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Descripton at end of newsletter Week of May 15, 2023
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Greetings Dornsife Faculty,
This week's report includes
- Recognition for 2 Dornsife faculty members;
- External funding success achieved by 3 College faculty;
- External funding opportunities including 3 limited submissions; and
- Request for Information from DARPA
- Communication from DCG on NIH updates.
Best regards,
Renee J. Perez, Vice Dean, Administration & Finance
Cathleen Crayton, Project Specialist
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Accolades
Ann Owens, 2022 William Julius Wilson Early Career Award, American Sociological Association’s Inequality, Poverty, and Mobility Section
Hiram Sims, English, appointed Library Board Commissioner of the Los Angeles Public Library system by Mayor Karen Bass
External Funding Successes
James Dolan, Earth Sciences, Dating alluvial fans by surface reflectance imaged with AVIRIS and EMIT spectroscopy, Jet Propulsion Laboratory, California Institute of Technology
Matthew Ragan, Wrigley Institute for Environment and Sustainabiltiy, Implementation of the Infrastructure Investments and Jobs Act: Improving and Enhancing the Southern California Coastal Ocean Observing System (IIJA), University of California, San Diego
Hajar Yazdiha, Sociology, CIFAR Global Azrieli Scholar: Boundaries, Membership, and Belonging Program, Canadian Institute for Advanced Research
External Funding Opportunities
***Limited Submission***
(Repost from last week; 1 slot available)
NSF / Across All Directorates
Program: BioFoundries to Enable Access to Infrastructure and Resources for Advancing Modern Biology and Biotechnology (BioFoundries)
Solicitation #: 23-585
Synopsis: Supports the research community by establishing BioFoundries facilities to serve both as user facilities and as innovation hubs for cutting-edge, multidisciplinary research with the important role of democratizing access to the tools of modern biology and biotechnology for the purposes of advancing scientific discoveries and translating those discoveries to address pressing societal challenges. A BioFoundry is an integrated facility that combines biological, chemical biology, and engineering biology systems and tools with automation, high throughput measurement, integrated data acquisition and analysis, and artificial intelligence (AI) and machine learning to enable feedback loops that facilitate progressive end-to-end cycles of design, build, test, and learn. In addition to providing broad access, a BioFoundry develops innovative (bio)technologies, invents new processes and workflows, integrates advanced computation, and creates reproducible results and shareable knowledge-bases to accelerate the design-build-test-learn pipeline from basic research to translation. By applying the same streamlining and automation principles that continue to revolutionize manufacturing, BioFoundries can operate with speed and at scales not possible in individual laboratories or typical university core facilities.
Award details: Awards totaling $15M to $24M over a 6-year period are anticipated. BioFoundries funding will be provided yearly. Pending the availability of funds, it is anticipated that $37M will be available for the Program in Fiscal Year 2024
USC Internal announcement: https://rii.usc.edu/limited-submissions/nsf-23-585/
External Announcement on website: https://www.nsf.gov/pubs/2023/nsf23585/nsf23585.pdf
USC Internal due date: June 9, 2023.
Letter of Intent due date: August 1, 2023.
Full Proposal due date: October 2, 2023.
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***Limited Submission***
(Allows 1 application partnership — partnership as defined as a collaboration between at least 2 different departments / colleges within one institution)
NIH / Across several institutes, predominantly National Institute of Neurological Disorders and Stroke [NINDS])
Program: HEAL Initiative Partnerships to Advance INterdisciplinary (PAIN) Training in Clinical Pain Research: The HEAL PAIN Cohort Program (T90 / R90 — Interdisciplinary Research Training Award / Interdisciplinary Regular Research Training Award)
NOFO #: RFA-NS-24-015
Synopsis: Supports the establishment of cohorts of T90 / R90 institutional / interdisciplinary postdoctoral training programs across various institutions as part of the HEAL PAIN Cohort Program. This program seeks to provide protected research time and formal research training opportunities to clinical pain researchers at an early stage of their careers while broadening the foci of research mentorship. Since the goal is to increase the clinical pain research workforce, the T90 / R90 Trainees / Participants must be in a clinical program or demonstrate an interest in clinical pain research. The NOFO includes a wealth of information that might be of interest to Dornsife investigators. Just a few examples of areas of interest for this NOFO include
- Bioinformatics
- Effective interventions for pain and co-morbidities, such as substance use disorder, sleep, and major depression
- Advancing health equity in the field of pai
Award details: HEAL intends to commit up to $673K (direct cost) for each award FY 2024 through FY 2028, contingent upon the availability of funds.
