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NSF-supported science and engineering research increasingly relies on cutting-edge infrastructure. With its Major Research Instrumentation (MRI) program and Major Multi-user Facilities (Major Facilities) projects, NSF supports infrastructure projects at the lower and higher ends of infrastructure scales across science and engineering research disciplines. The Mid-scale Research Infrastructure Big Idea is intended to provide NSF with an agile, Foundation-wide process to fund experimental research capabilities in the mid-scale range between the MRI and Major Facilities thresholds. NSF defines Research Infrastructure (RI) as any combination of facilities, equipment, instrumentation, or computational hardware or software, and the necessary human capital in support of the same. Major facilities and mid-scale projects are subsets of research infrastructure. The NSF Mid-scale Research Infrastructure-1 Program (Mid-scale RI-1) supports the design or implementation of unique and compelling RI projects. Mid-scale RI-1 implementation projects may include any combination of equipment, instrumentation, cyberinfrastructure, broadly used large-scale datasets, and the commissioning and/or personnel needed to successfully complete the project, or the design efforts intended to lead to eventual implementation of a mid-scale class project. Mid-scale RI-1 design projects will include the design efforts intended to lead to eventual implementation of a mid-scale class RI project. Mid-scale RI-1 projects should fill a research community-defined scientific need or enable a national research priority to be met. Mid-scale RI-projects should also enable US researchers to remain competitive in a global research environment and involve the training of a diverse workforce engaged in the design and implementation of STEM infrastructure.

The Cyberinfrastructure for Sustained Scientific Innovation (CSSI) umbrella program seeks to enable funding opportunities that are flexible and responsive to the evolving and emerging needs in cyberinfrastructure (CI). This program continues the CSSI program by removing the distinction between software and data elements/framework implementations, and instead emphasizing integrated CI services, quantitative metrics with targets for delivery and usage of these services, and community creation. The CSSI umbrella program anticipates two classes of awards: Elements: These awards target small groups that will create and deploy robust services for which there is a demonstrated need, and that will advance one or more significant areas of science and engineering. Framework Implementations: These awards target larger, interdisciplinary teams organized around the development and application of services aimed at solving common research problems faced by NSF researchers in one or more areas of science and engineering, and resulting in a sustainable community framework providing CI services to a diverse community or communities. Prospective Principal Investigators (PIs) should be aware that this is a multi-directorate activity and that they are encouraged to submit proposals with broad, interdisciplinary interests. Further, not all divisions are participating at the same level and division-specific priorities differ. Prospective PIs should also refer to the directorate/division-specific descriptions contained in Section II of this solicitation.

The MCA offers an opportunity for scientists and engineers at the Associate Professor rank (or equivalent) to substantively enhance and advance their research program through synergistic and mutually beneficial partnerships, typically at an institution other than their home institution. Projects that envision new insights on existing problems or identify new but related problems previously inaccessible without new methodology or expertise from other fields are encouraged. Partners from outside the PI's own sub-discipline or discipline are encouraged, but not required, to enhance interdisciplinary networking and convergence across science and engineering fields. By (re)-investing in mid-career investigators, NSF aims to enable and grow a more diverse scientific workforce (more women, persons with disabilities, and underrepresented minorities) at high academic ranks, who remain engaged and active in cutting-edge research.

Growing Convergence Research (GCR) at the National Science Foundation was identified as one of 10 Big Ideas. Convergence research is a means for solving vexing research problems, in particular, complex problems focusing on societal needs. It entails integrating knowledge, methods, and expertise from different disciplines and forming novel frameworks to catalyze scientific discovery and innovation. GCR identifies Convergence Research as having two primary characteristics: Research driven by a specific and compelling problem. Convergence Research is generally inspired by the need to address a specific challenge or opportunity, whether it arises from deep scientific questions or pressing societal needs. Deep integration across disciplines. As experts from different disciplines pursue common research challenges, their knowledge, theories, methods, data, research communities and languages become increasingly intermingled or integrated. New frameworks, paradigms or even disciplines can form sustained interactions across multiple communities. A distinct characteristic of convergence research, in contrast to other forms of multidisciplinary research, is that from the inception, the convergence paradigm intentionally brings together intellectually diverse researchers and stakeholders to frame the research questions, develop effective ways of communicating across disciplines and sectors, adopt common frameworks for their solution, and, when appropriate, develop a new scientific vocabulary. Research teams practicing convergence aim at developing sustainable relationships that may not only create solutions to the problem that engendered the collaboration, but also develop novel ways of framing related research questions and open new research vistas.

The Data Science Corps is one of the components of the HDR ecosystem enabling education and workforce development by focusing on building capacity for harnessing the data revolution at the local, state, and national levels to help unleash the power of data in the service of science and society. The Data Science Corps will provide practical experiences, teach new skills, and offer learning opportunities in different settings. This solicitation prompts the community to envision creative educational pathways that will transform data science education and expand the data science talent pool by enabling the participation of undergraduate and Master's degree students with diverse backgrounds, experiences, skills, and technical maturity in the Data Science Corps. These activities are envisioned to be inherently collaborative, with a lead organization and one or more collaborating organizations.

