NSF 24-504: Secure and Trustworthy Cyberspace (SaTC)

Program Solicitation NSF 24-504

National Science Foundation Directorate for Computer and Information Science and Engineering      Division of Computer and Network Systems      Division of Computing and Communication Foundations      Division of Information and Intelligent Systems      Office of Advanced Cyberinfrastructure Directorate for Social, Behavioral and Economic Sciences      Division of Social and Economic Sciences      Division of Behavioral and Cognitive Sciences Directorate for Mathematical and Physical Sciences      Division of Mathematical Sciences Directorate for STEM Education      Division of Graduate Education Directorate for Engineering      Division of Electrical, Communications and Cyber Systems

Full Proposal Deadline(s) (due by 5 p.m. submitter's local time):

     Proposals Accepted Anytime

Important Information And Revision Notes

• The description of partnerships has been clarified to describe post-award handling.
• Additional topics of interest have been added, including open-source software security, quantum computing security, generative AI security, and supply chain security.
• Collaboration letters for CORE and EDU proposals may now be one page, with any content, subject to standard NSF rules for font and margins. Any proposal may include no more than five (5) such letters.
• The descriptions for Broadening Participation in Computing have been revised.
• Instructions for Medium projects with no PIs or co-PIs from computer science-related departments have been added to the Broadening Participation in Computing section of the solicitation.

Any proposal submitted in response to this solicitation should be submitted in accordance with the NSF Proposal & Award Policies & Procedures Guide (PAPPG) that is in effect at the time the proposal is submitted. The NSF PAPPG is regularly revised and it is the responsibility of the proposer to ensure that the proposal meets the requirements specified in this solicitation and the applicable version of the PAPPG.

Summary Of Program Requirements

General Information

Program Title:

Secure and Trustworthy Cyberspace (SaTC)

Synopsis of Program:

In today's increasingly networked, distributed, and asynchronous world, cybersecurity involves hardware, software, networks, data, people, and integration with the physical world. Society's overwhelming reliance on this complex cyberspace, however, has exposed its fragility and vulnerabilities that defy existing cyber-defense measures; corporations, agencies, national infrastructure, and individuals continue to suffer cyber-attacks. Achieving a truly secure cyberspace requires addressing both challenging scientific and engineering problems involving many components of a system, and vulnerabilities that stem from human behaviors and choices. Examining the fundamentals of security and privacy as a multidisciplinary subject can lead to fundamentally new ways to design, build, and operate cyber systems; protect existing infrastructure; and motivate and educate individuals about cybersecurity.

The goals of the SaTC program are aligned with the National Science and Technology Council's (NSTC) Federal Cybersecurity Research and Development Strategic Plan (RDSP) and National Privacy Research Strategy (NPRS) to protect and preserve the growing social and economic benefits of cyber systems while ensuring security and privacy. The RDSP identified six areas critical to successful cybersecurity research and development: (1) scientific foundations; (2) risk management; (3) human aspects; (4) transitioning successful research into practice; (5) workforce development; and (6) enhancing the research infrastructure. The NPRS, which complements the RDSP, identifies a framework for privacy research, anchored in characterizing privacy expectations, understanding privacy violations, engineering privacy-protecting systems, and recovering from privacy violations. In alignment with the objectives in both strategic plans, the SaTC program takes an multidisciplinary, comprehensive, and holistic approach to cybersecurity research, development, and education, and encourages the transition of promising research ideas into practice. SaTC goals are also aligned with the Roadmap for Researchers on Priorities Related to Information Integrity Research and Development, the National Strategy to Advance Privacy-Preserving Data Sharing and Analytics, and the National Cyber Workforce and Education Strategy.

The SaTC program welcomes proposals that address cybersecurity and privacy, drawing on expertise in one or more of these areas: computing, communication, and information sciences; engineering; education; mathematics; statistics; and social, behavioral, and economic sciences. Proposals that advance the field of cybersecurity and privacy within a single discipline or interdisciplinary efforts that span multiple disciplines are both welcome.

The SaTC program spans the interests of NSF's Directorates for Computer and Information Science and Engineering (CISE), Engineering (ENG), Mathematical and Physical Sciences (MPS), Social, Behavioral and Economic Sciences (SBE), and STEM Education (EDU). Proposals must be submitted pursuant to one of the following designations, each of which may have additional restrictions and administrative obligations as specified in this program solicitation.

• CORE: This designation is the main focus of the multidisciplinary SaTC research program.
• EDU: The Education (EDU) designation is used to label proposals focusing on cybersecurity and privacy education and training.

• TTP: The Transition to Practice (TTP) designation will be used to label proposals that are focused exclusively on transitioning existing research results to practice.

CORE and TTP proposals may be submitted in one of the following project size classes:

• Small projects: up to $600,000 in total budget, with durations of up to three years; and
• Medium projects: $600,001 to $1,200,000 in total budget, with durations of up to four years.

EDU proposals are limited to $400,000 in total budget, with durations of up to three years. EDU proposals that demonstrate a collaboration, reflected in the PI, co-PI, and/or Senior Personnel composition, between a cybersecurity subject matter expert (researcher or practitioner) and an education researcher may request up to $500,000 for three years.

Cognizant Program Officer(s):

Please note that the following information is current at the time of publishing. See program website for any updates to the points of contact.