USC Announcement on website: https://rii.usc.edu/limited-submissions/rfa-ns-24-015/
External announcement on website: https://grants.nih.gov/grants/guide/rfa-files/RFA-NS-24-015.html
USC Internal due date: June 9, 2023.
Letter of Intent: August 11, 2023.
External due date: September 26, 2023.
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***Limited Submission***
(Repost from last week; 1 slot available)
National Endowment for the Arts
Program: Our Town
Synopsis: Supports activities that integrate arts, culture, and design into local efforts that strengthen communities over the long term. Our Town projects engage a wide range of local stakeholders in efforts to advance local economic, physical, and/or social outcomes in communities. Competitive projects are responsive to unique local conditions, authentically engage communities, center equity, advance artful lives, and lay the groundwork for long-term systems change.
Award details: $25K to $150K. Non-Federal 1:1 matching funds required.
USC Internal announcement: https://rii.usc.edu/limited-submissions/nea-our-town/
Announcement on website: https://www.arts.gov/grants/our-town
USC Internal due date: June 23, 2023.
Submission to grants.gov due date: August 3, 2023.
Submission to applicant window: August 10-17, 2023.
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Pen America
Program: Phyllis Naylor Grant for Children’s and Young Adult Novelists
Synopsis: Supports an author of children’s or young adult fiction for a novel-in-progress. The award was developed to help writers whose work is of high literary caliber and assist a writer at a crucial moment in their career to complete their novel.
Award details: $5K
Announcement on website: https://pen.org/pen-phyllis-naylor-grant/
Application due date: June 1, 2023.
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American Psychological Foundation
Program: Joseph B. Gittler Award
Synopsis: Supports and recognizes psychologists who are making and will continue to make scholarly contributions to the philosophical foundations of psychological knowledge. Encourages applications from diverse backgrounds who have Ed.D, Psy.D, or a Ph.D. from accredited institutions and whose contributions to the philosophical foundations of psychological knowledge have been recognized, particularly in the last 5 or 10 years and plan to continue to make contributions in the next 5 years going forward. Self-nominations are also accepted.
Award details: $4.5K
Announcement on website: https://apf.apa.org/funding/gittler-award/
Nominations due date: June 1, 2023.
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Smith Richardson Foundation
Program: Strategy and Policy Fellows
Synopsis: Supports young scholars and policy thinkers on American foreign policy, international relations, international security, military policy, and diplomatic and military history. This program supports junior or adjunct faculty, research associates, and postdocs who are engaged in policy-relevant research and writing, with the expected outcome of such support, a publication providing analysis. Within the think tank community, the program supports members of the rising generation of policy thinkers who are focused on U.S. strategic and foreign policy issues. Applicants must have earned a Ph.D. by the time of application.
Award details: $60K
Announcement on website: https://www.srf.org/programs/international-security-foreign-policy/strategy-policy-fellows-program/
Application due date: June 15, 2023.
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Simons Foundation / Simons Foundation Autism Research Initiative
Program: 2023 Cross-Species Studies of ASD – Request for Applications
Synopsis: Supports multi-disciplinary teams of PIs with human and animal research expertise to perform coordinated cross-species studies to advance understanding of ASD-relevant behaviors and their underlying neurobiological mechanisms, with the potential for developing novel biomarkers or interventions. The behaviors under study should be conserved across species and able to be measured objectively and quantitatively within the domains of sensory function, motor function, and sleep. Behaviors for which there is evidence of evolutionary conservation of such mechanisms, e.g., at the circuit level, will be prioritized. Studies in animals should take advantage of the use of more invasive techniques that would not be possible in humans, yet attempt to link findings from such techniques with analogous measurements in humans, e.g., LFP/EEG, or mesoscale Ca2+ imaging/fMRI.
Award details: $400K, inclusive of 20% indirect costs, over a project period of 2-3 years.
Announcement on website: https://www.sfari.org/grant/cross-species-studies-of-asd/
Application due date: June 15, 2023.
