News

BIODIVERSITY AND ECOSYSTEM INFORMATICS (BDEI)

NATIONAL SCIENCE FOUNDATION
April 12, 2001
NSF 01-99 (Dear Colleague Letter)
http://www.nsf.gov/cgi-bin/getpub?nsf0199

Proposals due: July 11, 2001 through the NSF FastLane system
(http://www.fastlane.nsf.gov)
Award decisions by August, 2001 with awards to follow no later than
September 2001.

Excerpt:
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Dear Colleague,

This letter calls to your attention a new research opportunity
in BIODIVERSITY AND ECOSYSTEM INFORMATICS (BDEI). This
opportunity seeks to support proposals for high-risk, small-
scale planning (less than $50,000) or incubation (less than
$100,000) activities that will likely catalyze rapid and
innovative advances in the new interdisciplinary research
community of biodiversity and ecosystem informatics. Subject to
the availability of funds, about $1.05 Million is available from
NSF. Both USGS and NASA may provide additional funding depending
on availability of funds and quantity/quality of proposals. 15-
20 awards are anticipated. This is a call for
incubation/planning research or workshop proposals to be
conducted as part of the existing Digital Government research
program (see http://www.nsf.gov/cgi-bin/getpub?nsf99103) within
the Division of Experimental and Integrative Activities (EIA) of
the NSF Directorate for Computer and Information Science and
Engineering (CISE). Collaborating agencies and NSF programs for
this opportunity include:
    National Science Foundation
    - Digital Government program (CISE Directorate)
    - Information and Data Management program (CISE Directorate)
    - Biological Databases and Informatics program (Biological
      Sciences Directorate)
    - Biological Oceanography program (Geosciences Directorate)
      National Aeronautics and Space Administration
      United States Geological Survey

Grants made under this opportunity would be expected to produce
tangible results within 12-18 months. It is anticipated that the
interdisciplinary groups can then continue to work together to
build on these pilot activities and thus participate more
effectively in other, larger informatics research competitions.
Successful proposals in response to this letter will foster
novel and synergistic interdisciplinary work between the
computer and information science community and the biodiversity
and ecological science community; it is hoped that a new
community of researchers will be the result. Rather than
incremental extensions of current work, proposals are expected
to address new and exciting Computer Science and Information
Technology (CS/IT) research directions, while at the same time
helping to identify the next-generation biodiversity and
ecosystems information infrastructure. Proposals that involve
collaborations with one or more Federal agencies are strongly
encouraged.

.....

Points of Contact
National Science Foundation

Primary contact, especially for administrative matters:

Larry Brandt
Digital Government Program
Phone: 703-292-8980
lbrandt@nsf.gov

Other NSF points of contact, especially for technical matters:

David Garrison
Biological Oceanography Program
Phone: 703-292-8582
dgarriso@nsf.gov

Sylvia Spengler
Biological Databases and Informatics Program
Phone: 703-292-8470
sspengle@nsf.gov

Maria Zemankova
Information and Data Management Program
Phone: 703-292-8930
mzemanko@nsf.gov

National Aeronautics and Space Administration

Woody Turner
NASA Headquarters
Earth Science Enterprise
Phone: 202-358-1662
wturner@mail.hq.nasa.gov

John Schnase
NASA Goddard Space Flight Center
Earth and Space Data Computing Division
Phone:  301-286-4351
jschnase@gsfc.nasa.gov

James A. Smith
NASA Goddard Space Flight Center
Laboratory for Terrestrial Physics
Phone:  301-614-6020
jasmith@hemlock,gsfc.nasa.gov

U. S. Geological Survey

Anne Frondorf
National Biological Information Infrastructure Program
Phone: 703-648-4205
anne_frondorf@usgs.gov