NSF issues first Convergence awards, addressing societal … – National Science Foundation (press release)

News Release 17-082

A deeper, more intentional approach to accelerating discovery

August 24, 2017

Throughout its history, the National Science Foundation (NSF) has focused on addressing grand challenges within science and engineering. These challenges represent our greatest opportunity to strengthen the nation through scientific discovery, and meeting them will require sustained and deep collaborations across scientific disciplines.

Through its Growing Convergent Research at NSF portfolio, the foundation seeks to highlight the value of Convergence, the deep integration of multiple disciplines in order to advance scientific discovery and innovation. The Foundation has issued the first set of Convergence awards, supporting workshops, summer institutes, and Research Coordination Networks (RCNs).

"NSF has supported cross-disciplinary collaboration for decades," said NSF Director France Crdova. "Convergence is a deeper, more intentional approach to the integration of knowledge, techniques, and expertise from multiple disciplines in order to address the most compelling scientific and societal challenges."

The 23 newly awarded projects will foster Convergence to address grand challenges in the context of five of NSF's "10 Big Ideas for Future NSF Investments," a set of cutting-edge research agendas uniquely suited for NSF's broad portfolio of investments. Those five ideas are: Harnessing the Data Revolution; Navigating the New Arctic; The Quantum Leap: Leading the Next Quantum Revolution; Work at the Human-Technology Frontier: Shaping the Future; and Understanding the Rules of Life: Predicting Phenotype.

The new Convergence awards include support for a Quantum Science Summer School that will bring together students from materials research, physics, engineering, mathematics, computer sciences, chemistry and the social sciences. These summer schools will prepare transdisciplinary students to meet the challenges of the quantum revolution.

Among the newly funded RCNs are projects that will:

The Convergence portfolio co-funds projects with other NSF programs, such as Transdisciplinary Research in Principles of Data Science (TRIPODS). The 2017 TRIPODS awards bring together the statistics, mathematics and theoretical computer science communities to develop the foundations of data science. TRIPODS is NSF's first major investment in Harnessing the Data Revolution.

The awards in the 2017 Convergence portfolio, arranged according to their associated Big Ideas:

Harnessing the Data Revolution

Work at the Human Technology Frontier

Navigating the New Arctic

The Quantum Leap

Understanding the Rules of Life

-NSF-

Media Contacts Rob Margetta, NSF, (703) 292-2663, rmargett@nsf.gov

The National Science Foundation (NSF) is an independent federal agency that supports fundamental research and education across all fields of science and engineering. In fiscal year (FY) 2017, its budget is $7.5 billion. NSF funds reach all 50 states through grants to nearly 2,000 colleges, universities and other institutions. Each year, NSF receives more than 48,000 competitive proposals for funding and makes about 12,000 new funding awards.

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Researcher Jeffrey Hickman leads a project focusing on how autonomous trucks will affect workers. Credit and Larger Version

University of Michigan principal investigator Silvia Lindtner at the workshop "Hacked Matter." Credit and Larger Version

Brown University mathematics professor Jeff Brock teaches topological methods in data analysis. Credit and Larger Version

Pennsylvania State University's Heng Xu will lead a Convergence workshop on crowdsourcing research. Credit and Larger Version

The University of Colorado's Colleen Strawhacker, leads a project on co-production in data science. Credit and Larger Version

Pennsylvania State's Ming Xiao's project will focus on networking Arctic coastal erosion research. Credit and Larger Version

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NSF issues first Convergence awards, addressing societal ... - National Science Foundation (press release)