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Cyber-physical systems (CPS) are engineered systems that are built from, and depend upon, the seamless integration of computation and physical components. Advances in CPS will enable capability, adaptability, scalability, resiliency, safety, security, and usability that will expand the horizons of these critical systems. CPS technologies are transforming the way people interact with engineered systems, just as the Internet has transformed the way people interact with information. New, smart CPS drive innovation and competition in a range of application domains including agriculture, aeronautics, building design, civil infrastructure, energy, environmental quality, healthcare and personalized medicine, manufacturing, and transportation. CPS are becoming data-rich enabling new and higher degrees of automation and autonomy. Traditional ideas in CPS research are being challenged by new concepts emerging from artificial intelligence and machine learning. The integration of artificial intelligence with CPS especially for real-time operation creates new research opportunities with major societal implications.

The purpose of this funding opportunity announcement (FOA) is twofold: 1. to accelerate translational and clinical Phase I and II a/b safety and efficacy studies for substantiating measurable functional benefits of probiotic/prebiotic components and/or their combinations; and; 2. to understand the underlying mechanisms of their action(s), and variability in responses to these interventions. This FOA calls for interdisciplinary collaborations across scientific disciplines engaged in microbiome and pro/prebiotic research including, but not limited to: nutritional science, microbiology, virology, microecology and microbiome, genomics, immunology, computational biology, chemistry, bioengineering, as well as integration of omics and computational approaches in DNA technologies.

On installation of an electric utility pole with a transformer, a grounding electrode must be installed to meet the grounding criteria for safety reasons. In low-earth-resistance ground, e.g. clay, loam or sandy soil ground, a ground electrode can be installed with a simple driving method at low cost. In high-earth-resistance ground, e.g. gravel, cobble, or rock ground, however, special boring methods are required to drill to a depth from 4 m to 120 m to secure the earth resistance criteria. These methods are large-scale and expensive.

The goal of the NSF Smart and Connected Communities (S&CC) program solicitation is to accelerate the creation of the scientific and engineering foundations that will enable smart and connected communities to bring about new levels of economic opportunity and growth, safety and security, health and wellness, and overall quality of life. This goal will be achieved through integrative research projects that pair advances in technological and social dimensions with meaningful community engagement. For the purposes of this solicitation, communities are defined as having geographically-delineated boundaries-such as towns, cities, counties, neighborhoods, community districts, rural areas, and tribal regions-consisting of various populations, with the structure and ability to engage in meaningful ways with proposed research activities. A "smart and connected community" is, in turn, a community that synergistically integrates intelligent technologies with the natural and built environments, including infrastructure, to improve the social, economic, and environmental well-being of those who live, work, or travel within it. A proposal for an S&CC Integrative Research Grants must include the following: Integrative research that addresses the technological and social dimensions of smart and connected communities; Meaningful community engagement that integrates community stakeholders within the project; A management plan that summarizes how the project will be managed across disciplines, institutions, and community entities; and An evaluation plan for assessing short-, medium-, and long-term impacts of the proposed activities.

The MBRP Clinical Trial Award mechanism is being offered for the first time in FY17.The objective of this Program Announcement is to explore innovative approaches to accelerate the translation of knowledge advances into new treatments for the Service members who sustain burn injuries. The results of the research funded through the FY17/18 MBRP Clinical Trial Award are expected to increase the body of knowledge and materiel products available to professionals and practitioners in health, medical science, and related fields. The research impact is expected to benefit both civilian and military communities.The FY17/18 MBRP Clinical Trial Award supports clinical research studies with the potential to have a major impact on the prevention, treatment, and mitigation of debilitating burn scars that are relevant to military personnel. The specific intent is to improve functional outcomes and/or assess clinical efficacy and safety of different treatment modalities (e.g., dressing topics, biologics, cell-based therapies, mechanical, photonics).