• Jeremy J. Epstein, Lead Program Director, CISE/CNS, telephone: (703) 292-8338, email: jepstein@nsf.gov
• Cindy Bethel, Program Director, CISE/IIS, telephone: (703) 292-4420, email: cbethel@nsf.gov
• Robert Beverly, Program Director, CISE/OAC, telephone: 703-292-7068, email: rbeverly@nsf.gov
• Daniel R. Cosley, Program Director, CISE/IIS, telephone: (703) 292-8832, email: dcosley@nsf.gov
• Sol Greenspan, Program Director, CISE/CCF, telephone: (703) 292-8910, email: sgreensp@nsf.gov
• Timothy Hodges, Program Director, MPS/DMS, telephone: (703) 292-5359, email: thodges@nsf.gov
• Karen Karavanic, Program Director, CISE/CNS, telephone: (703) 292-2594, email: kkaravan@nsf.gov
• Sara Kiesler, Program Director, SBE/SES, telephone: (703) 292-8643, email: skiesler@nsf.gov
• Rosa A. Lukaszew, Program Director, ENG/ECCS, telephone: (703) 292-8103, email: rlukasze@nsf.gov
• Daniela Oliveira, Program Director, CISE/CNS, telephone: (703) 292-4352, email: doliveir@nsf.gov
• Victor P. Piotrowski, Program Director, EDU/DGE, telephone: (703) 292-5141, email: vpiotrow@nsf.gov
• Andrew D. Pollington, Program Director, MPS/DMS, telephone: (703) 292-4878, email: adpollin@nsf.gov
• Phillip A. Regalia, Program Director, CISE/CCF, telephone: (703) 292-2981, email: pregalia@nsf.gov
• Ambareen Siraj, Program Director, EDU/DGE, telephone: (703) 292-8182, email: asiraj@nsf.gov
• Anna Squicciarini, Program Director, CISE/CNS, telephone: (703) 292-5177, email: asquicci@nsf.gov
• Xiaogang (Cliff) Wang, Program Director, CISE/CNS, telephone: (703) 292-2812, email: xiawang@nsf.gov
• ChunSheng (Sam) Xin, Program Director, EDU/DGE, telephone: (703) 292-7353, email: cxin@nsf.gov
• Li Yang, Program Director, EDU/DGE, telephone: (703) 292-2677, email: liyang@nsf.gov

Applicable Catalog of Federal Domestic Assistance (CFDA) Number(s):

• 47.041 --- Engineering
• 47.049 --- Mathematical and Physical Sciences
• 47.070 --- Computer and Information Science and Engineering
• 47.075 --- Social Behavioral and Economic Sciences
• 47.076 --- STEM Education

Award Information

Anticipated Type of Award: Standard Grant or Continuing Grant

Estimated Number of Awards: 90

NSF anticipates approximately 15 EDU awards, 35 Small awards, and 25 Medium awards.

Anticipated Funding Amount: $69,000,000

per year, dependent on the availability of funds.

Eligibility Information

Who May Submit Proposals:

Proposals may only be submitted by the following:

• Institutions of Higher Education (IHEs) - Two- and four-year IHEs (including community colleges) accredited in, and having a campus located in the US, acting on behalf of their faculty members. Special Instructions for International Branch Campuses of US IHEs: If the proposal includes funding to be provided to an international branch campus of a US institution of higher education (including through use of subawards and consultant arrangements), the proposer must explain the benefit(s) to the project of performance at the international branch campus, and justify why the project activities cannot be performed at the US campus.
• Non-profit, non-academic organizations: Independent museums, observatories, research laboratories, professional societies and similar organizations located in the U.S. that are directly associated with educational or research activities.

Who May Serve as PI:

As of the date the proposal is submitted, any PI, co-PI, or other senior project personnel must hold either:

• a tenured or tenure-track position,
or
• a primary, full-time, paid appointment in a research or teaching position

at a US-based campus of an organization eligible to submit to this solicitation (see above), with exceptions granted for family or medical leave, as determined by the submitting organization. Individuals with primary appointments at for-profit non-academic organizations or at overseas branch campuses of U.S. institutions of higher education are not eligible.

Proposals from Minority Serving Institutions (MSIs) are particularly encouraged.

Limit on Number of Proposals per Organization:

There are no restrictions or limits.

Limit on Number of Proposals per PI or co-PI: 4

An individual can participate as PI, co-PI, or senior personnel on no more than four SaTC proposals. There is a limit of:

• two proposals designated as CORE (across Small and Medium);
• one proposal designated as TTP (across Small and Medium); and
• one proposal designated as EDU.

These limits apply for the period from October 1st to September 30th of the following year to all proposals in response to this solicitation and are unrelated to any limits imposed in other NSF solicitations.

To treat everyone fairly and consistently, these eligibility constraints will be strictly enforced. If an individual exceeds these limits, only proposals received within the limits will be accepted, based on earliest date and time of proposal submission. No exceptions will be made.

Proposals that are withdrawn or returned without review will not count against this proposal limit.

Proposal Preparation and Submission Instructions

A. Proposal Preparation Instructions

• Letters of Intent: Not required
• Preliminary Proposal Submission: Not required
• Full Proposals:
  • Full Proposals submitted via Research.gov: NSF Proposal and Award Policies and Procedures Guide (PAPPG) guidelines apply. The complete text of the PAPPG is available electronically on the NSF website at: https://www.nsf.gov/publications/pub_summ.jsp?ods_key=pappg.
  • Full Proposals submitted via Grants.gov: NSF Grants.gov Application Guide: A Guide for the Preparation and Submission of NSF Applications via Grants.gov guidelines apply (Note: The NSF Grants.gov Application Guide is available on the Grants.gov website and on the NSF website at: https://www.nsf.gov/publications/pub_summ.jsp?ods_key=grantsgovguide).

B. Budgetary Information

• Cost Sharing Requirements:

  Inclusion of voluntary committed cost sharing is prohibited.

• Indirect Cost (F&A) Limitations:

  Not Applicable

• Other Budgetary Limitations:

  Other budgetary limitations apply. Please see the full text of this solicitation for further information.

