Dynamics of coupled natural and human systems cnh program

The proposal also should outline the expected benefits of the network's activities for the broader community of researchers engaged in research on coupled human and natural systems. The size of a network may vary depending on the theme and the needs of the proposed activity. The network may be regional, national, or international.

It is expected that a proposed network will involve investigators at diverse organizations. The inclusion of new researchers, post-docs, graduate students, and undergraduates is encouraged. Specific efforts to increase participation of underrepresented groups must be included. The proposal should identify an initial network of participants, but it also should specify mechanisms to maintain openness, ensure access, and actively promote participation by interested parties outside of the initial set of participants.

The principal investigator of the CNH-RCN award should play a strong leadership role in fully coordinating and integrating the activities of the network. A number of other network participants who will serve on a steering committee to work with the PI also should be designated, with those steering committee members considered as senior personnel.

The plan should include a description of the specific roles and responsibilities of the PI and the steering committee. Mechanisms for allocating funds, such as support for the work of a steering committee, should be clearly articulated. The plan should include provisions for flexibility to allow the structure of the group to change over time as membership and the network's foci evolve.

Mechanisms for assessing progress and the effectiveness of the networking activities should be part of the management plan. When participation by researchers from outside the U. Participants from organizations outside the U. NSF funds may not be used to support the expenses of the international scientists and students within their own organizations, but in RCN projects that involve international partners, NSF funds may be used for travel expenses for 1 U.

Projects should be conducted for the length of time necessary to effectively conduct the project. Depending on the quality of proposals for projects of different size and the availability of funds, NSF anticipates making 15 to 18 awards annually.

Who May Serve as PI:. Proposals submitted for this competition should clearly specify all relevant parts of the proposed project. With respect to the proposed research, the proposal should outline the theoretical foundations of the project as based in relevant literature. It should specify the questions on which the research will focus, the research methods that will be used, the expertise that different researchers will bring to different facets of the project, and how and where results will be disseminated.

With respect to education, the proposal should specify educational goals, what methods will be used to attain those goals, and the expertise of individuals who will participate in educational efforts. The proposal should also identify the proposed educational products, how those products will be disseminated, and how the effectiveness of educational activities will be evaluated.

This program solicitation requests material about the personnel involved in the project. Please use the following definitions to provide the corresponding information. Work on the Cover Sheet first. Check that the Awardee and Performing Organizations are correct. Highlight the Program Solicitation Number and click on the "Select" button. Highlight the appropriate division and click on the "Select Division" button. Click on the "Go Back" button and prepare the remainder of the Cover Sheet.

Note that although three or more separate NSF divisions may be listed, all proposals will be brought together to be managed by one of the participating divisions during a specific year. Program officers from all participating divisions will work together to coordinate evaluation of all proposals.

The CNH program in only one division therefore needs to be listed on the cover sheet. The title of the proposal should specify one of the following prefixes to designate the specific kind of proposal being submitted:.

The substantive title of the project should follow the prefix. Prepare the remainder of the cover sheet. Be sure that contact information for all PIs is current. All project descriptions for large CNH interdisciplinary projects are limited to 20 pages in length. With the exceptions noted below, proposers may organize the different components of the project description as they wish. The following sections MUST be included under separate headings in the project description:.

A biographical sketch with a 2-page limit must be provided for each investigator and each person identified as senior personnel. All biographical sketches should be prepared in conformance with the requirements in Chapter II, Section C. Each person identified as a principal investigator or as senior personnel must submit a current and pending support form. This proposal is considered a pending activity and should be listed on the form for all investigators and senior personnel.

Items 1 and 2 below are required to be included in this section for all proposals. Items 3, 4, and 5 should be included here if needed. Conflict of Interest Table. Provide a list in a single, alphabetized table with the full names and institutional affiliations of all people in conflict of interest with any of the senior personnel PI, Co-PIs, and any named personnel whose salary is requested in the project budgets.

Conflicts to be identified are a primary Ph. Please specify the type of conflict s for each person listed on the chart. Data Management Plan. Provide a description of the project's data management plan, as a maximum 2-page supplementary document.