The Operations Engineering (OE) program supports fundamental research on advanced analytical methods for improving operations in complex decision-driven environments. Analytical methods include, but are not limited to, deterministic and stochastic modeling, optimization, decision and risk analysis, data science, and simulation. Methodological research is highly encouraged but must be motivated by problems that have potential for high impact in engineering applications. Application domains of particular interest to the program arise in commercial enterprises (e.g., production/manufacturing systems and distribution of goods, delivery of services), the public sector/government (e.g., public safety and security), and public/private partnerships (e.g., health care, environment and energy). The program also welcomes operations research in new and emerging domains and addressing systemic societal or technological problems. The OE program particularly values cross-disciplinary proposals that leverage application-specific expertise with strong quantitative analysis in a decision-making context. Proposals for methodological research that are not strongly motivated by high-potential engineering applications are not appropriate for this program.

This mechanism supports basic research to increase knowledge/understanding through discovery and hypothesis generation, and should focus on providing basic fundamental knowledge that will inform and enable the future development of novel autonomous and/or robotic medical systems to care for wounded soldiers/patients through breakthrough, exploratory research. The objective is focused on addressing the following 1. Autonomous and Unmanned Medical Capability - Identify novel ideas, approaches and research towards the conceptualization of autonomous and unmanned technologies for next-generation, high-quality medical capabilities with limited or absent medical care personnel, or personnel with limited skills. Research novel concepts, plausible approaches and advanced concept designs using biologically inspired cognitive computing models, machine learning, artificial intelligence, soft robotic semi-autonomous/autonomous resuscitation concepts and advanced applications of information sciences among other innovative, exploratory research towards advancing the state-of-the-art in delivery of forward resuscitative care at the point of injury. 2. Medical Robotics Research - Identify novel ideas, approaches and research towards the conceptualization of medical robotics and real-time tele-presence capabilities exploring the limits of machine perception for tele-robotic semi-autonomous and autonomous trauma care within remote and dispersed geographic settings. This could include exploratory research in semi-autonomous robotic surgery to improve the safety profile and efficacy of tele-surgical procedures and outcomes using hard robotics in challenging situations (e.g., combat casualties on the multi-domain battlefield or mass casualty situations) and remote or austere geographic locations, among other innovative, exploratory research aims and novel concepts.

The Ohio Affiliate of  Prevent Blindness is accepting applications for its 2018 Young Investigator Student Fellowship Awards for Female Scholars in Vision Research. The Fellowship Program is designed to provide support for outstanding female scientists committed to pursuing biomedical, behavioral or clinical research careers relevant to the mission of Prevent Blindness - to prevent blindness and preserve sight.  Grants will be awarded for the summer 2018 session.  Awards will range from $3000-$5000 depending upon the availability of funds. The deadline for receipt of applications is Feb. 15, 2018. Applicants must be post-baccalaureate students enrolled in a master's or doctorate program during the summer of 2018, female, citizens or permanent residents of the United States, and conducting their research with a recognized academic institution in the State of Ohio. Applications from diverse fields in the health sciences including, but not limited to ophthalmology, optometry, nursing, genetics, public health, nutrition, gerontology, and bioengineering, are appropriate to the goals of this fellowship award. The Ohio Affiliate of Prevent Blindness encourages fellowship applications which investigate public health issues related to the burden of eye-related health and safety topics.

The MPS DC is expected to be the central clearinghouse for TC data management, and will incorporate novel approaches and technologies for data management, data mining and meta-analyses, and data sharing across many organs and tissues, diseases, data types, and TC platforms. The MPS Data center is expected to provide different levels of public and tiered access to TC information for basic and clinical researchers, academic and practicing physicians, the pharmaceutical industry, NIH, FDA and other government agencies, patients, and the lay public. The MPS Data Center will work with IQ Consortium members to develop and make available a secure, customizable coordinated data management system for collection, storage, and analyses of diverse data types from multiple TC platforms being developed and used for drug screening, safety and efficacy testing.

