Infrastructure Capacity for Biological Research | 21 501

Opportunity Information: Apply for 21 501

The National Science Foundation (NSF) Infrastructure Capacity for Biological Research (Capacity) Program is a discretionary grant opportunity (Funding Opportunity Number 21-501; CFDA 47.074) designed to strengthen shared research infrastructure that enables modern biological science. Rather than funding individual research projects, the program supports efforts that build broadly useful tools, products, and services that help many researchers do better, faster, or more reproducible biology across any research area supported by NSF's Directorate for Biological Sciences (BIO). The core idea is to invest in infrastructure that creates downstream scientific impact through wide community use, not just through the work of a single lab or institution.

Capacity projects are intended to implement new infrastructure, scale up existing resources, or make major improvements to established tools and services. NSF specifically emphasizes infrastructure that is broadly applicable and openly accessible to a wide scientific and education community. Successful projects are expected to produce high-quality deliverables and enable important science outcomes achieved by the broader user community. A key expectation is that the resulting resource serves researchers beyond a single research team, meaning proposals should clearly demonstrate community demand, usability, and plans for access, adoption, and sustained value.

The program is organized around three main areas. First, Cyberinfrastructure includes software platforms, data resources, computational workflows, databases, and other digital systems that support biological research at scale, including capabilities that improve data sharing, integration, analysis, or reproducibility. Second, Biological Collections covers infrastructure that improves the use and value of biological specimens and associated data, such as digitization, data standards, collection management improvements, or coordinated services that make collections more discoverable and useful to researchers and educators. Third, Biological Field Stations and Marine Laboratories focuses on capacity-building at places that provide access to field-based and marine research environments, including upgrades or services that expand what visiting scientists and students can do and how broadly those facilities can support the community.

In addition to implementation and improvement awards, the program also accepts proposals for planning activities or workshops. These are meant to support coordination and community alignment that may be necessary before building or expanding infrastructure, such as developing shared roadmaps, governance approaches, community standards, partnerships, or strategies to meet common needs across a research community.

There are also clear boundaries on what the program does not support. Instrumentation proposals are not part of this program and should instead be submitted to NSF's Major Research Instrumentation (MRI) program. Likewise, infrastructure that is primarily tailored to a single research project, a single laboratory, or a single institution is considered out of scope; those needs are expected to be addressed through the relevant BIO research programs that would typically fund that kind of work. In other words, Capacity is for community-serving infrastructure, not one-off project support.

From an administrative standpoint, proposals are accepted at any time (no fixed deadline listed). Awards can be as large as $1,200,000, and NSF anticipates making around 75 awards under this opportunity. Eligibility is listed as "Others" with additional clarification expected in the official eligibility text, so applicants should consult the solicitation details to confirm whether their organization type and project structure fit NSF requirements. Overall, this opportunity is best suited for teams that can demonstrate broad user demand, strong plans for open access and community benefit, and a clear pathway to delivering infrastructure that materially improves how contemporary biology is conducted.

• The National Science Foundation in the science and technology and other research and development sector is offering a public funding opportunity titled "Infrastructure Capacity for Biological Research" and is now available to receive applicants.
• Interested and eligible applicants and submit their applications by referencing the CFDA number(s): 47.074.
• This funding opportunity was created on Oct 02, 2020.
• Applicants must submit their applications by Proposals accepted anytime. (Agency may still review applications by suitable applicants for the remaining/unused allocated funding in 2026.)
• Each selected applicant is eligible to receive up to $1,200,000.00 in funding.
• The number of recipients for this funding is limited to 75 candidate(s).
• Eligible applicants include: Others (see text field entitled Additional Information on Eligibility for clarification).

Apply for 21 501

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