This information should be clearly identified by the subheading "Data Management Plan. However, plans should address some or all of the following issues:. The data management plan is considered an integral part of the project and therefore subject to reviewer, panel, and program evaluation.

Successful applicants will be expected to address this issue in annual and final project reports. Postdoctoral Researcher Mentoring Plan. Proposals that include funding to support postdoctoral researchers, and, do not include the requisite mentoring plan will be returned without review. The Postdoctoral Researcher Mentoring Plan is considered an integral part of the project and therefore subject to reviewer, panel, and program evaluation.

Letters of Collaboration. This section should include any letters of collaboration from individuals or organizations that are integral parts of the proposed project, such as the involvement of collaborator organizations that are not supported by subawards or documentation of permission to access sites, materials, or data for research or other associated project activities.

Letters of collaboration should focus solely on affirming that the individual or organization is willing to collaborate on the project as specified in the project description of the proposal. No additional text, especially elaboration of the nature of activities to be undertaken by the collaborator and endorsements of the potential value or significance of the project for the collaborator, may be included.

A template that should be used for the preparation of letters of collaboration is provided below. Letters of collaboration are not required for any individual designated as a principal investigator or senior personnel, nor are letters of collaboration required for any organization that will be a subawardee in the proposal budget. Inclusion of biographical sketches and current and pending support statements for individuals and subaward budgets for organizations are considered to be implicit statements affirming involvement in the proposed project.

The project description should document the nature and need for all collaborations. Each statement must be signed by the designated collaborator. Requests to collaborators for letters of collaboration should be made by the PI well in advance of the proposal submission deadline, because they must be included at the time of the proposal submission.

Letters deviating from this template are not accepted and may be grounds for returning the proposal without review. I agree to undertake the tasks assigned to me, as described in the proposal, and I commit to provide or make available the resources designated in the proposal.

Unless authorized here or in the Grant Proposal Guide , no other materials should be included in this section. Survey or interview protocols are not permitted in this section, nor are reprints of articles previously published by the investigators. Proposals that include materials in this section that belong in the project description may be returned without review.

In the case of proposals involving multiple organizations, a single organization must be identified as the lead, and a single proposal describing the entire project must be submitted by that organization. Funds may be distributed among partner organizations via subawards from the lead organization. A budget on the standard NSF budget form should be submitted for each subawardee.

Proposers are reminded they must provide biographical sketches of all senior project personnel, including those associated with foreign organizations, and letters of collaboration should be provided as supplementary documents from organizations that will not be supported through subawards.

While non-U. As described in Chapter V, Section D. In accordance with the applicable award terms and conditions, proposers are reminded of their responsibilities with regard to subawardees. Should an award be made, the prime awardee is responsible for flowing down the appropriate terms and conditions to, as well as management and oversight of, any subawardees on the project, including any foreign subawardees.

If the project involves human subjects, the Institutional Review Board IRB of the submitting organization must certify that the proposed project is in compliance with the Federal Government's "Common Rule" for the protection of human subjects. If IRB approval has been obtained and the date of approval is listed on the cover sheet, no other certification is required.

If IRB approval is still pending, submit certification of IRB approval in electronic form as soon as approval is obtained to the cognizant program officer. The name of this program officer will be listed in the Proposal Status module of FastLane. If the project involves vertebrate animals, the Institutional Animal Care and Use Committee IACUC of the submitting organization must certify that the proposed project is in compliance with the Animal Welfare Act and the regulations promulgated thereunder by the Secretary of Agriculture pertaining to the humane care, handling, and treatment of vertebrate animals.

If IACUC approval has been obtained and the date of approval is listed on the cover sheet, no other certification is required. CNH proposals must be in compliance with the GPG and special requirements in the solicitation in order to be considered for review. Proposals not in compliance with these requirements will be returned without review. Please refer to the following checklist to address some of the items required in all proposals:. Other Budgetary Limitations: Almost all CNH funding is expected to be available for awards to be made based on evaluation of proposals submitted for this competition.

