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Through the Joint Technology Transfer Initiative (JTTI) Program, OAR's Office of Weather and Air Quality (OWAQ) is soliciting proposals to conduct research and development activities related to advancing the convective scale modeling and water prediction over the coming 1 to 2 years.

The Division of Chemical, Bioengineering and Environmental Transport (CBET) in the Engineering Directorate of the National Science Foundation (NSF) is partnering with The Center for the Advancement of Science in Space (CASIS) to solicit research projects in the general field of combustion and thermal transport processes that can utilize the International Space Station (ISS) National Lab to conduct research that will benefit life on Earth. U.S. entities including academic investigators, non-profit independent research labs and academic-commercial teams are eligible to apply.

Shell is a leading oil and gas producer in the deepwater Gulf of Mexico, a recognized pioneer in oil and gas exploration and production technology and one of America's leading oil and natural gas producers, gasoline and natural gas marketers and petrochemical manufacturers. Focus on energy awareness with special publics, increasing interest in technical careers among students and professional development in science and math among educators. We support K-12 programs that boost math and science skills, as well as university programs that aid engineering and geoscience students and departments. Shell funds projects at vocational and technical schools where chemical and refinery operators and technicians are trained. We are especially interested in supporting educational outreach in math, science and technology to women/minority students and academic institutions with ethnically diverse enrollments. Focus on biodiversity initiatives with support to programs that restore critical ecosystems, address water, air quality research, preserve wetlands and sponsor wetlands initiatives. As part of our commitment to environmental stewardship, we support projects that restore and protect critical ecosystems. In addition to restoration and preservation efforts, we fund research projects for threatened wildlife and/or habitats.

Division of Ocean Sciences (OCE) is potentially interested in projects that integrate with the NASA field program intellectually and provide substantive advances in the basic scientific understandings of the "biological pump" or any associated biological, chemical, physical, or geological processes. NSF supported a workshop in February 2016 on the "Biology of the Biological Pump" at which basic research topics that could complement EXPORTS science were identified. OCE will consider additional aspects of the export system as well.

The overarching goal of INFEWS is to catalyze well-integrated interdisciplinary and convergent research to transform scientific understanding of the FEW nexus (integrating all three components rather than addressing them separately), in order to improve system function and management, address system stress, increase resilience, and ensure sustainability. The NSF INFEWS initiative is designed specifically to attain the following goals: 1. Significantly advance our understanding of the food-energy-water system through quantitative, predictive and computational modeling, including support for relevant cyberinfrastructure; 2. Develop real-time, cyber-enabled interfaces that improve understanding of the behavior of FEW systems and increase decision support capability; 3. Enable research that will lead to innovative solutions to critical FEW systems problems; and 4. Grow the scientific workforce capable of studying and managing the FEW system, through education and other professional development opportunities.

As computing has become an integral part of the practice of modern science, technology, engineering and mathematics (STEM), the STEM + Computing Partnerships program seeks to address the urgent need to prepare students from the early grades through high school in the essential skills, competencies, and dispositions needed to succeed in a computationally-dependent world. Thus, STEM+C advances the integration of computational thinking and computing activities in early childhood education through high school (pre-K-12) to provide a strong and developmental foundation in computing and computational thinking through the integration of computing in STEM teaching and learning, and/or the applied integration of STEM content in pre-K-12 computer science education.

The National Science Foundation (NSF) seeks to further develop and nurture a national innovation ecosystem that builds upon fundamental research to guide the output of scientific discoveries closer to the development of technologies, products, processes and services that benefit society. The goal of the program is to dramatically reduce the period of time necessary to bring a promising idea from its inception to widespread implementation.

This initiative enables interagency cooperation on one of the most pressing problems of the millennium - understanding interactions across the FEW nexus - how it is likely to affect our world, and how we can proactively plan for its consequences. It allows the partner agencies - National Science Foundation (NSF) and the United States Department of Agriculture National Institute of Food and Agriculture (USDA/NIFA) and others - to combine resources to identify and fund the most meritorious and highest-impact projects that support their respective missions, while eliminating duplication of effort and fostering collaboration between agencies and the investigators they support.

