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The Plant Biotic Interactions (PBI) program supports research on the processes that mediate beneficial and antagonistic interactions between plants and their viral, bacterial, oomycete, fungal, plant, and invertebrate symbionts, pathogens and pests. This joint NSF-NIFA program supports projects focused on current and emerging model and non-model systems, and agriculturally relevant plants. The program's scope extends from fundamental mechanisms to translational efforts, with the latter seeking to put into agricultural practice insights gained from basic research on the mechanisms that govern plant biotic interactions. Projects must be strongly justified in terms of fundamental biological processes and/or relevance to agriculture and may be purely fundamental or applied, or include aspects of both perspectives. All types of symbiosis are appropriate, including commensalism, mutualism, parasitism, and host-pathogen interactions. Research may focus on the biology of the plant host, its pathogens, pests or symbionts, interactions among these, or on the function of plant-associated microbiomes. The program welcomes proposals on the dynamics of initiation, transmission, maintenance and outcome of these complex associations, including studies of metabolic interactions, immune recognition and signaling, host-symbiont regulation, reciprocal responses among interacting species and mechanisms associated with self/non-self recognition such as those in pollen-pistil interactions.

These grants are awarded for general organizational support as well as funding for specific projects. Small grants average approximately $7,000 each. Applications are reviewed three times a year; the deadlines are the 1st of February, June, and October.  Grants awarded during a particular cycle will be announced at the beginning of the following cycle.   Priority is given to applicants that: Address our funding priorities from a holistic perspective -Protect Earth's beauty and bounty. -Create a robust, healthy food system. -Increase opportunities for outdoor activity. -Reduce environmental health hazards. -Build stronger communities. Operate with clearly defined objectives and viable plans to achieve them. Demonstrate strong community ties and operate at the community level. Promote positive change through both the projects and their implementation process.

The Sustainable Environments Program seeks to create just and sustainable communities in four ways: Sustainable Transportation Networks & Equitable Development Patterns We support clean, affordable, equitable, high-quality and efficient transportation and land use development that better connects critical services, jobs, schools, housing and other regional destinations. Energy Efficiency in the Built Environment No longer accepting grants. New guidelines are under construction to reflect the new direct of Surdna's work in the energy arena. Urban Water Management We support efforts to capture storm water and slowly release it into the existing network of drains, pipes and sewers, or reuse it where it falls to cultivate natural green spaces. Regional Food Supply We support ways to make it easier to get local, sustainably produced food from our farms to the markets closest to where it's grown, and to better connect food producers and consumers. We seek organizations that: -Promote meaningful collaborations and an integrated approach to infrastructure solutions (i.e., ways in which transportation, energy, water, and food systems can be combined); -Focus on infrastructure decisions that better meet the needs of historically underserved communities including low-income communities and people of color; -Promote long-term solutions and leverage strategic infrastructure investments; -Highlight, especially through communications, the multiple benefits of next generation infrastructure.

This grant program supports: (1) training students for Master's and doctoral degrees in food, agricultural and natural resource sciences, and; (2) Special International Study or Thesis/Dissertation Research Travel Allowances (IRTA) for eligible USDA NNF beneficiaries. Awards are specifically intended to support traineeship programs that engage outstanding students to pursue and complete their degrees in USDA mission areas. Applicants provide clarity about the philosophy of their graduate training, and relevance to USDA mission sciences, NIFA priorities and national science education policies and statistics. Applications are being solicited from institutions that confer a graduate degree in at least one of the following Targeted Expertise Shortage Areas: 1) animal and plant production; 2) forest resources; 3) agricultural educators and communicators; 4) agricultural management and economics; 5) food science and human nutrition; 6) sciences for agricultural biosecurity; and 7) training in integrative biosciences for sustainable food and agricultural systems.