NSF intends to make awards across a range of sizes as specified for the following types of awards. No award may be more than five years in duration. Budget Preparation Instructions: Budgets should include travel funds for Principal Investigators to attend a workshop or meeting of those supported by the CNH Program every 1 to 2 years.

All subaward budgets with narrative justification should be submitted following the budget and narrative justification from the submitting organization. View the Solicitation. Skip to Navigation. News Contact Us. Find Us On Facebook. Events About Us. Submission Deadline:. Tuesday, January 23, CNH projects should address questions of general, theoretical interest in both the natural sciences and in the social and behavioral sciences.

Proposals should present clear, novel, and non-trivial hypotheses that can be tested conclusively using a scientifically sound research design that employs current or innovative methods.

A CNH research proposal should demonstrate how the proposed research is well grounded in relevant theory from a range of appropriate fields and how it will advance basic understanding in both the natural sciences and the social and behavioral sciences.

The project should focus on one or a limited number of specific questions that follow from the theoretical discussion and review of relevant literature. Projects likely to improve capabilities for predicting the responses of systems to endogenous and exogenous changes, including appropriate estimates of uncertainty in model predictions, are encouraged. CNH research teams should have expertise that enables the team to conduct the proposed research effectively. Project personnel should include expertise from the natural sciences and the social and behavioral sciences.

CNH projects must show promise of having strong broader impacts with respect to one or more of the following kinds of activity: 1 providing special education and training opportunities related to CNH research; 2 broadening the diversity of scholars engaged in CNH research; 3 contributing to the infrastructure for future CNH research; and 4 using CNH research for societal benefit. Large and small research projects are expected to differ in scope.

For example, small projects may have fewer study sites or personnel, may study systems with fewer key processes, or may require less time. Proposals for small projects are not expected to compete with proposals for large projects; large and small projects will be evaluated independently.

Note that both large and small research projects must include research on all four of the CNH components, as previously described. Budgets should be developed at levels justified by the planned activities.

The amounts listed above are total budgets over the duration of the project, including both direct and indirect costs. A CNH-RCN seeks to encourage development of new research directions by supporting groups of researchers to communicate and coordinate their research, educational, and training activities across disciplinary, organizational, and geographic boundaries.

Although a CNH-RCN should not support either planning or conduct of individual research projects, it should engage in activities that will facilitate future basic research across scientific communities. The scientific work to be advanced should include all four components necessary for CNH funding. CNH-RCN awards support the means by which investigators can share information and ideas, foster synthesis and new collaborations, develop community standards, and in other ways advance science and education through communication and sharing of ideas.

CNH-RCN awards are not meant to support existing networks or the activities of established collaborations. CNH-RCN organizers should follow the special instructions for preparation of proposals in the latter part of this solicitation. CNH funds provide support only for projects based on proposals submitted to and evaluated during the annual CNH competition. Budgets should be developed at scales appropriate for the project to be conducted.

Projects should be conducted for the length of time necessary to effectively conduct the project. No CNH award may be more than five years in duration. Depending on the quality of proposals for projects of different size and the availability of funds, NSF anticipates making 10 to 15 CNH awards annually. This program solicitation requests material about the personnel involved in the project.

Please use the following definitions to provide the corresponding information. The solicitation number for this solicitation should be specified as the program solicitation number. Designation of multiple CNH entries is superfluous. Because CNH does not engage in co-review with regular NSF programs, no other program or competition should be specified on the cover sheet.

The title of the proposal should begin with one of the following prefixes to designate the specific kind of proposal being submitted:. The rest of the title of the proposal should describe the project in concise, informative language so that a scientifically or technically literate reader could understand what the project is about.

The title should emphasize the scientific work to be undertaken. Proposers should not use cute or attention-grabbing phrases, which could lead reviewers to question the intellectual significance of the project. Note the following special requirement:. Project Description 1.

The following sections must be included in the project description, however, using the headers specified for each section.