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American Chemical Society (ACS) / Women Chemists Committee (WCC)
Program: Rising Star Award
Synopsis: Supports and recognizes women (both cis and trans) chemists who have demonstrated outstanding promise for contributions to their respective fields. Appropriate candidates will typically be no more than 15 years from receipt of their terminal scientific degree. Applicants can either be self-nominated or can be nominated by another individual for this award. While the candidate must be an ACS member, the nominator does not need to be an ACS member. Chemists who have already received wide acclamation or who have previously been awarded the Rising Star Award are not eligible for nomination.
Award details: $1K; opportunities to present contributions at WCC-sponsored symposium at the Spring Meeting, as well as networking opportunities at WCC cocktail and luncheon socials.
Announcement on website: https://www.acs.org/funding/awards/women-chemists-rising-star-award.html
Nominations due date: June 15, 2023.
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Tyler Prize
Program: The John and Alice Tyler Prize for Environmental Achievement
Synopsis: Supports the work of individuals organizing for their work on the environment, energy, and health, resulting in important benefits for humanity. The nominee’s work is evaluated on scientific merit, addressing global realities, demonstration of measurable scalable impacts on an environmental issue or policy, and ability to engage with younger generations. Individuals and organizations are eligible for the award. While this is not an internal USC prize, the program is administered by USC.
Award details: Annual award is $250K
Announcement on website: https://tylerprize.org/nominate/
Nominations due date: August 11, 2023.
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When Everyone Survives (WES)
Program: WES 2023 Research Grant
Synopsis: Supports new and established investigators who are requesting support for laboratory, translational, or clinical research related to acute leukemia.
Award details: $50K for one year.
Announcement on website: https://www.wheneveryonesurvives.org/grant_application
Application due date: On or before June 1, 2023.
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RTW Charitable Foundation (RTWVCF)
Program: Request for Proposals for the 2023 RTWCF Research Grant Cycle
Synopsis: Supports translational projects that bridge the gap between proof-of-concept studies in animal models and preclinical safety/toxicology studies. This Request for Proposals is open to
- Scientists and clinicians associated with an academic institution
- Research on diseases that affect fewer than 2000 patients worldwide (monogenetic, life-threatening conditions affecting fewer than 300 patients worldwide preferred)
- Research on diseases for which no commercial drug-development programs exist
- Projects in any therapeutic area
- Projects that involve any clinically validated therapeutic modality (gene-replacement and antisense oligonucleotide-based therapies preferred)
- Projects for which there is evidence that the proposed therapeutic modality works in an animal model (or in another suitable system)
Award details: $150K for one year.
Announcement on website: https://www.rtwcf.org/research-grant-cycle/
Letter of Intent due date: May 31, 2023.
Full proposal due date (invited): July 31, 2023.
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National Endowment for the Arts (NEA)
Program: Grants for Arts Projects
Synopsis: Supports opportunities for public engagement with the arts and arts education, for the integration of the arts with strategies promoting the health and well-being of people and communities, and for the improvement of overall capacity and capabilities within the arts sector. NEA funds arts projects in Artist Communities, Arts Education, Dance, Design, Folk & Traditional Arts, Literary Arts, Local Arts Agencies, Media Arts, Museums, Music, Musical Theater, Opera, Presenting & Multidisciplinary Arts, Theater, and Visual Arts.
Award details: $10K to $100K. 1:1 non-Federal match required. Most rewards are <$25K.
Announcement on website: https://www.arts.gov/grants/grants-for-arts-projects
Submission to grants.gov due date: July 6, 2023.
Submission to applicant portal window: July 11th to 18th, 2023.
Announcement of Award: April 2024.
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National Institute of Justice (NIJ)
Program: Innovations in Measuring Community Perceptions of Challenge
Synopsis: Supports the development of new methods for capturing community perceptions of police and public safety. To facilitate comparing entries using similar methods, entries will be accepted under two categories (with each category measuring the same 5 constructs): Category 1 is for approaches that use a survey instrument, regardless of whether the sampling design is a probability, nonprobability, or a combination of the two. Solutions that solely rely upon law enforcement contact surveys will not be considered. Category 2 is for approaches that use non-survey instrument methods to measure constructs, i.e., those that gather information without direct interaction with community members via social media data (e.g., through sentiment analysis, natural language processing, and automatic summarization), administrative data, and other proxy data, perhaps combined with mobile telephone data, or some combination of the above, to gather accurate, cost-effective measures of community perceptions. Challenge submissions will be judged by a panel of reviewers with expertise in one or more of the following areas: criminal justice, data science, and survey methodology. Category 1 will be evaluated with other Category 1 submissions; Category 2 will be compared to Category 2 submissions.