Communities in the United States (US) and around the world are entering a new era of transformation in which residents and their surrounding environments are increasingly connected through rapidly-changing intelligent technologies. This transformation offers great promise for improved wellbeing and prosperity, but poses significant challenges at the complex intersection of technology and society. The goal of the NSF Smart and Connected Communities (S&CC) program solicitation is to accelerate the creation of the scientific and engineering foundations that will enable smart and connected communities to bring about new levels of economic opportunity and growth, safety and security, health and wellness, and overall quality of life. This goal will be achieved through integrative research projects that pair advances in technological and social dimensions with meaningful community engagement.

Run-off-road (ROR) traffic crashes account for almost one-third of the deaths and serious injuries each year on U.S. highways. The effective design of roadsides, including the placement of roadside safety devices, can reduce the frequency and/or severity of these crashes but requires an understanding of the nature and frequency of roadside encroachments. Unfortunately, the best quality encroachment data currently available were collected in the 1960s and 1970s. The age of these datasets means they are likely no longer representative of the current vehicle fleet or highway conditions. Further, each of these datasets has significant limitations, including specific exclusion of heavy vehicles and motorcycles and a very limited range of traffic volumes (i.e., less than 20,000 vehicles per day); such limitations have fostered much debate over the value of findings from these studies.

The Ohio Federal Research Network (OFRN) Round 4 Opportunity Announcement is focused on expanding Ohio's leadership in federal and industry aerospace research, development and sustainment for unmanned air systems (UASs), personal air vehicles (PAVs), and logistics delivery air vehicles (LDAVs). Across the different classes, target applications, and technologies, several barriers persist, including FAA flight certification, safety concerns, and specific technical and market validation needs. The focus of the Round Four Opportunity Announcement is to leverage the unique Federal and Ohio assets to systematically address these challenges.

The program supports four main research themes that are envisioned to advance the goal of ubiquitous co-robots:scalability,customizability,lowering barriers to entry, andsocietal impact,includinghuman safety. Topics addressingscalabilityinclude how robots can collaborate effectively with orders of magnitude more humans or other robots than is handled by the current state of the art; how robots can perceive, plan, act, and learn in uncertain, real-world environments, especially in a distributed fashion; and how to facilitate large-scale, safe, robust and reliable operation of robots in complex environments.Customizabilityincludes how to enable co-robots to adapt to specific different tasks, environments, or people, with minimal modification to hardware and software; how robots can personalize their interactions with people; and how robots can communicate naturally with humans, both verbally and non-verbally. Topics inlowering barriers to entryshould focus on lowering the barriers for conducting fundamental roboticsresearchand research on integrated robotics application. This may include development of open-source co-robot hardware and software, as well as widely-accessible testbeds. Outreach or using robots in educational programs do not, by themselves, lower the barriers to entry for robotics research. Topics insocietal impactinclude fundamental research to establish and infuse robotics into educational curricula, advance the robotics workforce through education pathways, and explore the social, economic, ethical, security, and legal implications of our future with ubiquitous collaborative robots.

The program supports four main research themes that are envisioned to advance the goal of ubiquitous co-robots: scalability, customizability, lowering barriers to entry, and societal impact, including human safety. Topics addressing scalability include how robots can collaborate effectively with orders of magnitude more humans or other robots than is handled by the current state of the art; how robots can perceive, plan, act, and learn in uncertain, real-world environments, especially in a distributed fashion; and how to facilitate large-scale, safe, robust and reliable operation of robots in complex environments. Customizability includes how to enable co-robots to adapt to specific different tasks, environments, or people, with minimal modification to hardware and software; how robots can personalize their interactions with people; and how robots can communicate naturally with humans, both verbally and non-verbally. Topics in lowering barriers to entry should focus on lowering the barriers for conducting fundamental robotics research and research on integrated robotics application.