With the exceptions noted below, proposers may organize the different components of the project description as they wish. Applicants should be aware that descriptions of other resources that may assist in the conduct of the project may be identified, but these descriptions should be narrative in nature and must not include any quantifiable financial information. This section should describe only facilities, equipment, and other resources that will be used during the conduct of the project.

The section should not explain the specific ways in which resources in the project will be used. Such detailed, project-specific explanations constitute an attempt to circumvent the Project Description page limitation and would constitute grounds for returning the proposal without review. Note that if there are no facilities, equipment, or other resources to describe, a statement to that effect must be included in the proposal.

Special Information and Supplementary Documentation. This is required whether the funding for the post-doctoral researcher s is requested in the lead institution's budget or through a subaward.

The post-doc mentoring plan must be no longer than one 1 page in length for the project as a whole and must be included as a supplementary document. CNH does not permit the inclusion of a graduate or undergraduate student mentoring plan as a supplementary document. Proposals may include such plans in the project description. All proposals must include a plan for data management and sharing the products of research.

The data management plan must be no longer than two pages in length and must be included as a supplementary document. Proposers are especially encouraged to specify how they intend to make data, software, and other products of the research readily available to potential users through institutionally based archives, repositories, or distribution networks so that the products may be easily accessed by others over long time periods.

Letters of Collaboration or Commitment. Brief letters or free-standing e-mail messages from individuals or organizations that will work with or provide in-kind support for the proposed project may be included as supplementary documents.

Such letters are not needed from individuals included as senior personnel on a project or from subawardee organizations, because their involvement in the project is affirmed by their biographical sketches or subaward budgets. Letters of collaboration or commitment should consist only of the willingness to collaborate or provide in-kind support for the project in ways that have been outlined in the project description.

Such letters should not argue for support of the project by detailing activities or reasons for support. Such additional text may be included in the project description of the proposal but is not permitted in a supplementary document.

CNH program directors strongly recommend the use of a template like one of the following for letters of collaboration or letters of commitment. If one of these templates or very similar text is not used, the text provided by the letter's author must be equally brief and to the point.

Inclusion of longer letters may result in the PIs being forced to remove such letters with no other changes to the proposal permitted or in NSF's returning the proposal without review. I agree to undertake the tasks associated with me as described in the project description of this proposal.

I commit to provide or make available the resources designated in the project description of the proposal that seeks support for this project. Note: When special program solicitations, such as the Facilitating Research at Primarily Undergraduate Institutions RUI solicitation, permit special kinds of supplementary documents, they may be permitted in proposals submitted to CNH.

If you have questions regarding the appropriateness of certain kinds of submissions, contact the CNH program officers well in advance of the proposal-submission deadline for clarification. If the submitting organization's Institutional Review Board IRB has approved plans for research involving human subjects or the Institutional Animal Care and Use Committee IACUC has approved research involving vertebrate animals, certification of that may be included on appropriate sections of the cover sheet.

Documentation of the certification may be included as a supplementary document, but that is not required if sufficient information is provided by the sponsored projects office on the cover sheet of the proposal. Documents submitted to the IRB or IACUC to obtain approval should not be included, because such documentation will include material appropriate for inclusion in the Project Description but not as a supplementary document. If the required certifications cannot be supplied quickly, CNH program directors may have to turn their attention to other meritorious projects that can be funded right away.

If the expiration of the current approval will occur before or soon after the possible start date for an award, be prepared to seek renewal of the approval so that you have an active certification if you are informed the proposal will be recommended for funding. Once you receive written certification that your renewal has been approved, forward it to the managing program officer of your proposal.

Examples of the kinds of materials that applicants have improperly attempted to include in the past are survey or interview protocols; reprints of articles previously published by the investigators; and letters of support that present arguments on behalf of funding the project.

Proposals that include supplementary documents not permitted in this section may be returned without review. In the case of proposals involving multiple organizations, a single organization must be identified as the lead, and a single proposal describing the entire project must be submitted by that organization.

Funds may be distributed among partner organizations via subawards from the lead organization.