide, please.
Jim Fowler: There is also institutional eligibility criteria that must be followed. So proposals may be submitted by accredited institutions of higher education that belong to to at least one of the following consultations as a minority serving institution, and you see those listed here
Jim Fowler: now, and as an important note we at Nsf. Cannot certify whether you are a minority-serving institution or not the eligibility can be checked
Jim Fowler: at this ipads website that's run by the Us. Department of Education. You can see the Url listed there,
Jim Fowler: and we have some more information in in the solicitation itself.
Jim Fowler: Next slide, please.
Jim Fowler: So there's another website here. Ah, run by the Department of Education as well, that i'll list um programs that are, I would say, institutions that are organized by different categories of the minority serve and institutions.
Jim Fowler: So you can refer to this fight as well as the one on the previous slide, to determine whether you are an eligible Msi or not. But ultimately you're going to have to sort this out with an official at your university or institution, because the institution must satisfy the definition of an Msi,
Jim Fowler: and that is spelled out in section one of the solicitation, and there is an Msi certification form that is required with this submission of the proposal that's described as Section Five, with solicitation
Jim Fowler: for the and Msi certification, there will be a representative of your institution, for example, somebody in the sponsored research Program office, or perhaps higher in the food chain at your university.
Jim Fowler: That person must sign a certification of Msi eligibility, and that will be included in the supplementary documentation section of the proposal.
Jim Fowler: Ah! Again we at Ms. We at Nsf. Cannot certify you as an Msi. That somebody at your university should be able to do that, and you will need to have somebody do that. And if and in an official capacity, in order to get this certification of Msi eligibility document completed for your proposal.
Jim Fowler: So another ah, very important eligibility criterion. And this is new for this year is that institutions that have received, and Nsf. Awards, totally more than two million dollars within the past five years, and as dated from the fiscal year Deadline Day
Jim Fowler: from the size programs listed in Section Two. Ah, and that is all of the size core programs, plus those four Cross division programs
Jim Fowler: are not eligible to serve as lead institutions, but you may participate as a non-lead collaborator.
Jim Fowler: And so this this two million dollar figure is from all of those section two programs combined over the last five years combined.
Jim Fowler: Okay, next um page, please.
Jim Fowler: So some of the mechanics of the proposal submission process uh the proposal starts off with a cover sheet. You will need to designate an Nsf. Unit of consideration. This would be a division or office in most cases. Uh. So you should choose the division or office or uh one of the four eligible cross-demision programs as the unit of consideration. So these include uh Ccf Cns Iis Oac
Jim Fowler: for the divisions and for the Cross Division programs. Remember, those are Sat, C Cps, c. And C. The Sncc. And Chs.
Jim Fowler: Ah, your proposal title I should begin with the size Dash Msi at Colon, and then the thread acronym, and then the intended size program. So this would be the core program for the eligible Cross division program. So some examples. So for an Rp. Project submitted in the Ccf Division, we would
Jim Fowler: call that size Dash Msi Colon Rpat, Colin, Ccf. Poland, and then your project title for a Dp. Project submitted to the Sassi program Size Dash Msi Cole and Dp. Colin Sassy Colin. And then your project title.
Jim Fowler: Okay, next page, please.
Jim Fowler: So in the project description, and this is the main body proposal. In the first paragraph of the project description you need to identify the intended size program, Cds, Sassy, Ccf. Et cetera,
Jim Fowler: and then the description must indicate how the proposed research will foster department and or organizational research capacity.
Jim Fowler: In addition to the guidance that's specified in the G. You need to also provide an institutional data narrative.
Jim Fowler: That is the project. Description must include institutional data with a narrative describing and contextualizing the institution need for the proposed project and its potential to build research, capacity and partnerships.
Jim Fowler: Next slide, please.
Jim Fowler: Okay, you'll have a number of supplementary documents. Um. We ask that you provide a list of project personnel and their partner institutions. So if you're working in a collaborative proposal, the lead institution should provide this information for all of the participants.
Jim Fowler: You'll need a collaboration plan, and there's a two-page limit on that the data management Pan plan, also two pages cloud computing resources. If applicable, we'll talk about that in a little bit. A departmental letter which must be one page, and then the certification of Msi eligibility, which I mentioned before.
Jim Fowler: Next slide, please.
Jim Fowler: Okay, Going into a little bit more of the specifics of these collaboration plan needs to address the specific roles of all of the Pis, Tokiis and other senior personnel, as well as any paid consultants at all of the institutions that are involved. Projects. That collaboration plan needs to describe how the project would be managed across all of the investigators, the institutions and or disciplines.
Jim Fowler: It needs to identify the specific coordination mechanisms that will enable process, institution and or cross-discipline, scientific integration. And it should point to specific budget line items that support these management and coordination mechanisms.
Jim Fowler: Next slide please
Jim Fowler: a data management plan that needs to be included. And this should address how the proposal will conform to Nsf. Policy on the dissemination and sharing of research results,
Jim Fowler: specific guidance on data management plans that are submitted to the size can be found at this link here
Jim Fowler: and chapter Two of um. The Pat G also has the details of the full policy implementation, and we have ah another site here. Um! The bfa runs. Ah, this site about additional information on dissemination and the sharing of research results.
Jim Fowler: Okay. Next page
Jim Fowler: Cloud computing resources. Ah, if you are requesting cloud and resources and Deep will be talking about Cloud Bank and what to do for that in just a moment.