C. Due Dates

• Full Proposal Deadline(s) (due by 5 p.m. submitter's local time):

       Proposals Accepted Anytime

Proposal Review Information Criteria

Merit Review Criteria:

National Science Board approved criteria. Additional merit review criteria apply. Please see the full text of this solicitation for further information.

Award Administration Information

Award Conditions:

Additional award conditions apply. Please see the full text of this solicitation for further information.

Reporting Requirements:

Additional reporting requirements apply. Please see the full text of this solicitation for further information.

I. Introduction

Making cyberspace secure and trustworthy is a critical challenge confronting society. The fragility and vulnerability of cyberspace has exposed societies and individuals to untold risks with severe consequences. Achieving a more secure cyberspace demands overcoming major scientific challenges and realizing privacy and trust in cyberspace requires reconciling technology with human and societal needs. New advances in technology for cyberspace, changes in society, and adoption in new domains will also necessitate a rethinking of the interplay between security, privacy, and trust in cyberspace. The multi-disciplinary SaTC program seeks fundamentally new, principled approaches to protect and defend cyberspace against harmful actions by determined adversaries, and to assess their effectiveness. The SaTC program also seeks to explore innovative approaches for growing a capable, next-generation cyber workforce, and for accelerating the transition of successful cybersecurity research into practice and useful products and services.

The NSTC released the Federal Cybersecurity RDSP, a broad, coordinated Federal strategic plan for cybersecurity research and development, in order to preserve the growing social and economic benefits by thwarting adversaries and strengthening public trust of cyber systems. The plan calls for sound mathematical and scientific foundations, principled design methodologies, and metrics for evaluating success or failure for securing cyberspace. Highlighted in the plan is the need for socio-technical approaches that consider human, social, organizational, economic, and technical factors, and the complex interaction among them, in the creation, maintenance, and operation of secure systems and infrastructure. The plan underscores the need for rapid transfer of research results to potential users, including the dissemination of best practices, outreach activities, and research infrastructure. Finally, the plan calls for research in cybersecurity education to satisfy the present and future workforce demands for qualified cybersecurity professionals.

The NSTC also announced the NPRS with the goal of enabling individuals, companies, and the government to benefit from cyber systems while effectively balancing those benefits with their risks to privacy. The strategy calls for characterizing key socio-technical issues that challenge privacy, and articulating goals for research in social, behavioral, and economic sciences needed for designing, using, and evaluating these socio-technical systems. The NPRS highlights the need for networking and information technology research for underlying privacy-enhancing technologies and related topics.

This solicitation supports these NSTC strategies for a secure and trustworthy cyberspace with privacy imperatives, which are critical to our national priorities in commerce, education, energy, financial services, healthcare, manufacturing, and defense. In strong alignment with the objectives in these plans, the SaTC program, in collaboration with industrial and international partners, takes a multidisciplinary, comprehensive, and holistic approach to cybersecurity and privacy research, development, technology transfer, and education.

II. Program Description

Cyberspace is a complex ecosystem that involves computer hardware, software, networks, data, people, and integration with the physical world. Society's overwhelming reliance on this complex cyberspace, however, has exposed its fragility and vulnerabilities that defy existing cyber-defense measures: corporations, agencies, national infrastructure, and individuals continue to suffer cyber-attacks. Achieving cybersecurity while protecting the privacy of individuals requires not only understanding the technical weaknesses of the components of a system and how they can be addressed, but also understanding the human-centric aspects of secure cyber systems. Examining the fundamentals of security and privacy from many different perspectives can, in turn, lead to fundamentally new and holistic ways to design, build, and operate cyber systems, protect existing infrastructure, and motivate and educate individuals about security and privacy.

The SaTC program welcomes proposals that address cybersecurity and privacy, and that draw on expertise in one or more of these areas: computing, communication, and information sciences; engineering; education; mathematics; statistics; and social, behavioral, and economic sciences. Proposals that advance the field of cybersecurity and privacy within a single discipline or interdisciplinary efforts that span multiple disciplines are both welcome.

The SaTC program spans the interests of NSF's Directorates for Computer and Information Science and Engineering (CISE), Engineering (ENG), Mathematical and Physical Sciences (MPS), Social, Behavioral and Economic Sciences (SBE), and STEM Education (EDU). Proposals must be submitted pursuant to one of the following designations, each of which may have additional restrictions and administrative obligations:

• CORE: This designation is the main focus of the SaTC research program.
• EDU: The Education (EDU) designation is used to label proposals focusing entirely on cybersecurity and privacy education and training.
• TTP: The Transition to Practice (TTP) designation is used to label proposals that are focused exclusively on transitioning existing research results to practice.

Core and TTP proposals may be submitted in either of the following project size classes:

• Small projects: up to $600,000 in total budget, with durations of up to three years; and
• Medium projects: $600,001 to $1,200,000 in total budget, with durations of up to four years.

EDU proposals are limited to $400,000 in total budget, with durations of up to three years. EDU proposals that demonstrate a collaboration, reflected in the PI, co-PI, and/or Senior Personnel composition, between a cybersecurity subject matter expert (researcher or practitioner) and an education researcher may request up to $500,000 for three years.

PROJECT CLASSES

Any proposal submitted to the CORE designation for this solicitation must be consistent with the Small or Medium project classes defined below. Proposals submitted to the TTP designation for this solicitation must be consistent with the Small or Medium project classes defined below. Proposals will be considered for funding within their project class. EDU Projects have their own budget class, described below in the EDU Designation section.

SMALL Projects: Small projects, with total budgets up to $600,000 for durations of up to three years, are well suited to one or two investigators (PI and one co-PI or other Senior Personnel) and at least one student and/or postdoc.