This grant program supports: (1) training students for Master's and doctoral degrees in food, agricultural and natural resource sciences, and; (2) Special International Study or Thesis/Dissertation Research Travel Allowances (IRTA) for eligible USDA NNF beneficiaries. Awards are specifically intended to support traineeship programs that engage outstanding students to pursue and complete their degrees in USDA mission areas. Applicants provide clarity about the philosophy of their graduate training, and relevance to USDA mission sciences, NIFA priorities and national science education policies and statistics. Applications are being solicited from institutions that confer a graduate degree in at least one of the following Targeted Expertise Shortage Areas: 1) animal and plant production; 2) forest resources; 3) agricultural educators and communicators; 4) agricultural management and economics; 5) food science and human nutrition; 6) sciences for agricultural biosecurity; and 7) training in integrative biosciences for sustainable food and agricultural systems.

The intended outcome of this FOA is to advance efforts for a nationally integrated food safety system (IFSS) by supporting Manufactured Food Regulatory Program Standards (MFRPS), Rapid Response Teams (RRT) and Food Protection Task Force (FPTF) programs, as well as special projects. For the purposes of this FOA, the term State encompasses all eligible organizations as defined in Section 3.

The purpose of the SCRI program is to address the critical needs of the specialty crop industry by awarding grants to support research and extension that address key challenges of national, regional, and multi-state importance in sustaining all components of food and agriculture, including conventional and organic food production systems.

The overall goal of the Organic Transitions Program (ORG) is to support the development and implementation of research, extension and higher education programs to improve the competitiveness of organic livestock and crop producers, as well as those who are adopting organic practices. NIFA administers the ORG program by determining priorities in U.S. agriculture through Agency stakeholder input processes in consultation with the NAREEEAB. ORG will continue to prioritize environmental services provided by organic farming systems in the area of soil conservation, pollinator health, and climate change mitigation, including greenhouse gases (GHG), as well as the development of educational tools for Cooperative Extension personnel and other agricultural professionals who advise producers on organic practices, and development of cultural practices and other allowable alternatives to substances recommended for removal from the National Organic Program's National List of Allowed and Prohibited Substances. It is expected that all projects will integrate research, education and extension activities, as appropriate to project goals, although some projects may be weighted more heavily than others in one or more of these areas. However, all proposals should have activities and impact in research and at least one of the other areas: education and extension

The Secondary Education, Two-Year Postsecondary Education, and Agriculture in the K-12 Classroom Challenge Grants (SPECA) program seeks to: (a) promote and strengthen secondary education and two-year postsecondary education in the food, agriculture, natural resources and human (FANH) sciences in order to help ensure the existence of a workforce in the United States that's qualified to serve the FANH sciences system; and (b) promote complementary and synergistic linkages among secondary, two-year postsecondary, and higher education programs in the FANH sciences in order to advance excellence in education and encourage more young Americans to pursue and complete a baccalaureate or higher degree in the FANH sciences.

This Commercial Fishing Occupational Safety Research Cooperative Agreement was established by The Coast Guard Authorization Act of 2010 (P.L. 111-281), as amended by the Howard Coble Coast Guard and Maritime Transportation Act of 2014 (P.L. 113-281), and is intended to provide funding to individuals in academia, members of non-profit organizations and businesses involved in fishing and maritime matters, and other entities with expertise in commercial fishing safety. The funding will be used to support research on improving the occupational safety of workers in the commercial fishing industry. This includes: improving vessel design; developing and improving emergency and survival equipment; enhancing vessel monitoring systems; improving communication devices, deicing technology, and severe weather detection. In order to support and administer the grant program, the Coast Guard and NIOSH signed a Memorandum of Understanding on May 17, 2018. While the Coast Guard, along with the Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA), provides regulatory oversight for safety and health matters within the commercial fishing industry, NIOSH is an agency operating under the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) with the mission of generating new knowledge in occupational safety and health and transferring that knowledge into practice to prevent worker injury, illness and death. NIOSH conducts and funds scientific research, develops methods to prevent occupational hazards, develops guidance and authoritative recommendations, translates scientific knowledge into products and services, disseminates information, identifies factors underlying work-related disease and injury and responds to requests for workplace health hazard evaluations. NIOSH has an extensive history of conducting research to understand and to reduce hazards in the commercial fishing industry.