Award details: A total of $175K in prizes is available which will be tiered and divided between the two submission categories.
Announcement on website: https://nij.ojp.gov/funding/innovations-measuring-community-perceptions-challenge?utm_source=govdelivery&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=challenge2023
Submission window: May 16, 2023, to July 31, 2023.
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NASA / Science Mission Directorate (SMD) – Planet Science Division (PSD)
Program: Support for Planetary Sample Science (SPSS)
Announcement #: NNH23ZDA017C
Synopsis: Supports research with NASA’s curated extraterrestrial samples located at the Johnson Space Center (JSC) This work would be carried out in collaboration with NASA Headquarters Science Mission Directorate (SMD), the Planetary Science Division (PSD) within SMD, and the JSC. The two major elements required are:
- A training program for researchers interested in working with NASA’s extraterrestrial samples
- A visiting scientist program to support researchers while they carry out research using JSC facilities. Other activities may be included in a proposal but the main focus of the proposal must be on enabling community-driven scientific research with samples.
Award details: Maximum award is $5M over 5 years.
Announcement on website: Planetary Sample Science
Step 1 Proposal due date: June 12, 2023.
Step 2 Proposal due date: July 24, 2023.
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Department of Defense (DoD) / U.S. Army Corps of Engineers / Engineer Research and Development Center
Program: Integrating long-term datasets with next-generation ecological models to quantify ecological response in aquatic systems
Funding Opportunity #: W81EWF-23-SOI-0015
Synopsis: Supports projects for integrating long-term environmental datasets into the next generation of integrated ecological models. The next generation of integrated ecological models developed under this cooperative agreement will be applicable to all aquatic ecosystems and both native and invasive species associated within these habitats. Predicting how species distributions will change over time is paramount for developing sustainable navigation strategies. Current approaches treat these as two separate efforts without focusing on the general driving factors of all species. The development of integrated ecological models that are parameterized with long-term datasets will benefit the public because they will be able to accurately predict how both invasive and native species will respond to changes in the environment. These models will optimize decision-making and reduce future uncertainty for invasive spread and provide critical information for endangered species management. Please consult the solicitation for the 7 specific objectives of this initiative.
Award details: Expected amount of funding for each award is $2.5M for Year 1; $2.5M for Year 2; $2.5M for Year 3 for the 3-year project period.
Announcement on website: Integrating long-term datasets with next-generation ecological models
Application due date for Phase l: June 15, 2023.
Application due date for Phase II (invited): July 17, 2023.
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NSF / Directorate for Social, Behavioral and Economics Sciences - Division of Behavioral and Cognitive Sciences (Linguistics, Developmental Science, Perception, Action and Cognition, Cognitive Neuroscience, Dynamic Language Infrastructure-Documenting Endangered Languages and Science of Learning and Augmented Intelligence)
Program: Stimulating Diversification in Language Science Research (LangDiv) via Dear Colleague Letter (DCL)
NSF #: : 23-010
Synopsis: Supports research that diversifies and further deepens the study of language and communication. This is a collaborative initiative across several programs in the Division of Behavioral and Cognitive Sciences with shared interests in the study of language and an effort to catalyze new collaborations that integrate knowledge across disciplines and / or levels of analysis. The goal is to advance more generalizable and replicable theories in the language and communication sciences via diversified sampling practices, language(s) of study, methodologies and theoretical perspectives. To advance more generalizable and replicable theories in the language sciences, researchers are encouraged to develop new epistemic frameworks and to broaden the representation of learners, languages, cultures, contexts of learning and use, and locations sampled in language science research.
Announcement on website: LangDiv
Proposal due date: As this is not a special competition or new program; investigators should submit a proposal in response to this DCL directly to one of the participating programs, following their guidelines including deadlines/target dates.