MEDIUM Projects: Medium projects, with total budgets ranging from $600,001 to $1,200,000 for durations of up to four years, are well suited to one or more investigators (PI, co-PI and/or other Senior Personnel) and several students and/or postdocs.

• Medium project descriptions must be comprehensive, well-integrated, and make a convincing case that the collaborative contributions of the project team will be greater than the sum of each of their individual contributions. Rationale must be provided to explain why a budget of this size is required to carry out the proposed work.
• Because the success of collaborative research efforts is known to depend on thoughtful coordination mechanisms that regularly bring together the various participants of the project, Medium proposals with more than one investigator must include a Collaboration Plan of up two pages as a Supplementary Document. The length of, and level of detail provided in, the Collaboration Plan should be commensurate with the complexity of the proposed project. If a Medium proposal with more than one investigator does not include a Collaboration Plan, that proposal will be returned without review. Please see Proposal Preparation Instructions Section V.A for additional guidelines on collaboration plans.
• Collaboration plans, budgets, and budget justifications should demonstrate that key personnel, and especially lead PIs, have allocated adequate time for both their individual technical contributions and the leadership of collaborative activities necessary to realize the synergistic effects of larger-scale research.

DESIGNATIONS

All SaTC proposals must be submitted to one of the following designations: CORE, EDU, or TTP. The focus of each designation is described below, along with any additional restrictions and administrative obligations. No matter the designation, all proposals must have a separate section in the project description titled "Relevance to Secure and Trustworthy Cyberspace" that discusses the potential impact of the research with respect to the goals of the SaTC program, and clearly justifies the keywords selected in the Project Summary with respect to the research plan. (More information on keyword selection is available in Section V.A; keywords roughly align with the research topics described below.)

Secure and Trustworthy Cyberspace core research (CORE) designation

This solicitation focuses only on research directly supporting a safe, privacy-aware, secure, resilient, and trustworthy cyberspace, conducted ethically with the highest scientific standards. Of special interest are proposals that are transformative, forward-looking, and offer innovative or clean-slate approaches that provide defenders a distinct advantage. Proposals whose security science exposes underlying principles having predictive value that extends across different security domains are especially encouraged. The program discourages proposals that address a sole vulnerability or device without advancing security science or considering the broader consequences of the proposed remedy. The program discourages proposals that simply address quick fixes or ad-hoc solutions without much scientific merit. The program likewise discourages research focused primarily on the design, development, or use of offensive techniques when it would be harmful to the operation of existing cyberinfrastructure and/or are at odds with ethical, legal, and diplomatic concerns and US rules and regulations. Proposers should give considerable thought to unintended consequences of offensive research.

All proposals should (a) include a clear and concise description of the threat model(s) or specific risk(s) to privacy, security, or trustworthy cyberspace that the proposed research addresses; (b) discuss the generalizable theories and research methods that will be developed; and (c) discuss the trade-offs and risks involved in the research plan.

Some specific research topics of interest for CORE proposals include, but are not limited to:

Authentication and Access Control: Proposals addressing innovative and robust identity management and authentication approaches are of interest. Topics include but are not limited to: continuous authentication; multi-factor authentication; biometric authentication; device-level authentication; identity and credential management; federated identity; privacy-preserving authentication; defense approaches and verification techniques for authentication systems; and usable authentication. Also of interest are access control and authorization solutions that are essential for protecting systems, networks, and applications; topics of interest include, but are not limited to: models of access control and authorization; cryptographic techniques for access control (e.g., attribute-based encryption); and formal policy analysis methods, models, and frameworks for privacy-preserving and secure inter-operation. Also of interest are foundational techniques for building trust in cyberspace; topics such as models and frameworks for trust in computing, trust metrics, zero-trust architecture, trusted execution environments, and trust through transparency and accountability.

Cryptography (Applied and Theoretical): Topics of interest include all applications of cryptography, especially in networks, edge and cloud computing, Internet of Things (IoT), electronic commerce, or in any other real-world setting. Innovative design and application of cryptography and related techniques such as attribute-based encryption, functional encryption, lightweight low-latency encryption, error correction through message authentication codes, unified lightweight solutions for encryption, authentication and error correction, efficient schemes for homomorphic encryption, program obfuscation, information theoretic security, steganography, cryptanalysis, and post-quantum cryptography are of interest. Research on side channel and leakage resilience, memory-hard functions, verifiable computation, non-malleable codes, computer-aided cryptographic proofs, and digital currencies are also in scope, as are efficient schemes for secure multi-party computation (including querying and machine learning over distributed datasets), particularly when there are clear contributions toward the cryptographic aspects of the problem.

Cyber-Physical Systems (CPS): Topics of interest include research on security and privacy of cyber-physical systems that integrate sensing, computation, control, and networking into physical objects and infrastructure, connecting them to other systems, to users, and to each other. Systems of interest may or may not include humans in the loop. Also of interest are techniques for leveraging fundamental physical properties to improve security or privacy; system vulnerabilities and mitigations; system models; measuring and assessing security or privacy characteristics of systems; and human-centric design of protection mechanisms.