The Geotechnical Engineering and Materials Program (GEM) supports fundamental research in soil and rock mechanics and dynamics in support of physical civil infrastructure systems. Also supported is research on improvement of the engineering properties of geologic materials for infrastructure use by mechanical, biological, thermal, chemical, and electrical processes. The Program supports the traditional areas of foundation engineering, earth structures, underground construction, tunneling, geoenvironmental engineering, and site characterization, as well as the emerging area of bio-geo engineering, for civil engineering applications, with emphasis on sustainable geosystems. Research related to the geotechnical engineering aspects of geothermal energy and geothermal heat pump systems is also supported. The GEM program encourages knowledge dissemination and technology transfer activities that can lead to broader societal benefit and implementation for provision of physical civil infrastructure. The Program also encourages research that explores and builds upon advanced computing techniques and tools to enable major advances in Geotechnical Engineering.

CAREER: 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 junior faculty who exemplify the role of teacher-scholars through outstanding research, excellent education and the integration of education and research within the context of the mission of their organizations. Such activities should build a firm foundation for a lifetime of leadership in integrating education and research. NSF encourages submission of CAREER proposals from junior faculty members at all CAREER-eligible organizations and especially encourages women, members of underrepresented minority groups, and persons with disabilities to apply.

Projects selected under this FOA will develop characterization tools, technologies, and or methodologies that improve the ability to predict geologic storage capacity within 30 percent, improve the utilization of the reservoir by understanding how faults and fractures in a reservoir affect the flow of CO2, and ensure storage permanence.

The Office of Energy Efficiency and Renewable Energy (EERE) intends to issue, on behalf of the Geothermal Technologies Office (GTO), a Funding Opportunity Announcement (FOA) entitled "Low Temperature Mineral Recovery Program." EERE's objective in this FOA is to promote the advancement of thermal energy processes capable of converting geothermal heat sources into power, in conjunction with the development or exploitation of technologies capable of capturing, concentrating, and/or purifying valuable materials contained within geothermal brines to economically extract resources that can provide additional revenue streams to geothermal operators. This targeted initiative of the GTO focuses on strategic mineral extraction as a path to optimize the value stream of low-to-moderate temperature resources.

The Directorates for Engineering (Division of Chemical, Bioengineering, Environmental & Transport Systems), Geosciences (Division of Atmospheric and Geospace Sciences) and Mathematical and Physical Sciences (Divisions of Astronomical Sciences and Physics) of the National Science Foundation (NSF) and the Office of Science/Office of Fusion Energy Sciences (SC/FES) of the Department of Energy (DOE) are continuing in FY2014 the joint Partnership in Basic Plasma Science and Engineering begun in FY1997 and continued in FY2000, FY2003, FY2006 and FY2009. As stated in the original solicitations (NSF 97-39, NSF 99-159, NSF 02-84, NSF 05-619, NSF 09-596), which are superseded by the present solicitation, the goal of the initiative is to enhance plasma research and education in this broad, multidisciplinary field by coordinating efforts and combining resources of the two agencies. The current solicitation also encourages submission of proposals to perform basic plasma experiments on the Large Aperture Plasma Device (LAPD) at the University of California, Los Angeles (UCLA), a unique user facility designed to serve the needs of the broader plasma community.

Reducing risk through improved drilling success rates is critical to securing financing and ultimately lowering overall costs for developing geothermal power projects. This success hinges on knowledge of the geological, geophysical, and geochemical characteristics that indicate geothermal favorability; along with improved coverage of data that are signatures of the key properties of temperature, permeability, and fluid. To this end, GTO is interested in projects that apply innovative exploration technologies to collect new data and/or apply new analysis methods to extract new value from data. Successful applications will focus on one of the regions identified in GTO?s Data Gap Analysis, and include a significant component of uncertainty analysis that directly demonstrates potential or real impact on success rates. Projects should lead to the development of a Geothermal Play Fairway, which details a specific region constrained through a favorabl e combination of structural and hydrological conditions.

