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http://www.nsf.gov/funding/browse_all_funding.jsp
Directorate
for Mathematical and Physical Sciences
Office of Multidisciplinary Activities
The Office of Multidisciplinary
Activities (OMA) facilitates and supports opportunities in research and education that cross the traditional disciplinary boundaries. OMA works in partnership with the five MPS Divisions—Astronomical
Sciences, Chemistry, Materials Research, Mathematical Sciences, and Physics—to
respond more effectively to the excellence and creativity of the MPS
communities, particularly to proposals that, because of their subject,
scope, or multi-investigator or multidisciplinary nature, did not readily
fit the existing MPS program structure.
OMA provides a focal point in the Directorate for partnerships (e.g.,
with other agencies, industry, national laboratories, State and local
governments, and international organizations), seeds crosscutting research
in areas of particular promise, and supports innovative experiments in
education that could lead to new paradigms in graduate and undergraduate
education in the mathematical and physical sciences, particularly in
multidisciplinary settings.
OMA is open to creative ideas from all segments of the MPS community,
ranging from individual investigators to centers. It especially encourages
initiatives by multi-investigator, multidisciplinary teams pursuing problems
on a scale that exceeds the capacity of individual investigators. OMA
is particularly receptive to projects incorporating education and research
training experiences that contribute to a diverse, high-quality workforce
with technical and professional skills, career path flexibility, and
an appetite for lifelong learning appropriate to the dynamic global science
and technology enterprise of the 21st century.
In addition to encouraging creative proposals from the community, OMA
works with MPS Divisions to identify areas of research and education
that are seen as particularly timely and promising. Three areas of emphasis
for fiscal year 2004 are the development of next-generation instrumentation
to enable fundamental advances within disciplines and across disciplinary
boundaries; innovations in education, particularly at the graduate and
undergraduate levels, that broaden the backgrounds and strengthen the
technical, professional, and personal skills of graduates; and research
at the interface between MPS disciplines and the biological sciences,
where there are extraordinary opportunities for mathematical and physical
scientists to use their expertise in addressing significant research
and instrumentation challenges in the biosciences and biomedical-related
sciences.
In partnership with the MPS Divisions, OMA coordinates three MPS-wide
activities that integrate research and education:
1. Research Experiences for Teachers (RET)
Utilize the extensive
network of Research Experiences for Undergraduates (REU) Sites as a platform
for providing in-service and preservice K–12 teachers with discovery-based
learning experiences in the MPS disciplines that they can incorporate
into their classroom activities.
2. MPS Distinguished International Postdoctoral Research Fellowships
(MPS-DRF)
Enable postdoctoral investigators in MPS disciplines
to carry out research at the world’s leading facilities and laboratories.
A primary objective of the MPS-DRF activity is to provide talented, recent
doctoral recipients in the mathematical and physical sciences with an
effective means of establishing international collaborations in the early
stages of their careers, thereby facilitating and enhancing connections
between the U.S. science and engineering community and its international
counterparts (see program announcement NSF
01-154).
3. MPS Internships in Public Science Education (MPS-IPSE)
Are
intended to bring together the expertise of the scientific research community
traditionally supported by the MPS Directorate with that of the public
science education community, in partnership, to communicate the most
recent scientific advances to the public. The IPSE activity provides
support for undergraduate and graduate students and for K–12 teachers
to work in conjunction with MPS research scientists and with professionals
at science centers and museums on projects in public science education
(see program announcement NSF
02-064).
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