NSF has long supported transformative research in artificial intelligence (AI) and machine learning (ML). The resulting innovations offer new levels of economic opportunity and growth, safety and security, and health and wellness. At the same time, broad acceptance of large-scale deployments of AI systems relies critically on their trustworthiness which, in turn, depends upon the collective ability to ensure, assess, and ultimately demonstrate the fairness, transparency, explainability, and accountability of such systems. Importantly, the beneficial effects of AI systems should be broadly available across all segments of society. NSF and Amazon are partnering to jointly support computational research focused on fairness in AI, with the goal of contributing to trustworthy AI systems that are readily accepted and deployed to tackle grand challenges facing society. Specific topics of interest include, but are not limited to transparency, explainability, accountability, potential adverse biases and effects, mitigation strategies, validation of fairness, and considerations of inclusivity. Funded projects will enable broadened acceptance of AI systems, helping the U.S. further capitalize on the potential of AI technologies. Although Amazon provides partial funding for this program, it will not play a role in the selection of proposals for award.

NineSigma, representing Betco Corporation, a privately held specialty chemical and equipment manufacturer, is seeking partners with solutions to clean, disinfect, and sanitize skin and surfaces. Novel products, technology advancements, or other approaches that can demonstrate efficacy to improve the overall cleanliness, health, and safety of commercial environments are of immediate interest.

Pharmaceutical blister packages often have moisture and oxygen barrier requirements to maintain the efficacy of the drug they contain. Traditional barrier materials used today are PCTFE, EVOH, PVDC, PVC, COC, and combinations thereof. Klockner Pentaplast Films is seeking a thermoformable solution that can be made into blister packs that protects pharmaceuticals from moisture and oxygen. Although the use of glass bottles meets the technical specs of this RFP, studies have shown that compliance to medication instructions increases when patients and consumers use blister packs. The technology must: * Be a material, or a technology that enables the modification of a material, to achieve ALL of the following properties: - Can be made into a thermoformable film - Provides the moisture barrier equivalence of 0.015 g-mil/100 in²-day - Provides an oxygen barrier equivalence of 0.005 cm³-mil/100 in²-day - Be approved (or approvable) for food safety by the FDA - Contains no halogens *Other properties that are highly desired but not required for this application: - Optically clear - Can be recycled in traditional recycling streams - Contains mostly bio-based, natural, or sustainable materials

For the purpose of driverless operation, it is crucial to avoid any risk of harm to any external object or entity. In the domain of automated driving systems, conforming to the SAE levels (SAE J3016) perception of the environment is critical for achieving safety requirements. BMW is seeking for improved / alternative sensor or detection solutions that can scan 360 degrees around the vehicle before it starts moving either forward or rearward. The solution should be able to detect any relevant object surrounding the vehicle and prevent the vehicle from starting to drive, if an obstacle is detected.  

The purpose of the R01 grant program is (1) to develop an understanding of the risks and conditions associated with occupational diseases and injuries, (2) to explore methods for reducing risks and preventing or minimizing exposure to hazardous conditions in the workplace, and (3) to translate significant scientific findings into prevention practices and products that will effectively reduce work-related illnesses and injuries. The Research Project Grant (R01) supports a discrete, specified, circumscribed project in scientific areas that represent the investigators’ specific interests and competencies and that fall within the mission of NIOSH. Applicants must concisely describe the occupational health burden addressed in their proposal and must link the need for the proposed research activities to planned outputs that will help alleviate this burden. Applicants should clearly articulate the anticipated impacts of the proposed research, both during the project period and beyond

The purpose of the R01 grant program is (1) to develop an understanding of the risks and conditions associated with occupational diseases and injuries, (2) to explore methods for reducing risks and preventing or minimizing exposure to hazardous conditions in the workplace, and (3) to translate significant scientific findings into prevention practices and products that will effectively reduce work-related illnesses and injuries. The Research Project Grant (R01) supports a discrete, specified, circumscribed project in scientific areas that represent the investigators' specific interests and competencies and that fall within the mission of NIOSH. Applicants must concisely describe the occupational health burden addressed in their proposal and must link the need for the proposed research activities to planned outputs that will help alleviate this burden. Applicants should clearly articulate the anticipated impacts of the proposed research, both during the project period and beyond.