Jim Fowler: But you do need to provide a supplementary document that does not exceed two pages, and this document should address the anticipated annual and total costs for accessing the desired file of computing resources based upon pricing currently available,
Jim Fowler: which cloud providers will be used, and a technical description and justification of the Rip West along the how the cost was estimated
Jim Fowler: now importantly in your budget for the project, you should not include any cost for the cloud computing resources used via Cloud Bank. The total cost of the project, however, includes this computed resource, and this total cost may not exceed the budget limit, as described in the solicitation,
Jim Fowler: and the solicitation goes into some detail about how to calculate these costs and the budget. But the bottom line is that the total cost of the project, including the cloud computing
Jim Fowler: costs, cannot exceed the budget limit. But you, Don't, actually include the budget into the budget. The cloud computing costs, and with that I will say next slide and turn it over to Deep.
Deep Medhi: Uh, thank you, Jim. So uh, Jim just started talking about the cloud bank
it, and
Deep Medhi: the way that the product cloud computing part of the way it works is that we have
Deep Medhi: from this picture. But you can see that as A. P. I. You request
Deep Medhi: that you want to use one of the commercial cloud provider right now we are a partnership within, as in what the service uh Google Cloud Platform, Ivan Cloud and Microsoft Zoom.
Deep Medhi: And so once Um, because of that, what happens is that we are trying to give access to anybody
Deep Medhi: they can do.
I's rather that they can use the Cloud bank to
Deep Medhi: the main point is to democratize the access to researchers, and this is a pi centric program
Deep Medhi: next slide, please.
Deep Medhi: So the the idea is that this benefit actually well, you know, three different entities involved with the size researchers, you know, removed a fraction. For example, my needs to do
Deep Medhi: do not have the agreement with the Cloud Provider to use any cloud services. So so they, you know. Then the pis can then use cloud, then to use cloud in the services. So that's one of the big benefit of it. Second thing is that
Deep Medhi: Mit. Ctl. And some institutions may have an agreement with one of the Cloud providers, but because of our agreement through Cloud Bank multiple cloud providers are available. So if your research requires you to use something that's not available from the one hundred and one
Deep Medhi: plot provider that your institution has agreement with, then you can still use the other provider, and that's the benefit to them.
Deep Medhi: Uh for Nsf. It creates an entity that will actually does everything tick
Deep Medhi: it for us
Deep Medhi: for the so size for the pis. Ah, you can actually track it. Use it. You can log in and see how much it is almost it's a real-time basis. How much cloud credit you use it. And so that's a very good thing. So and for the cloud over here it gives access to the new
Deep Medhi: users and communities, you know, you know, helps with uploading a high-touch nature of working within the reserves
Deep Medhi: looks like this.
Deep Medhi: So I actually talked about this, but I kind of recap a couple of the important things. But one thing I want to point out is the very first bullet. If you are going to use any of the cloud provider. Then, in the project summaries you need to add the word cloud access,
Deep Medhi: one word without any space. It should be included at the end of the overview section before it. Your the section of the intellectual map that's very, very important.
Deep Medhi: And then, as Jim said before, the budget should not be a part of the main project body. It is done with a toothpaste supplement which is already covered. But i'm going to go over an example. Can you go to the next slide, please?
Deep Medhi: So let's say that you want to submit a proposal to threat to That is the Research demonstration Project, Rdp. And which allows the total budget limit of six hundred thousand.
Deep Medhi: So if, as a pi, you wish to request fifty thousand in commercial plot, provider through plot. Bang! What you do is in your Nsf. Budget, your link. You are going to limit it for five hundred and fifty thousand dollars,
Deep Medhi: and then that fifty thousand dollars that you want to request for Cloud credit you wanted to, man. Send it in the supplement document with the justification of how you come up with the cost, and whose cloud provider you want to use it.
Deep Medhi: And once you may think that this fifty thousand dollars disappears, That's not so, because what we do is that if your project is funded, then we funnel that fifty thousand dollars
Deep Medhi: directly to the Cloud Provider, and then you log in these your institutions in Commons credentials, and then access it right there.
Deep Medhi: Um next light
Deep Medhi: So important deadlines that the full proposal deadline is coming up in about six weeks. Wait a second for this year, and then from next year it will be the first February seventh, and February sixth. Sorry that's what it is,
Deep Medhi: we expect for this rounds proposal. That's due on May the second to be announced by August, but they got funded so
Deep Medhi: and so um pay attention to what we have in terms of the deadline. All the guidelines we talked about today, so that that you can prepare it properly and submit by a second
Deep Medhi: next slide.
Deep Medhi: Um! So. Ah, we want to point out that there are going to be um aspiring investigators or workshops. There are three upcoming ones, as mentioned. You are one at the University of Alabama, at one in Hawaii, the one in Alaska. So those are coming up. Obviously you can see that
Deep Medhi: next slide, please.
Deep Medhi: Um, Anyway, we want to a week. I want to recover that. That is an aspiring investment to our transition to size school program. The resource expansion is to give building on the technical things and responding to research and societal opportunity,
Deep Medhi: building, build out across cross-cutting, afford to infrastructure and people engaging in broader conversation with the research community, with industry and with us, agency and international.
Deep Medhi: Next slide, please.
Deep Medhi: So we are done with our part of the presentation. Then we can go to Q. And A. And a couple of them. I already answered by Texas typing it to the Q. And A.