his announcement explicitly encourages projects that improve the capacity of education systems and communities to create impactful STEM educational experiences for students and workers. Submissions are encouraged to consider including active learning approaches and incorporating 21st century skill development. Projects must aim to increase student and worker engagement in STEM and enhance people with needed Naval STEM capabilities. ONR encourages applications to utilize current STEM educational research for informing project design and advancing our understanding of how and why people choose STEM careers and opportunities of naval relevance. While this announcement is relevant for any stage of the STEM educational system, funding efforts will be targeted primarily toward projects addressing the below communities or any combination of these communities: * Secondary education communities; * Post-Secondary communities; * Informal science communities; * Current naval STEM workforce communities. Project scope may range in size and complexity. Projects that are already established with prior funding sources or have established stakeholders are especially encouraged to consider the following scope areas: * Develop and implement exploratory pilot projects that seek to create new educational experiences within educational and training communities. * Develop larger cohesive STEM education and training activities that strengthen the capacity of regional communities and stakeholders to improve STEM education and training.
The Division of Molecular and Cellular Biosciences (MCB) has developed a new opportunity to enable researchers with a strong track record of prior accomplishment to pursue a new avenue of research or inquiry. This funding mechanism is designed to facilitate and promote a PI's ability to effective adopt empowering technologies that might not be readily accessible in the PI's current research environment or collaboration network. Transformative research likely spans disciplines and minimizing the practical barriers to doing so will strengthen research programs poised to make significant contributions. The award is intended to allow mid-career or later-stage researchers (Associate or Full Professor, or equivalent) to expand or make a transition in their research programs via a sabbatical leave or similar mechanism of professional development and then develop that research program in their own lab. This award will also enable the PI to acquire new scientific or technical expertise, facilitate the investigator's competitiveness, and potentially lead to transformational impacts in molecular and cellular bioscience.
The Understanding the Rules of Life: Microbiome Theory and Mechanisms (URoL:MTM) program is an integrative collaborationacross Directorates and Offices within the National Science Foundation. The objective of URoL:MTM is to understand and establish the theory and mechanisms that govern the structure and function of microbiomes, a collection of microbes in a specific habitat/environment. This may include but is not limited to host-associated microbiomes, such as those with humans and other organisms, where i) the microbiome impacts host physiology, behavior, development, and fitness; ii) the host influences the metabolic activity, dynamics and evolution of the microbiome, and iii) the environment (biological, chemical, physical, and social) influences and is influenced by both the host and the microbiome. Recent progress has transformed our ability to identify and catalogue the microbes present in a given environment and measure multiple aspects ofbiological, chemical, physical, and social environments that affect the interactions among the members of the microbiome, the host, and/or habitat. Much descriptive and correlative work has been performed on many microbiome systems, particularly those in the human, soil, aquatic, and built environments. This research has resulted in new hypotheses about the microbiome's contributions to potential system function or dysfunction. The current challenge is to integrate the wide range of accumulated data and information and build on them to develop new causal/mechanistic models or theories of interactions and interdependencies across scales and systems.
