Instrument Capacity for Biological Research (ICBR)

Submit to Infrastructure Capacity for Biology solicitation (NSF 18-594).

Advances in the biological sciences are enabled by our capacity to acquire, manage, represent, and analyze biological information through the use of modern instrumentation and computational tools.  Instrumentation Capacity for Biological Research (ICBR) invites proposals that specifically enable increased access to state of the art instrumentation in support of the biological sciences by (1) increasing access to a community of users through broadening of dissemination of such instrumentation, and (2) broadening access to state-of-the art instrumentation and facilities at a regional or national level.  

Providing scientists with the instrumentation and resources necessary to make these discoveries requires investments in new instrumentation capabilities and extending access to existing instrumentation and experimental facilities.   Competitive proposals under ICBR will expand access to new or existing instrumentation that supports a significant segment of the biological research community conducting research in areas supported by the NSF Biological Sciences Directorate (BIO).  The program will support activities that (1) enhance the access to and dissemination of innovative instrumentation, and (2) promote and enable access to existing instrumentation facilities (ie. imaging, genomics, proteomics, etc.) at the regional or national level.

ICBR supports capacity building that may include (but is not limited to):

• Building a community of instrument users through broadening dissemination of new or significantly improved instrumentation
• Broadening of access to instrumentation or experimental facilities at the regional or national level that provide infrastructure for data collection that might not be otherwise available to researchers due to the cost of instrumentation, the lack of available resources on campus, or the requirement of otherwise unavailable technical expertise.