The NSF Division of Undergraduate Education (DUE) in collaboration with AAAS will offer an Improving Undergraduate STEM Education: Education and Human Resources (IUSE: EHR) webinar focusing on opportunities for funding in the IUSE: EHR program, specifically associated with the Institutional and Community Transformation (ICT) track of the IUSE program. An audio archive and slides will be posted after the webinar at https://aaas-iuse.org. The IUSE: EHR program "seeks to promote novel, creative, and transformative approaches to generating and using new knowledge about STEM teaching and learning to improve STEM education for all undergraduates." The program supports proposals interested in improving undergraduate education, developing faculty expertise, preparing K-12 teachers, and providing all undergraduate students with STEM competencies and a basic understanding of STEM concepts and principles. All projects must contribute to the body of knowledge about what works in undergraduate STEM education and the conditions that lead to improved STEM teaching and learning. The ICT track seeks to fund innovative work on systemic change that may be measured at the departmental, institutional, or multi-institutional level, or across communities of STEM educators and/or educational researchers. ICT projects are expected to include one or more theories of change to guide the proposed work and this webinar will provide information about expectations for Identifying and incorporating these theories of change.

The AFRI Foundational and Applied Science Program supports grants in six AFRI priority areas to advance knowledge in both fundamental and applied sciences important to agriculture. The six priority areas are: Plant Health and Production and Plant Products; Animal Health and Production and Animal Products; Food Safety, Nutrition, and Health; Bioenergy, Natural Resources, and Environment; Agriculture Systems and Technology; and Agriculture Economics and Rural Communities.

In 2020, we are offering financial assistance through a Targeted Small Grants Program. (TSG Program). Up to $3 million is available for grants for innovative fresh food retail and food system enterprises that seek to improve access to healthy food in underserved areas. For more information about the program, including eligibility information, please download and read the Request for Applications (RFA). The RFA describes all of the application questions and the application process.  The 2020 TSG Program will have a two-phased application process. The Letter of Interest (LOI) is the first step in the RFA process and is required for all applicants to express interest in grant funding from the TSG Program. LOIs are due no later than 8:00 pm Eastern Time on July 10, 2020. Reinvestment Fund review LOIs, and invite eligible applicants to submit a full application.

The Plant Biotic Interactions (PBI) program supports research on the processes that mediate beneficial and antagonistic interactions between plants and their viral, bacterial, oomycete, fungal, plant, and invertebrate symbionts, pathogens and pests. This joint NSF/NIFA program supports projects focused on current and emerging model and non-model systems, and agriculturally relevant plants. The program's scope extends from fundamental mechanisms to translational efforts, with the latter seeking to put into agricultural practice insights gained from basic research on the mechanisms that govern plant biotic interactions. Projects must be strongly justified in terms of fundamental biological processes and/or relevance to agriculture and may be purely fundamental or applied or include aspects of both perspectives. All types of symbiosis are appropriate, including commensalism, mutualism, parasitism, and host-pathogen interactions. Research may focus on the biology of the plant host, its pathogens, pests or symbionts, interactions among these, or on the function of plant-associated microbiomes. The program welcomes proposals on the dynamics of initiation, transmission, maintenance and outcome of these complex associations, includingstudies of metabolic interactions, immune recognition and signaling, host-symbiont regulation, reciprocal responses among interacting species and mechanisms associated with self/non-self recognition such as those in pollen-pistil interactions. Explanatory frameworks shouldinclude molecular, genomic, metabolic, cellular, network and organismal processes, with projects guided by hypothesis and/or discovery driven experimental approaches. Strictly ecological projects that do not address underlying mechanisms are not appropriate for this program. Quantitative modeling in concert with experimental work is encouraged. Overall, the program seeks to support research that will deepen our understanding of the fundamental processes that mediate interact

