FUNDING OPPORTUNITIES

MIT SEA GRANT FY2020 REQUEST FOR PROPOSALS

SUMMARY

MIT Sea Grant provides competitive funding opportunities for Massachusetts university-based research scientists who seek to address marine issues in ways that benefit the Commonwealth. In FY2020 MIT Sea Grant will focus our funding resources on the following three specific areas of marine research:

1. Offshore aquaculture, a topic first introduced last year. The focus is on novel technologies to enable offshore installation and operation. Within this area, we particularly encourage submissions in three topics: (a) Flexible surfaces with embedded sensors and actuators that can be used as “intelligent” nets, capable of sensing the environment and controlling flow and fish; (b) Autonomy for surface and underwater craft for inspection and maintenance of offshore farms – autonomy algorithms should be open, extensible, and applicable to a wide variety of platforms and missions; and (c) Very low power physical, chemical, or biological sensors for farm monitoring. Highly ranked aquaculture proposals received through this competition will allow MITSG to take advantage of up to 50% co-funding by the NSGCP.
2. Ocean acidification, focusing on ocean monitoring using physics-based data inference, fusing diverse sources of data, e.g. at least two of satellite data, data from drifters, and buoy data. The target is to demonstrate such a computer monitoring system for the Boston Harbor or the Gulf of Maine.
3. Underwater wireless power transmission and data communication, particularly for shallow water applications. The challenge is to deliver laboratory prototype for wireless energy transfer to exceed 1 kW, and/or prototype for data transmission underwater in highly stratified environment targeting distances of the order of 100 m.

INFORMATIONAL MEETING

An informational meeting for the FY2020 RFP was held at MIT Sea Grant on Thursday, January 24, 2019 to provide guidance for interested applicants. Meeting slides are available for download, and a recording of the meeting is available online.

FUNDING & DURATION

The maximum annual research project budget request to be considered is $100,000 for a total of $200,000 for a two-year project. This does not include the required matching funds provided by the PI, which amount to at least 50% of the figure requested from Sea Grant. Matching funds must be from non-federal sources and can include cash, salaries, equipment, supplies, ship-time, etc. Projects last for up to two years. The PI will submit a project timeline as part of their full proposal.

ELIGIBILITY

Lead scientists on a proposal must have Principal Investigator standing at their own institutions to be eligible for funding, and must not be the recipient of other MIT Sea Grant funding during the period of the grant (2/1/2020 to 1/31/2022).

PROPOSAL PROCESS

The proposal process is initiated in January of each year when the RFP is announced. Project work begins on February 1 of the following year. The rules governing NOAA/Sea Grant deadlines are strictly enforced and the contents of proposals must be complete by the dates and times given in the Proposal Schedule.

RULES AND ASSUMPTIONS

1. The Principal Investigator is eligible to submit an external proposal according to his/her home institution.
2. The appropriate authorities at the home institution approve budget figures, including matching fund estimates.
3. The Principal Investigator agrees to the review process described.
4. The Sea Grant Director may, at his/her discretion, remove a proposal from further consideration at any point in the process if an investigator has overdue obligations to the MIT Sea Grant College Program under a previous research contract.
5. The budget amount requested from Sea Grant will not increase by more than 10% in the course of the submission process.

PROPOSAL EVALUATION & SELECTION

Step One: Preliminary proposals submitted by deadline are reviewed by a panel of experts appointed by the Director. Principal Investigators whose projects are scientifically sound and are aligned with the goals of the MIT Sea Grant College Program will be encouraged to write a full proposal.

Step Two: Full proposals are distributed for extensive peer review. The reviewers’ comments (blinded) are made available to the Principal Investigators for response and rebuttal.

Step Three: The full proposal, reviewers’ critiques, and the PI’s responses are submitted to a Technical Review Panel which meets in September for extensive discussion and to make final recommendations. The Director, with the advice of the State/Industry Council and the Program Monitor, and giving due consideration to the Panel’s recommendations and the relevance of the proposed work to the Program’s strategic goals, selects proposals to be included in the MIT Sea Grant College Program Omnibus Proposal. The Omnibus is submitted in October to the NOAA Office of Sea Grant for review and acceptance. Funding authorization is finalized within 60 days, and Principal Investigators are informed of the result.

PRE-PROPOSALS

Please contact MIT Sea Grant Director Dr. Michael Triantafyllou (mt@mit.edu) for his approval of your research topic (this is REQUIRED). Once the Director has approved your topic, contact seagrantinfo@mit.edu for login and access to eSeaGrant.

Instructions for Submitting Pre-Proposals

Pre-proposals are due by March 5, 2019 5:00 pm.

FULL PROPOSALS

Full proposals are due by June 11, 2019 5:00 pm.