NSF BioFoundries to Enable Access to Infrastructure and Resources for Advancing Modern Biology and Biotechnology (BioFoundries) Program 2024

To:	Chairs and Administrators, Departments in the Biological and Physical Sciences; Associate Deans for Research; College/School Research Administrators
From:	Office of the Vice Chancellor for Research & Graduate Education
Date:	May 30, 2023
Subject:	BioFoundries to Enable Access to Infrastructure and Resources for Advancing Modern Biology and Biotechnology (BioFoundries) Program 2024

Deadline

Deadline for Internal Review:

June 23, 2023

Project Description

The goal of this solicitation is to support the establishment of BioFoundries that focus on the innovation pipeline and research, while ensuring broad access to the research resources, training, education, and outreach to catalyze our understanding of biological or bio-engineered systems and to support the design-build-test-learn pipeline for rapid translation of basic discoveries into applications. The research must aim to integrate advances in modern biology, chemical biology, biotechnology, and related fields with innovations in automation, high-end measurement infrastructure, nanotechnology, micro-fabrication, integrated testing and data acquisition, and AI-enabled analysis and automation of the scientific discovery process. The user-facing activities of the BioFoundry must ensure that these advances are accessible to the widest possible scientific community. A desirable outcome of the BioFoundry is to establish the standardization of instrumentation, data, and scientific practices that will make possible the integration of data from multiple sources/databases and allow the construction of data analysis pipelines using heterogeneous software data analysis and AI tools that communicate through standard data structures. Ultimately the BioFoundries should aspire to support open collaborations among scientists.

BioFoundries are expected to include mechanisms and resources to ensure reproducibility of results and the ability to share data in both human- and machine-usable formats. BioFoundries should address the issue of reproducibility through verifiable algorithmic approaches to build trust and confidence of the research as well as user community and by providing repositories of data, tools, and algorithms that would allow outside groups to reproduce the scientific results obtained.

The research supported by BioFoundries may follow from the work supported by previous or existing NSF programs, or it could represent an entirely new direction. A key feature of the BioFoundries should be the deep integration of advanced discovery, technological innovation, knowledge sharing, and collaborations to open new avenues for translating results from basic research to societally beneficial outcomes. Additional information on the research and technology components of the BioFoundries can be found in the Proposal Preparation section of this solicitation.

BioFoundries are envisioned to combine characteristics of user facilities and research centers in a scientific ecosystem that includes:

• A user facility that provides strategic technical capacity and infrastructure, resources, samples, workflows, and data, in a manner that is open and responsive to a diverse community of external researchers at various institutions and that fosters the creation of standards for the above;
• Multidisciplinary research teams and technology development teams that conduct in-house research on a focused topic central to the BioFoundry theme, while simultaneously pushing the technical state of the art to develop next-generation instrumentation, experimental and computational methods, standardization and validation processes, workflows and automations, and advancing the capabilities of existing tools in concert with the in-house research teams and the external user community. Such research and technology development may span any aspect of biological and biotechnology domains supported by the NSF.
• Programs for training the next generation of researchers; and
• Activities that permit the BioFoundries to serve as nexus points for academic/industry collaborations and partnerships to enable pathways to translation.

 

The BioFoundries Program will not support projects that would be eligible for support through core, center, or infrastructure programs funded by other parts of NSF. Proposed BioFoundries should complement investments such as those funded through the Mid-Scale Research Infrastructure Programs or Materials Innovation Platforms.

Anticipated Award Type: Cooperative Agreement

Amount per award: $15,000,000 to $24,000,000
Duration of award: 6 Years
Estimated Number of Awards: 2 to 4

Additional Information: NSF Program Directors will host an informational webinar on the BioFoundries program for the broad science and engineering community on June 15, 2023; 3-4 pm ET. The webinar will feature a brief presentation with details on the program, solicitation criteria, and deadlines followed by a Q&A session. UW-Madison requires that prospective PIs attend this webinar prior to submitting an application for internal review. Register for the webinar here. 

Eligibility

UW-Madison is limited to one proposal as lead institution.

Individuals may appear as Senior Personnel (Principal Investigator/Project Director, co-PI, and other faculty or equivalent with biographical sketches included in the proposal even though their names may not be listed on the proposal Cover Sheet) on only one proposal.

Website

The following link contains additional information on the program and specific application instructions:
https://www.nsf.gov/pubs/2023/nsf23585/nsf23585.htm

Internal Competition Application Instructions

Sponsor Deadlines

Letters of Intent are due to NSF by August 01, 2023. Applications are due to NSF by October 02, 2023.

Questions?

Contact grants@research.wisc.edu.