The EMP is established to develop, maintain, or expand markets for exports of United States agricultural commodities and to promote cooperation and exchange of information between agricultural institutions and agribusinesses in the United States and emerging markets. The EMP assists U.S. entities in developing, maintaining, or expanding exports of U.S. agricultural commodities and products by funding activities that enhance emerging markets' food and rural business systems, including reducing trade barriers. The EMP is intended primarily to support export market development efforts of the private sector, but EMP resources may also be used to assist public organizations. The EMP is administered by personnel of the Foreign Agricultural Service (FAS) on behalf of the Commodity Credit Corporation.

NSF-funded advancements are enabling a wide variety of beneficial applications of UAS in areas such as monitoring and inspection of physical infrastructure, prevention of airport bird strikes, smart emergency/disaster response, natural gas leak detection, agriculture support, personal services, and observation and study of weather phenomena including severe storms. These advances are made possible through fundamental investments in theoretical principles of UAS, including intelligent sensing, perception, and control; estimation; communications; collaboration and teaming; UAS adaptation and learning; human-UAS interaction; and safety, security, and privacy of UAS. These novel fundamental approaches enable increased understanding of how to intelligently and effectively design, control, and apply UAS to beneficial applications. NSF welcomes proposals that accelerate fundamental technological advances in UAS; these proposals should be submitted to existing CISE and ENG core and crosscutting research programs, following all proposal preparation instructions specified in the corresponding program announcements and solicitations. All proposals must meet the requirements of NSF's Grant Proposal Guide (GPG), along with any program- or solicitation-specific proposal preparation instructions and review criteria. Proposals must be synergistic with the goals of the programs to which they are submitted.

NSF-funded advancements are enabling a wide variety of beneficial applications of UAS in areas such as monitoring and inspection of physical infrastructure, prevention of airport bird strikes, smart emergency/disaster response, natural gas leak detection, agriculture support, personal services, and observation and study of weather phenomena including severe storms. These advances are made possible through fundamental investments in theoretical principles of UAS, including intelligent sensing, perception, and control; estimation; communications; collaboration and teaming; UAS adaptation and learning; human-UAS interaction; and safety, security, and privacy of UAS. These novel fundamental approaches enable increased understanding of how to intelligently and effectively design, control, and apply UAS to beneficial applications. NSF welcomes proposals that accelerate fundamental technological advances in UAS; these proposals should be submitted to existing CISE and ENG core and crosscutting research programs, following all proposal preparation instructions specified in the corresponding program announcements and solicitations. All proposals must meet the requirements of NSF's Grant Proposal Guide (GPG), along with any program- or solicitation-specific proposal preparation instructions and review criteria. Proposals must be synergistic with the goals of the programs to which they are submitted.

The EaSM funding opportunity enables interagency cooperation on one of the most pressing problems of the millennium: climate change and how it is likely to affect our world. It allows the partner agencies -- National Science Foundation (NSF) and U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA) -- to combine resources to identify and fund the most meritorious and highest-impact projects that support their respective missions, while avoiding duplication of effort and fostering collaboration between agencies and the investigators they support.

The Cooperative Agreement announced in this FOA represents the continuation and further refinement as well as expansion of well-established collaborations between WHO and FDA, through OIP, in support of data-driven and science-based public health, science-based and research strategies and approaches that align well with FDA domestic and global goals. This cooperative agreement is expected to contribute to the knowledge base of the current regulatory efforts in support of food and medical products safety and quality globally and address specific challenges and fill gaps in the global efforts to ensure said safety and quality of such products.

This project not only serves the National Park Service and specifically Great Smoky Mountains National Park by allowing the Park to maintain and repair the assets it is responsible for and the public greatly benefits by having safe access to two very popular trails at GRSM