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Cyberinfrastructure for the Geosciences – Opportunities

A variety of NSF opportunities support the development and implementation of cyberinfrastructure for the geosciences. A common goal of these opportunities is to increase public access to data generated through NSF-sponsored research. NSF's strategy for public access to research data is articulated in its Public Access Plan (NSF 15-52) and Public Access Plan 2.0 (NSF 23-104), and specific data policies are described in the Proposal & Award Policies & Procedures Guide (PAPPG). GEO Divisions and Offices specify additional data policies, and identify cyber resources available to support these policies (Directorate for Geosciences—Data Policies).

This website provides an overview of the range of NSF opportunities supporting cyberinfrastructure and data sharing in the geosciences. PIs are encouraged to reach out to cognizant Program Officers to learn more about relevant funding opportunities.

NSF Funding Opportunities

NSF Cross-Directorate opportunities
NSF's Directorate for Geosciences (GEO) collaborates on a variety of cross-Directorate cyberinfrastructure opportunities. Specific EarthCube, OAC, and HDR opportunities are described below.

  • Pathways to Enable Open-Source Ecosystems (POSE) program
    • Many NSF-funded research projects result in publicly accessible, modifiable, and distributable open-sourced software, hardware or data platforms that catalyze further innovation. In some cases, an open-source product is widely adopted and forms the basis for a self-sustaining open-source ecosystem (OSE) comprises a distributed community of developers and a broad base of users across academia, industry and government. The goal of the POSE program is to fund new OSE managing organizations, each responsible for the creation and maintenance of infrastructure needed for efficient and secure operation of an OSE based around a specific open-source product or class of products.
    • Solicitation NSF 23-556; Deadline Date: September 7, 2023 (and annually thereafter on first Thursday in September)
      • This solicitation seeks two types of proposals, allowing teams to (1) propose specific activities to scope the development of an OSE (Phase I), and (2) develop a sustainable OSE based on a mature open-source product that shows promise both in the ability to meet an emergent societal or national need and to build a community to help develop it (Phase II).
      • What Has Been Funded (Recent Awards Made Through This Program, with Abstracts)

  • Pilot for the Allocation of High-Throughput Computing Resources (HTC). Through this Dear Colleague Letter (DCL), NSF 22-051, NSF announces a Pilot for the Allocation of High-Throughput Computing (HTC) resources made available through the Partnership to Advance Throughput Computing (PATh) project supported by NSF. HTC supports the automated execution of workloads that consist of large ensembles of self-contained inter-dependent tasks that may require large amounts of computing power over long periods of time to complete. Available resources include large-scale compute and GPU servers and nearline storage, as described in more detail on the PATh credit accounts web page.

  • NSF’s Public Access Initiative (PAI) strives to make the outputs of scientific research funded by the National Science Foundation publicly available to the greatest extent and with the fewest constraints possible and consistent with law.

GEO Directorate-wide opportunities

The NSF Directorate for Geosciences (GEO) seeks to foster an open, transparent, and inclusive ecosystem of software, data, and knowledge capabilities to advance geosciences understanding and to train the next generation of geoscientists.

  • The Geosciences Open Science Ecosystem (GEO OSE) program seeks to support sustainable and networked open science activities to foster an ecosystem of inclusive access to data, physical collections, software, advanced computing, and other resources toward advancing research and education in the geosciences. The purpose of this support is to broadly enable geoscientists to leverage expanding information resources and computing capabilities to address interdisciplinary grand challenge research questions at the forefront of the geosciences.
    • Solicitation: NSF 23-534 - Deadline date: March 16, 2023

  • Advancing Research in the Geosciences Using Artificial Intelligence (AI) and Machine Learning (ML). Through this Dear Colleague Letter (DCL), NSF 23-046, the NSF Directorate for Geosciences (GEO) encourages the submission of proposals that advance our understanding of geosciences using Artificial Intelligence (AI) and Machine Learning (ML) methods. To promote research that benefits from AI/ML and reduces barriers to its use in the geosciences, GEO welcomes proposals incorporating AI/ML methods across its broad range of programs. The geosciences collectively refers to the research supported in the Divisions of Atmosphere and Geospace (AGS), Earth (EAR), and Ocean (OCE) Sciences, and in the Office of Polar Programs (OPP). Proposals in response to this DCL must advance core geosciences program goals and use AI/ML methods toward addressing scientific problems. Relevant proposals should be submitted to an existing GEO program, according to that program's submission guidelines. Before submission, PIs should contact cognizant program directors in the program(s) within AGS, EAR, OCE, or OPP that are most relevant to their projects to discuss the appropriate mechanism for submission.

GEO Division-specific opportunities
The four Divisions and Offices within NSF's Directorate for Geosciences (GEO) support cyberinfrastructure projects serving specific research disciplines. GEO Division- and Office-specific opportunities are described below.

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