The National Science Foundation’s (NSF) Directorate for Computer and Information Science and Engineering (CISE) and Intel Labs recently announced a new partnership to support novel, transformative, multidisciplinary approaches that address the problem of securing current and emerging cyber-physical systems, the infrastructures they form, and those integrated with them. A key goal of this activity is to foster a long-term research community committed to advancing research and education at the confluence of cybersecurity, privacy, and cyber-physical systems, and to transitioning its findings into engineering practice. The partnership aims to combine NSF’s experience in developing and managing successful large, diverse research portfolios with Intel’s long history of building research communities in emerging technology areas through efforts such as its Science and Technology Centers Program.
The joint solicitation calls for Synergy proposals, to be funded jointly by NSF and Intel at up to $1 million per year over three years, that take a holistic view of the challenges in protecting cyber-physical systems but also the human factors, policies, and economics of the future CPS marketplace. The larger award size is intended to enable more ambitious multidisciplinary exploration.
In addition, the solicitation includes a track for Breakthrough proposals, to be funded by NSF at up to $500,000 total over three years. These proposals should foster the collaboration of at least two PIs representing the cybersecurity and privacy as well as cyber-physical systems communities.
To achieve the goal of fostering a community of researchers at the intersection of cyber-physical systems and cybersecurity and privacy, the program includes an Ideas Lab to be held in the Greater Washington, DC, area on Aug. 12-16, 2014.
Preliminary proposals for participation in the Aug. 12-16 Ideas Lab are due via FastLane by July 29, 2014; full proposals must be received by Oct. 28, 2014. Participation in the Ideas Lab is not required for full proposals that were not developed through the Ideas Lab.
For more details, see the full solicitation at http://www.nsf.gov/pubs/2014/nsf14571/nsf14571.htm
NSF and Intel intend to hold a webinar on this solicitation in the second part of June; more details will be provided soon.
To gauge interest in the Ideas Lab and help with our planning, please respond by email to adkeromy@nsf.gov or dcorman@nsf.gov with an indication of interest and intend to submit a white paper (no commitment implied).
Submitted by Frankie King on June 7th, 2014