Data Science, Machine Learning (ML), and Artificial Intelligence (AI): Topics of interest include advances in techniques and tools for modeling, analysis, and visualization of data and metadata to predict, detect, and mitigate security and privacy risks. This includes advances in secure and/or privacy-preserving infrastructure for data science, including dataset management, provenance, validation, and linking; secure and privacy-preserving methods for publishing actual or synthetic datasets including but not limited to differential privacy; and methods for retrieval, querying, and text and network analysis over datasets that effectively trade off security, privacy, and utility. It also includes robustness and risks of the methods themselves, including adversarial ML threats in model training, deployment, and reuse; privacy risks including model inversion, membership inference, attribute inference, re-identification, and de-anonymization; and forensic and formal methods for analyzing, auditing, and verifying security- and privacy-related aspects of AI components. Also of interest are security, privacy, and trust in data science and AI/ML, with respect to transparency and interpretability/explainability of models and algorithms, and associated issues of fairness and bias.  Use of generative AI systems for improving security, the risks of generative AI systems to security, and the security of generative AI systems are all of interest.

Formal Methods and Language-based Security: Topics of interest include formal definitions, models, and frameworks for security, privacy, and trust; security and privacy preserving composition; and principled, secure design, analysis, verification, and synthesis techniques that bridge the gap between high-level security models and software development. Also of interest are information flow, programming language-based approaches, secure compilation, verification techniques for cryptography and other security protocols, and secure-by-construction techniques. All applications of formal techniques for security and/or privacy, especially those applied in distributed, operating, networked and hardware systems, are of special interest.

Hardware Security Architecture: Topics of interest include architectural support for authenticating devices and firmware, secure booting, secure firmware/software updates, secure execution environments, multi-party computation, information flow tracking, privacy protection, and acceleration of security primitives and protocols. Also of interest are detection and mitigation of cache/memory side channels, covert channels, instruction-set architecture (ISA) to support security and privacy, identification/mitigation of security vulnerabilities in emerging technologies and paradigms, and hardware-assisted techniques for the security of systems including the Internet of Things (IoT) and software.

Hardware Security Design: Topics of interest include techniques for the development of secure and tamper-resistant hardware; identification, detection, and mitigation of Trojans; watermarking; side channel attacks; reverse engineering of hardware designs; and hardware obfuscation. Also of interest are hardware implementations of cryptography, acceleration of security primitives, agile hardware implementations, modeling attacks and countermeasures, proximity verification, security metrics, trusted manufacturing, tamper proofing, and securing the hardware supply chain.

Human-Centric Computing: Topics of interest include the analysis, design, implementation, and evaluation of user-facing aspects of online systems that have significant privacy and security elements. These include design research and needs analyses around applications, devices, and tools that help end users and other stakeholders accomplish privacy- and security-related goals; the application of data science and social science techniques and theories to the design of these tools; techniques focused on the security, privacy, and trust concerns that arise from the tools themselves, and the analysis and evaluation of their usability, utility, and effects around privacy and security at the level of individuals, dyads, groups, organizations, and societies. Also of interest is research on access to and accessibility of security and privacy supporting technologies and interfaces for special populations, broadly construed as people or groups with diverse characteristics that might affect their cybersecurity risks and needs.

Information Integrity: Topics of interest include emerging threat models stemming from unverifiable information and information provenance; methods for detecting, countering, or mitigating information manipulation (e.g., altered, false, injected, and hidden content) and manipulators across media including text, audio, images, video, and virtual/augmented/mixed/extended reality; multimedia forensics; steganalysis; assessing, predicting, and demonstrating how people decide that information is trustworthy; studying and modeling the methods and motivations of actors in the creation, dissemination, consumption, sharing, and evolution of (mis/dis)information online; imbalance and polarization due to misinformation and/or lack of accountability; computational techniques, systems, and interfaces, and/or behavioral, social, or economic interventions for mitigating risks of manipulated information in specific domains, especially critical domains such as elections and voting, public health, and child safety where potential harm can be significant; and enhancing authenticity and trustworthy information and dissemination to prevent or mitigate harm in cyberspace as a whole.

Intrusion Detection: Topics of interest include detection of malicious attacks on systems, networks, datasets, algorithms, software, sensors, or other system-critical elements. Also of interest are techniques for profiling normal or abnormal system behaviors, the role of human cognition in the detection of attacks, techniques for improving human usability of intrusion detection systems, metrics of attack severity or attacker effort, and methods for evaluating effectiveness of intrusion detection techniques.

Mathematics and Statistics: SaTC encourages the participation of mathematical scientists. Topics of interest include research on the mathematical foundations of cryptography, in particular, research into the questions arising out of the development of secure post-quantum cryptographic methods such as those based on lattices, codes, multivariate functions, and super-singular isogenies; cryptographically effective multi-linear maps; and novel applications of statistics and probability to security and privacy problems such as private information retrieval, information-theoretic privacy, intrusion detection and differential privacy.

Networking, Wired and Wireless: Topics of interest include research on communication and network system security, including but not limited to security and privacy for wireless systems; jamming attack and defense; security of fifth-generation ("5G") and beyond wireless networks; covert channel detection; anonymization and privacy methods; secure localization and location privacy; cross-layer methods for enhancing security and privacy; distributed denial-of-service (DDoS) attack and defense; key management and public key infrastructure (PKI) for networks; security and privacy in the home; enterprise, data center, edge, and cloud networks; software-defined networking (SDN); optical networks; Internet and IoT-scale networks; as well as security and privacy in mobile sensing systems, future Internet architectures and next-generation cellular networks, cognitive radio, and dynamic spectrum access systems. Also of interest are anonymizing (e.g., onion routing) networks, anti-censorship, network forensics, network risk management, network measurement and modeling for advancing security and privacy, and networked systems and mobile applications that rely on a secure communication substrate. Research on analysis techniques and large-scale measurement of security and privacy concerns associated with social networking applications, tools, and infrastructures are also in scope.