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NSF / Across All Directorates
Program: Conference Proposals on Clean Energy Topics via Dear Colleague Letter (DCL)
NSF #: 23-108
Synopsis: Supports workshops that will identify collaborative research opportunities for advancing science and technology for clean energy. The goal of these workshops is to initiate new collaborations in clean energy topics within academia or between academia and Federally Funded Research and Development Centers (FFRDCs). It is encouraged that PIs organize a topical workshop in collaboration with one or more FFRDCs that have significant research activity in the proposed topic. Preference for funding workshops will be given for workshops whose themes allow with themes related to (partial)
- Net--zero fuels and/or bioenergy with a focus on enabling new science and technology discovery
- Hydrogen, , fusion, and/or geothermal technologies
- Critical materials for clean energy technologies - their recovery, reuse, and recycling
Announcement on website: Conference Proposal on Clean Energy
Proposal due date: Submission of a conference proposal is by invitation only; the process is initiated by the submission of a Concept Outline describing the proposed conference topic. Please consult the DCL for more details.
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NIH / National Center for Advancing Translational Sciences (NCATS)
Program: Awards Supporting Cutting-Edge Technologies for Translational Science (ASCETTS) (R21)
NOFO #: PAR-23-177
Synopsis: Supports investigator-initiated development, early-stage proof of concept, high-risk and potentially high-reward studies of feasibility, and exploratory technology development to address barriers, limitations, or bottlenecks in translational science – particularly for therapeutic development. This opportunity is appropriate for the development of technologies that could be advanced sufficiently in the two-year project period to garner subsequent support from the NIH or investors outside of the NIH with the ultimate goal of bringing the technology to market. Technologies that may be of interest include (partial)
- biomarker development or diagnostic technologies
- synthetic biology tools to tackle multiple diseases
- algorithms and software to support the design and implementation of new treatments
Award details: Awards are up to $275,000 direct costs for the 2-year project period of the award. No more than $200K direct costs may be requested in any single year.
Announcement on website: https://grants.nih.gov/grants/guide/pa-files/PAR-23-177.html
Application due date: June 19, 2023.
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NIH / National Institute on Drug Abuse (NIDA)
Program: Advancing Psychedelics Research for Treating Addiction (R01)
NOFO #: RFA-DA-24-028
Synopsis: Supports research to improve understanding of psychedelic drug mechanisms in the context of substance use disorders (SUDs). This initiative will also support the design and synthesis of chemical biology tools and probes to aid basic research on psychedelics and their translational pharmacology. A Plan for Enhancing Diverse Perspectives (PEDP) is required and will be assessed as part of the scientific and technical peer-review evaluation. Applications that fail to include a PEDP will be considered incomplete and will be withdrawn. Examples of areas of research interest include (partial)
- Research on how different administration paradigms (e.g., acute, repeated) of psychedelic drugs impact cellular and molecular effects, interactions between signaling pathways and neural circuits, and phenotypic consequences
- Structure-activity, structure-functional-selectivity, and structure-kinetic relationship studies towards identifying chemical probes and/or drug-like compounds with well-defined selectivity metrics for neural targets relevant to psychedelic action and SUDs
- Determination of 3D structures of psychedelics bound to SUD-relevant biological targets and identification of binding sites of ligands, and molecular interactions using emerging computational and structural biology techniques
Award details: Up to $350K for direct costs per year for a maximum project period of 5 years.
Announcement on website: https://grants.nih.gov/grants/guide/rfa-files/RFA-DA-24-028.html
Application due date: November 2, 2023.
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Announcements of Interest for Dornsife Investigators
USC Office of Research and Innovation
Research Advancement - Wash. DC Office
The Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA) / Ethical, Legal, and Societal Implications (ELSI) of Emerging Technologies RFI
Special Notice: DARPA-SN-23-68
Synopsis: Seeks to explore the ethical, legal, and societal implications (ELSI) of emerging technologies. ELSI has a vital role in the responsible development of emerging technologies by guiding innovation, maximizing the potential application space, and facilitating the dialogue with future end-users, the public, and policymakers to ensure all perspectives and implications are considered. To understand the state of the art, this RFI seeks input from experts who study the effective integration of ELSI considerations within disruptive, multi-disciplinary technology development and transition.
Anouncement on website: ELSI RFI
Responses Requested by: June 9, 2023.
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Department of Contracts and Grants
You may have noticed NIH has changed its nomenclature for funding opportunities. Funding Opportunity Announcement (FOA) is now Notice of Funding Opportunity (NOFO). Please see announcement from DCG on this name change as well as NIH updates concerning the National Heart, Lung and Blood Institute: NewsFlash.
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Book Cover: Driving Force: Automobiles and the New American City, 1900-1930 (Angel City Press, May 2023) Darryl Holter (History) and Stephen Lee
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