NSF

NSF - Cyber-Physical Systems (CPS)

While tremendous progress has been made in advancing CPS technologies, the demand for innovation across application domains is driving the need to accelerate fundamental research to keep pace. At the same time, the CPS program seeks to open new vistas for the research community to think beyond the usual cyber-physical paradigms and structures and propose creative ideas to address the myriad challenges of today's systems as well as those of the future that have not yet been designed or fielded.

The CPS program aims to develop the core research needed to engineer these complex CPS, some of which may also require dependable, high-confidence, or provable behaviors. Core research areas of the program include control, data analytics, and machine learning—including real-time learning for control, autonomy, design, Internet of Things (IoT), mixed initiatives including human-in- or human-on-the-loop, networking, privacy, real-time systems, safety, security, and verification. By abstracting from the particulars of specific systems and application domains, the CPS program seeks to reveal cross-cutting, fundamental scientific and engineering principles that underpin the integration of cyber and physical elements across all application domains. The program additionally supports the development of methods, tools, and hardware and software components based upon these cross-cutting principles, along with validation of the principles via prototypes and testbeds. This program also fosters a research community that is committed to advancing education and outreach in CPS and accelerating the transition of CPS research into the real world.

All proposals must include the following as part of the Project Description:

  • A Research Description that describes the technical rationale and technical approach of the CPS research, including the challenges that drive the research problem and how the research integrates cyber and physical components. This section must also describe how the research outcomes are translational to other application domains. Specifically, it must include:
    • A subsection titled "CPS Research Focus" which describes the cyber-physical system attributes of the challenge problem and clearly identifies the core CPS research areas addressed in which the novel and foundational research contributions are being made;
  • An Evaluation/Experimentation Plan that describes how proposed concepts will be validated and outlines the metrics for success;
  • A Project Management and Collaboration Plan that summarizes how the project team is ideally suited to realize the project goals and how the team will ensure effective collaboration; and
  • A Broader Impacts section that describes how the research will be disseminated to a broad and diverse audience. This should go beyond traditional academic publications and includes education and outreach from the research team spanning multiple levels of engagement. Broader Impacts encompasses Broadening Participation in Computing (BPC) and Engineering (BPE).

In FY 2020, NSF is working closely with multiple agencies across the federal government, including the U.S. Department of Homeland Security (DHS) Science and Technology Directorate (S&T); the U.S. Department of Transportation (DOT) Federal Highway Administration (FHWA); several National Institutes of Health (NIH) institutes and centers including the National Institute of Biomedical Imaging and Bioengineering (NIBIB), National Cancer Institute (NCI), and National Center for Advancing Translational Sciences (NCATS); and the U.S. Department of Agriculture National Institute of Food and Agriculture (USDA NIFA, hereafter referred to as NIFA).

 

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20-055 Dear Colleague Letter: Provisioning Advanced Cyberinfrastructure to Further Research on the Coronavirus Disease 2019 (COVID-19)

Through this DCL (which complements NSF 20-052), the Office of Advanced Cyberinfrastructure (OAC) within the Directorate for Computer and Information Science and Engineering is inviting RAPID proposals and supplemental funding requests to existing awards that address COVID-19 challenges through data and/or software infrastructure development activities. Such activities would be funded by the Computational and Data-Enabled Science and Engineering (CDS&E) program or the Cyberinfrastructure for Sustained Scientific Innovation (CSSI) program.

Proposals in response to this DCL and the NSF DCL on COVID-19 (NSF 20-052) may also request the use of NSF-funded advanced computing resources such as Frontera, Stampede2, Bridges, Comet, and JetStream. To ensure availability of these computing resources, investigators must contact OAC prior to submission of the proposal.

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20-052 Dear Colleague Letter on the Coronavirus Disease 2019 (COVID-19)

In light of the emergence and spread of the coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) in the United States and abroad, the National Science Foundation (NSF) is accepting proposals to conduct non-medical, non-clinical-care research that can be used immediately to explore how to model and understand the spread of COVID-19, to inform and educate about the science of virus transmission and prevention, and to encourage the development of processes and actions to address this global challenge.

NSF encourages the research community to respond to this challenge through existing funding opportunities. In addition, we invite researchers to use the Rapid Response Research (RAPID) funding mechanism, which allows NSF to receive and review proposals having a severe urgency with regard to availability of or access to data, facilities or specialized equipment as well as quick-response research on natural or anthropogenic disasters and similar unanticipated events. Requests for RAPID proposals may be for up to $200K and up to one year in duration. Well-justified proposals that exceed these limits may be entertained. All questions should be directed either to a program officer managing an NSF program with which the research would be aligned or to rapid-covid19@nsf.gov.

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20-065 Dear Colleague Letter: Request for SBIR/STTR Phase I Proposals Addressing COVID-19

The Division of Innovation and Industrial Partnerships (IIP) of the Engineering Directorate invites US-based small businesses to submit Phase I proposals focused on the development and deployment of new technologies, products, processes, and services with the potential to positively impact the nation’s and world’s ability to respond to the COVID-19 crisis. Areas of research that might be considered include, but are not limited to: artificial intelligence, digital health, diagnostics, distributed ledger, environmental technologies, medical devices, pharmaceutical technologies, disinfection and sterilization, and filtration and separations. Interested proposers are invited to submit to the NSF Small Business Innovation Research (SBIR) and Small Business Technology Transfer (STTR) Phase I Program.

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