The Electrical, Communications and Cyber Systems (ECCS) Division supports enabling and transformative research that fuels progress in engineering applications with high societal impacts. ECCS programs encompass novel electronic, photonic, and magnetic devices; communication systems, novel integrated circuits, antennas, sensors; machine learning, control, and networks, to name a few. The fundamental research supported by ECCS impacts a wide range of applications such as communications, energy and power, healthcare, environment, transportation, manufacturing, and other areas. ECCS strongly emphasizes the integration of education into its research programs to support the preparation of a diverse and professionally skilled workforce. ECCS also strengthens its programs through links to other areas of engineering, science, industry, government, and international collaborations. The Addressing Systems Challenges through Engineering Teams (ASCENT) program is a strategic investment of ECCS that emphasizes new collaboration modalities among the various ECCS supported sub-disciplines. ASCENT encourages robust collaborations between the devices, circuits, algorithmic, and network research communities to develop innovative projects. ASCENT seeks proposals that are bold and ground-breaking transcending the perspectives and approaches typical of disciplinary research efforts. ASCENT projects are expected to lead to disruptive technologies or nucleate entirely new research fields motivated by the most pressing societal challenges the global community faces.

The Arthur L. Norberg Travel Fund provides short-term grants-in-aid to help scholars with travel expenses to use archival collections at the Charles Babbage Institute.  Each year we plan to award two or more $750 grants. The Charles Babbage Institute (CBI) is an internationally recognized research center and archives focused on the history of information technology.  CBI conducts major research projects; publishes books and articles; and collects, processes, and provides open public access to the most diverse and extensive collection of archival materials on computing, software, and networking in the world.  CBI collections include the records of corporations, technical and trade associations, personal papers, industry publications, oral histories, photographs, film/video, and an extensive reference library.  The Norberg Travel Fund is named for CBI's founding director, Arthur L. Norberg, and is funded by generous gifts from his friends and colleagues.

Most survey-based prevalence estimates of type 1 diabetes among adults have been based on self-reported information about a young age at diagnosis (e.g.,30 years and 40 years) and insulin use within a year of diagnosis. However, this estimation approach misses type 1 diabetes in adults with older age of onset and may misclassify some cases of type 2 diabetes as type 1 if insulin use begins soon after diagnosis. The major goal of this project is to evaluate the validity of survey questions (or algorithms based on them) to distinguish between adults (aged 18 years of age) with type 1 and type 2 diabetes in a representative sample of adult diabetic patients in a diabetes patient registry or database. Using a gold standard, validity will be assessed by examining the sensitivity, specificity, and positive predictive value of algorithms to identify type of diabetes across demographic strata such as age, sex, and race. A secondary goal is to validate definitions of type of diabetes using electronic health records.

The Public Affairs Section (PAS) of the U.S. Embassy in New Delhi announces an open competition through the Public Diplomacy Grants program for a Cooperative Agreement to implement one or both activities of a "TechCamp" project focused on growing women-owned social enterprises in India and Pakistan which includes a workshop and follow-on. The TechCamp workshop will take place in a third-party country easily reached from both countries. (Please refer to the full announcement available under related 'documents tab')

The Major Research Instrumentation (MRI) Program serves to increase access to multi-user scientific and engineering instrumentation for research and research training in our Nation's institutions of higher education and not-for-profit scientific/engineering research organizations. An MRI award supports the acquisition or development of a multi-user research instrument that is, in general, too costly and/or not appropriate for support through other NSF programs. MRI provides support to acquire critical research instrumentation without which advances in fundamental science and engineering research may not otherwise occur. MRI also provides support to develop next-generation research instruments that open new opportunities to advance the frontiers in science and engineering research. Additionally, an MRI award is expected to enhance research training of students who will become the next generation of instrument users, designers and builders. An MRI proposal may request up to $4 million for either acquisition or development of a research instrument. Beginning with the FY 2018 competition, each performing organization may submit in revised "Tracks" as defined below, with no more than two submissions in Track 1 and no more than one submission in Track 2.rack 1: Track 1 MRI proposals are those that request funds from NSF greater than or equal to $100,000. Track 2 MRI proposals are those that request funds from NSF greater than or equal to $1,000,000 up to and including $4,000,000.Consistent with the America COMPETES Act of 2007 Cost sharing of precisely 30% of the total project cost is required for Ph.D.-granting institutions of higher education and for non-degree-granting organizations.

Social science research on many topics has often been hampered by the limitations of survey data. However, the digital age has rapidly increased access to large and comprehensive data sources such as public and private administrative databases, and unique new sources of information from online transactions, social-media interactions, and internet searches. New computational tools also allow for the extraction, coding, and analysis of large volumes of text. Advances in analytical methods for exploiting and analyzing data have accompanied the rise of these data. The emergence of these new data also raises questions about access, privacy and confidentiality. The Russell Sage Foundation's initiative on Computational Social Science (CSS) supports innovative social science research that brings new data and methods to bear on questions of interest in its core programs in Behavioral Economics, Future of Work, Race, Ethnicity and Immigration, and Social Inequality. Limited consideration will be given to questions that pertain to core methodologies, such as causal inference and innovations in data collection.

The Faculty Early Career Development (CAREER) Program is a Foundation-wide activity that offers the National Science Foundation's most prestigious awards in support of early-career faculty who have the potential to serve as academic role models in research and education and to lead advances in the mission of their department or organization. Activities pursued by early-career faculty should build a firm foundation for a lifetime of leadership in integrating education and research. NSF encourages submission of CAREER proposals from early-career faculty at all CAREER-eligible organizations and especially encourages women, members of underrepresented minority groups, and persons with disabilities to apply.