Privacy (Applied and Theoretical): Topics of interest include a range of privacy-related subjects: from theoretical to experimental, from computational to social and behavioral, from usability to accountability, and from understanding the human perception of privacy to devising practical tools and systems that mitigate privacy concerns while retaining high utility. There are many types of private information that may be of concern, ranging from personal health records to online activities and social media postings, from the anonymity of network communications to the anonymity of financial transactions, and from structured relational records to spatial-temporal data to unstructured text. The broad spectrum of private data in turn calls for a wide variety of scientific methods that are often multidisciplinary in nature, spanning mathematical, statistical, computational, social, behavioral, and economic sciences. Research on privacy that addresses not only the proper understanding, management, and protection of private information, but also the interplay of privacy with complex social, technical, and regulatory challenges in building a secure and trustworthy cyberspace is also of interest. Examples include privacy issues arising from identity management, cloud and edge computing, big data and AI/ML applications, surveillance, forensics, censorship, crowd-sourcing, social networks, and behavioral targeting, among many others.

Social, Behavioral, and Economic Sciences: SaTC supports research on the ethical, political, legal, cultural, and societal dimensions of security and privacy. Topics of interest include trolling and cyber-bullying, spamming, phishing, and ransoming cyber-crime and electronic markets for illegal activity, manipulations of polling and voting data, and other destructive behaviors and information; understanding fundamental social, economic, behavioral, and/or cognitive dimensions of privacy, security, and trustworthiness associated with creating, sharing, disseminating, and filtering of information; intended and unintended consequences of security or privacy practices and policies; predicting, understanding, and countering effective responses by individuals or organizations to misinformation and manipulation of online content and processes, and cyber-attacks and threats; cybersecurity organizational strategies including cyber insurance and risk management, investments, or governance; and risks and benefits for security, privacy, or trust arising from emerging online technologies and algorithms.

Approaches to these and other topics may include economic analyses of incentive structures and mechanisms, sociological research on demographic, structural, and cultural dimensions; behavioral science research on individual, group, and organizational behavior; cognitive, statistical, or computational modeling and analyses of the behavior of individuals, groups, organizations, or networks, including developing and applying linguistic analysis, natural language processing, social network analysis, and ML as well as other computational modeling methods to understand security and privacy-related behaviors. Proposals addressing the social, behavioral, legal, policy, organizational, economic, or governance dimensions of cybersecurity, privacy, and trust should build on the existing scientific literature, and contribute to fundamental principles and insights on the human aspects of cybersecurity and privacy.

Software: Topics of interest include techniques, methods, and tools for detecting and mitigating software vulnerabilities and malware through software analysis and testing; methods and tools for programmers and programming environments to foster security and privacy by design during software development; and improvements to security and privacy in ubiquitous computing environments such as mobile, web, and domain-specific platforms. Also of interest is the incorporation of security and privacy requirements and validation into the software development process, principled techniques for composing security and privacy mechanisms, and methods to design security and privacy properties into components and systems. Approaches to securing software supply chains and issues relating to open-source software ecosystems are of interest.

Systems: Topics of interest include research on security and privacy of systems for computation or storage of data. Systems of interest range from small, stand-alone devices through smart phones, general-purpose computers, and networked systems at the enterprise or cross-enterprise levels, as well as browsers, application-based platforms, cloud and edge computing systems, virtualized systems, and databases large or small. Also of interest are system vulnerabilities and mitigations; policy enforcement; accountability (e.g., logging, audit, provenance); system models; techniques supporting secure system design or implementation; and techniques for measuring and assessing security or privacy characteristics of systems and human usability of system protection mechanisms. Forensic techniques for identifying, preserving, recovering, and analyzing digital artifacts in host and virtual computing systems, memory, storage systems, computer and communications networks, mobile systems, cloud- and edge-based systems, and applications such as social networks and media are of interest. Security of emerging systems architectures (e.g., quantum computing systems) is of interest.

Transition to Practice (TTP) Designation

The objective of the TTP designation is to support the development, implementation, and deployment of later-stage and applied security or privacy research into an operational environment. The TTP program seeks to mature technologies that have been validated in a lab or have shown promise as a proof of concept but have not been evaluated or deployed in operation. A TTP-designated proposal must describe how technology from prior successful research results will be deployed into an organization, system, or community. The outcome of a TTP project should be demonstrable advancement in the technology's readiness, robustness, validation, or functionality.

Collaborations with industry are strongly encouraged; however, a TTP project may transition later-stage research by other means such as licensing to commercial or government end users, or deployment into scientific research cyberinfrastructure or Research and Education Networks. A TTP project should bridge the gap between research and production via technology maturation and is not intended for pure operational support.

A TTP proposal must include a project plan that addresses major tasks and system development milestones as well as an evaluation plan with quantifiable metrics for the working system. The eligibility constraints described in Section IV apply to proposals within the SaTC TTP designation.

In addition, TTP proposals will be evaluated with careful attention to the:

• Description of the problem or need being addressed;
• Description of the technology being transitioned, including substantiating evidence from prior research of the technology's potential to materially impact the problem;
• Novelty of the intended system, software, or architecture;
• Identification of an intended population or organization that will serve as an early adopter of the technology;
• Deployment plan for implementing the pilot or prototype system into an operational environment;
• Composition of the proposal team, which should demonstrate not only technical expertise in areas such as software engineering, but also skills in project management and systems development;
• Explanation of the post-grant, long-term software and/or system sustainability;
• The extent to which production experience will feed back into research, if applicable; and
• Appropriateness of the budget for the effort.

Software developed under the TTP designation is not required to be open-source. However, if open source software is developed, it should be released under an open source license listed by an Open Source Initiative. If software will not be open source, a strong case must be provided justifying this approach.

Questions regarding the TTP designation should be addressed directly to SaTC Program Officer Cliff Wang (xiawang@nsf.gov).