An "Ideas Lab" is a new merit review strategy being used at the National Science Foundation to address grand challenges in STEM research and education. The Ideas Lab process is modeled on the "IDEAS Factory" program http://www.epsrc.ac.uk/funding/routes/network/ideas/Pages/experience.aspx developed by the Engineering and Physical Sciences Research Council (EPSRC) of the United Kingdom. The Ideas Lab process starts with submission of a brief application to participate in the Ideas Lab, indicating a Principal Investigator's interest in and preliminary ideas regarding the specific Ideas Lab topic. A diverse sub-set of participants from a range of disciplines and backgrounds will be selected from the submitted applications by NSF and will be brought together in an intensive, interactive and free-thinking environment, where participants immerse themselves in a collaborative dialog in order to construct bold and innovative approaches. In the IDEAS Factory model, the five-day Ideas Lab culminates with the development of multidisciplinary collaborative concepts by teams of participants; a sub-set of these teams are then invited to submit full proposals. This Dear Colleague Letter only invites applications to participate in Phase I of the IUSE Ideas Labs (i.e., the 5-day immersive activity). Full proposals will not be invited at the end of the three IUSE Phase I Ideas Labs.

In 2013, a new NSF-funded petascale computing system, Blue Waters, was deployed at the University of Illinois.  The goal of this project and system is to open up new possibilities in science and engineering by providing computational capability that makes it possible for investigators to tackle much larger and more complex research challenges across a wide spectrum of domains.  The purpose of this solicitation is to invite research groups to submit requests for allocations of resources on the Blue Waters system. Proposers must show a compelling science or engineering challenge that will require petascale computing resources. Proposers must also be prepared to demonstrate that they have a science or engineering research problem that requires and can effectively exploit the petascale computing  capabilities offered by Blue Waters.  Proposals from or including junior researchers are encouraged, as one of the goals of this solicitation is to build a community capable of using petascale computing.

CCOM's Summer Undergraduate Research Fellowship (SURF) program is designed to create research experiences for undergraduate students who are interested in pursuing graduate work. SURF is aimed primarily at students who are working toward a degree in science, engineering, or math and are completing their junior year.

While geothermal power is an attractive potential source for sustainable energy production, the high heat temperature requirements (typically >150?C) of most geothermal capture systems constrain geographic distribution and economic viability of geothermal energy production. Advancement of strategic material or mineral recovery aims to address this limitation. By partnering with geothermal and mineral industry stakeholders to develop additional revenue streams from brines, the economic viability of geothermal projects will increase while also allowing for increased geographic diversity of this clean, round-the-clock energy source. Rare earths and strategic minerals are essential for modern industry, especially clean-energy technologies, but are subject to supply risk in the face of ever-increasing demand. As an example, consumer uses of lithium batteries have soared over the last decade, powering everything from electric cars to tablets to cell phones. Global demand for lithium carbonate is expected to exceed 250,000 tons by 2017?a 60% increase over current usage. As demand grows in this burgeoning market, a reliable supply of critical materials for advanced manufacturing technologies is a growing concern. This program aims to help alleviate this type of supply bottleneck. The Energy Department seeks up to ten 1-2 year feasibility and/or applied R&D projects that will lead to commercialized technologies. Geothermal mining of rare earth and near-critical metals are the focus of this research, with the intent to effectively lower the cost of geothermal energy production while diversifying and stabilizing the supply of critical materials for domestic industries.

The AAAS Early Career Award for Public Engagement with Science, established in 2010, recognizes early-career scientists and engineers who demonstrate excellence in their contribution to public engagement with science activities. A monetary prize of $5,000, a commemorative plaque, complimentary registration to the AAAS Annual Meeting, and reimbursement for reasonable hotel and travel expenses to attend the AAAS Annual Meeting to receive the prize are given to the recipient.

The AAAS Early Career Award for Public Engagement with Science, established in 2010, recognizes early-career scientists and engineers who demonstrate excellence in their contribution to public engagement with science activities. A monetary prize of $5,000, a commemorative plaque, complimentary registration to the AAAS Annual Meeting, and reimbursement for reasonable hotel and travel expenses to attend the AAAS Annual Meeting to receive the prize are given to the recipient. Nominee must be an early-career scientist or engineer in academia, government or industry actively conducting research in any scientific discipline (including social sciences and medicine).  "Early career" is defined as an individual who has been in his/her current field for less than seven years and pre-tenure or job equivalent. Post-doctoral students are eligible for this award. Nominee will have demonstrated excellence in his/her contribution to public engagement with science activities, with a focus on interactive dialogue between the individual and a non-scientific, public audience(s). Types of public engagement activities might include: informal science education, public outreach, public policy, and/or science communication activities, such as mass media, public dialogue, radio, TV and film, science café, science exhibit, science fair, and social and online media.