NSF Designing Materials to Revolutionize and Engineer our Future (DMREF)

NSF Designing Materials to Revolutionize and Engineer our Future (DMREF)

Below is a summary assembled by the Research & Innovation Office (RIO). Please see the full solicitation for complete information about the funding opportunity.

Program Summary

DMREF seeks to foster the design, discovery, and development of materials to accelerate their path to deployment by harnessing the power of data and computational tools in concert with experiment and theory. DMREF emphasizes a deep integration of experiments, computation, and theory; the use of accessible digital data across the materials development continuum; and strengthening connections among theorists, computational scientists, data scientists, mathematicians, statisticians, and experimentalists as well as those from academia, industry, and government. DMREF is committed to the education and training of a next-generation materials research and development (R&D) workforce; well-equipped for successful careers as educators and innovators; and able to take full advantage of the materials development continuum and innovation infrastructures that NSF is creating through partnership with other federal and international agencies.

DMREF is the principal NSF program responsive to the National Science and Technology Council’s (NSTC’s) Office of Science and Technology Policy (OSTP) Subcommittee on the Materials Genome Initiative (MGI). Over its inaugural decade, the MGI has driven a transformational paradigm shift in the philosophy of how materials research is performed. DMREF is supportive of the 2021 MGI Strategic Plan and its three primary goals, i.e., unifying the materials innovation infrastructure; harnessing the power of materials data; and educating, training, and connecting a world-class materials R&D workforce. 

Proposals submitted to this solicitation must be directed by a team of at least two Senior/Key Personnel with complementary expertise. The proposed research must involve a collaborative and iterative “closed-loop” process wherein theory guides computational simulation, computational simulation guides experiments, and experimental observation further guides theory.

See the solicitation for complete details.

Deadlines

• CU Internal Deadline: 11:59pm MST December 16, 2024
• Sponsor Deadline: 5:00pm MST February 4, 2025

Internal Application Requirements (all in PDF format)

• Project Summary (3 pages maximum): Please include 1) the proposed work’s connection to the central objectives of DMREF; 2) data and software cyberinfrastructure to be used to achieve project goals; 3) plans to train a diverse, inclusive Materials Genome Initiative (MGI) workforce; 4) a management plan describing how data and workforce development will be integrated into the project’s workflow; 5) the roles of each senior/key personnel and any federal/international personnel; and 6) a timeline for project implementation.
• Lead PIs’ Curriculum Vitae
• Budget Overview (1 page maximum): A basic budget outlining project costs is sufficient; detailed OCG budgets are not required.

To access the online application, visit: https://cuboulderovcr.secure-platform.com/a/solicitations/7032/home

Eligibility

By the submission deadline, any PI, co-PI, or other Senior/Key project personnel must hold either:

• A tenured or tenure-track position, or
• A primary, full-time, paid appointment in a research or teaching position with exceptions granted for family or medical leave, as determined by the submitting institution.

No individual may appear as Senior/Key Personnel (PI, Co-PI, Faculty or Other Senior/Key Personnel) on more than one (1) DMREF proposal submitted in response to this solicitation.

Limited Submission Guidelines

Each organization is limited to serving as lead on five (5) DMREF proposals. There is no limit on the number of proposals in which an organization may serve in a Collaborative, non-lead role.

Award Information and Duration

• Anticipated Award Size: $1.5M - $2M
• Award Duration: 4 years
• Anticipated Number of Awards: 20 - 25

Review Criteria

In addition to the standard NSF Intellectual Merit and Broader Impacts Criteria, reviewers will be asked to consider the following:

• How effectively does the proposed work help accelerate materials discovery, understanding, and/or development by building the fundamental knowledge base needed to progress toward designing and making materials with specific, desired functions or properties?
• How effectively does the proposed research use collaborative processes with iterative feedback among tasks? Do the materials synthesis / growth / processing techniques, characterization / testing methodology, theory / mathematics, data science, and computation / simulation aspects of the project strongly interact with each other to promote significant advances in each of these components and advance materials design?
• How effectively does the proposed work provide training for the next generation of scientists and engineers, educated in a multidisciplinary, integrated experimental and computational approach to materials research? Will adequate data-related training be provided for students and postdoctoral researchers, as needed?
• How appropriate is the Data Management and Sharing Plan for the type of data that the project is expected to create? How effectively does the proposal convey that the digital data generated by the project will be made freely available within a reasonable time from publication, without the need for request to the investigator, in a way that the data is findable, accessible, interoperable, and reusable (FAIR)?

In addition to being evaluated according to the previously described criteria, proposals submitted to the Division of Mathematical Sciences (DMS) as the Primary Unit of Consideration will be evaluated with respect to whether they seek new mathematical or statistical results that will advance the DMREF agenda. These proposals will be co-evaluated by other divisions in the areas of science and engineering where impacts of the projects are expected.