Cybersecurity Education (EDU) Designation

The National Cyber Workforce and Education Strategy highlights the importance of cyber education and workforce development, which are essential for keeping up with rapid technological advancements and ensuring U.S. competitiveness. The EDU designation is interested in inquiry into and the development of evidence-based and evidence-generating approaches that will improve cybersecurity education and workforce development at the K-12, undergraduate, graduate, and professional education levels. EDU supports projects that: improve cybersecurity learning and learning environments (both in formal and informal settings), conduct education research, develop new educational materials and methods of instruction, develop new assessment tools to measure student learning, promote teacher recruitment and training in the field of cybersecurity, and improve the diversity of the cybersecurity workforce. In addition to innovative work at the frontier of cybersecurity education, the program also encourages applications of effective research studies at different types of institutions and with different student bodies to produce novel knowledge about the efficacy and transferability of findings.

Competitive proposals submitted to the EDU designation will leverage results from basic and/or applied research in cybersecurity and research on student learning, both in terms of intellectual merit and broader impacts, and will articulate how they will address the challenge of expanding existing educational opportunities and resources in cybersecurity and/or privacy. This may include, but is not limited to, the following efforts:

• Conduct research that advances improvements in teaching and student learning in cybersecurity and/or privacy;
• Based on the results of basic research in cybersecurity, define a cybersecurity body of knowledge and establish curricular activities for new courses, degree programs, and educational pathways leading to wide dissemination and adoption;
• Investigate approaches to make cybersecurity and/or privacy education and workforce development broadly diverse and inclusive, including the effects of instructional strategies on the culture of the STEM classroom;
• Design and execute innovative strategies to increase enrollment in graduate programs, aimed at nurturing cybersecurity professionals with research expertise in critical areas such as secure software design and development (including use of memory safe languages), the secure use of AI, quantum computing, advanced manufacturing, and emerging wireless technologies;
• Implement innovative strategies to increase cybersecurity faculty numbers by supporting those proficient in cyber curricula integration, offering faculty development opportunities, and equipping faculty with pertinent cybersecurity resources;
• Improve teaching methods for delivering cybersecurity content to K-12 students that promote correct and safe online behavior, and understanding of the foundational principles of cybersecurity;
• Develop and implement activities to help K-12 teachers integrate cybersecurity into formal and informal learning settings;
• Support institutional collaborations between community colleges and four-year colleges and universities;
• Develop educational approaches or pathways to foster industry-relevant skills for cybersecurity jobs of the future;
• Develop effective evidence-based co-curricular activities for students studying cybersecurity at the K-12, undergraduate, or graduate level; and
• Evaluate the effectiveness of cybersecurity competitions and other engagement, outreach, and retention activities.

Proposals must have clear and specific plans for assessment and evaluation. The evaluation should include formative evaluation for project improvement and summative evaluation to assess and document project outcomes, accomplishments, and lessons learned. Funds to support an evaluator independent of the project must be requested. The evaluator, external to the project, may be employed by a project's home institution as long as they work in a separate organizational unit that has a different reporting line from that of the project's home unit. The evaluator cannot serve as a PI, co-PI, or Senior Personnel on the project. The proposal must identify appropriate assessment and evaluation plans for project improvement, as well as plans for programmatic evaluation at the end of the project for accountability purposes. The evaluation plans must clearly align with the stated goals of the project. Meaningful assessment and evaluation of NSF-funded projects should be based on appropriate metrics, keeping in mind the likely correlation between the effect of broader impacts and the resources provided to implement projects. For information about effective approaches to evaluation, see the following resources:

• The 2010 User-Friendly Handbook for Project Evaluation
• Online Evaluation Resource Library (OERL)

EDU projects are expected to contribute to the cybersecurity education knowledge base. In addition to translating research results into the classroom, the projects will help to understand how people learn the concepts, practices, and ways of thinking in cybersecurity and understand the nature and development of expertise in cybersecurity. All EDU proposals should formulate and seek to answer research questions. Some examples of research questions that are within the scope of the EDU designation are: how cybersecurity curricula and instruction are designed to improve learning; how pedagogical methods are implemented in the classroom; how cognitive, behavioral, social, and affective aspects impact learning and teaching in cybersecurity; and how interventions improve student persistence, grit, graduation, and learning outcomes. The complexity, scope, and size of those contributions should be commensurate with the relevant experience and expertise of the project team and the institution. Project teams are encouraged to include an investigator with expertise in education research. For guidelines for improving as well as future directions for STEM education research, see the following resources:

• Common Guidelines for Education Research and Development
• Discipline-based education research: Understanding and improving learning in undergraduate science and engineering

All EDU proposals must include a dissemination strategy that is tied to broader impact goals and a clear plan to report on the project and its successes and lessons learned to appropriate audiences.

EDU proposal budgets are limited to $400,000 and their durations are limited to three years. Proposals that demonstrate a collaboration, reflected in the project team as PI, co-PI, or Senior Personnel, between a cybersecurity subject matter expert (researcher or practitioner) and an education researcher may request up to $500,000 for three years with reasonable justification of additional fund use. In order to qualify for the increased budget cap, proposals should describe how the contribution of each area - cybersecurity and education - will contribute to intellectual merit and broader impacts. Ideally, the research will be interdependent, integrated, and will contribute novel understanding and impact on cybersecurity learning, pedagogy, and equity and inclusion in educational settings. Proposals must describe how the collaboration will work in the planning, research, and dissemination stages.

Questions about Cybersecurity Education proposals should be addressed directly to EDU Program Officers (satc-edu@nsf.gov) in the Directorate for Education and Human Resources.

BROADENING PARTICIPATION IN COMPUTING (Medium proposals only)

CISE has long been committed to Broadening Participation in Computing (BPC). This commitment means addressing the underrepresentation of many groups in CISE relative to their participation in postsecondary education (https://ncses.nsf.gov/pubs/nsb20223/data). Broadening participation will require a range of measures, including institutional programs and activities as well as culture changes across colleges, departments, classes, and research groups.

With this solicitation, CISE is continuing the BPC effort started in 2018 that encourages the research community to engage in meaningful BPC activities. The CISE BPC effort builds on many of the programs, research, and resources created through CISE's past and ongoing investments in BPC, and it aligns with the recommendations of the Strategic Plan for Broadening Participation produced by the CISE Advisory Committee in 2012. Specifically, each Medium project with a lead or non-lead organization (department, school, or institute) that primarily carries out research and education in computer science, computer engineering, information science, and/or other closely-related field, must include a BPC plan (see details in Proposal Preparation). CISE encourages the use of the resources available at the NSF-funded BPCnet Resource Portal (https://bpcnet.org). BPCnet provides BPC project and departmental plan templates, suggested activities, and opportunities for consultant services, and publicly available data to support PIs and Departments in creating their BPC Plans. CISE encourages PIs to leverage departmental plans verified by BPCnet to coordinate efforts within their institution. BPC plans must include roles for all PIs and co-PIs and be included as a Supplementary Document, following the guidelines as described in the Proposal Preparation Instructions.

For Medium projects where none of the PIs or co-PIs are from computing organizations as described above, a BPC plan is not required. To emphasize this point, PIs are encouraged to include a statement titled "Broadening Participation in Computing Plan" and the text "no PIs on this project are in computing organizations, so no BPC plan is required".

A meaningful BPC plan can answer positively to the following questions:

1. Goal and Context: Does the plan describe a goal and the data from your institution(s) or local community that justifies that goal?
2. Intended population(s): Does the plan identify the characteristics of participants, including school level?
3. Strategy: Does the plan describe activities that address the stated goal(s) and intended population(s)?
4. Measurement: Is there a plan to measure the outcome(s) of the activities?
5. PI Engagement: Is there a clear role for each PI and co-PI? Does the plan describe how the PI is prepared (or will prepare or collaborate) to do the proposed work?

All PIs and co-PIs who are from computing organizations (as described above) are expected to participate in BPC activities in a manner aligned with their personal contexts, interests, and skills. More information regarding the BPC effort can be found at https://www.nsf.gov/cise/bpc.

SaTC PI MEETINGS

The SaTC program plans to host PI meetings every other year with participation from all active SaTC projects. This meeting will be a community-wide event with representatives from federal agencies, academia, industry, and international institutions. Principal investigators from all solicitation designations are expected to participate in these meetings. The next PI meeting is expected to be held in Fall 2024, and approximately every two years thereafter.

For all awards, one or more project representatives (PI/co-PI/senior researcher or NSF-approved replacement) must attend the first PI meeting held after the award date. For multi-institution projects, only one PI needs to attend, not one per institution (though this is welcomed).

SaTC FORUM

The SaTC program sponsors the SaTC Forum, a community forum for SaTC researchers, developers, and educators. All SaTC funded PIs are encouraged to maintain the project page corresponding to their SaTC project on the SaTC Forum. For the SaTC PI meetings, PIs or other project representatives must also provide a poster for the poster session and a slide describing their project(s), which will be made available on the SaTC Forum. The Forum provides an opportunity for prospective PIs to obtain information about ongoing SaTC research.

CO-FUNDING OPPORTUNITIES FOR THIS SOLICITATION:

NSF may enter into partnerships with other agencies, foundations, and organizations interested in co-funding projects submitted to this solicitation. PIs on proposals that meet the general eligibility requirements of one or more of these partners may be contacted by the cognizant NSF program director following submission of their proposals and be given the option of having their proposals considered jointly by NSF and the partner(s). If a PI so chooses, a given partner's representatives may have access to the corresponding proposal, may be invited to sit in on the NSF review panel's discussion of that proposal and may be able to discuss the reviews with the NSF SaTC program directors. This consideration by one or more partners will be strictly optional; PIs who choose not to avail themselves of this option will have their proposals reviewed solely by NSF.

The CISE CNS Division will be responsible for receiving submitted proposals, determining compliance of proposals with the guidelines specified in the program solicitation, selecting proposals for NSF funding, and negotiating the award budgets. Once NSF's decisions on funding have been made, relevant partner(s) will be able to choose to co-fund any of the awards submitted for their consideration.

In some cases, NSF will determine after review that partial funding by another agency, foundation, or other organization may be beneficial to all parties. In such cases, NSF will request approval from the PI before any information is shared with the other party. This consideration is strictly optional; PIs who decline to have their proposal shared will have their proposals considered for funding solely by NSF.

In cases where a proposal is co-funded by NSF and a partner organization, PIs will be required to share their NSF annual and final reports with the partner organization, and will be requested to invite representatives of partner organizations to regularly scheduled meetings of the research team. Partners may provide additional funding to support other involvement with the research team.

An updated list of partners, including partner-specific eligibility requirements, will be maintained on the SaTC program webpage.

START DATES

To avoid overdue reports blocking award actions during the end of a fiscal year, institutions are discouraged from seeking project start dates between July 2 and September 30 of a given year. Awardee institutions may incur allowable pre-award costs within the 90-day period immediately preceding the start date of the grant subject to the conditions specified in the PAPPG; this will allow support for students or other relevant activities to begin over this period.

COLLABORATION LETTERS

Core and EDU proposals: Letters of collaboration from academic or industry partners are welcome, but are not expected. Letters should explicitly describe the resources (e.g., hardware, software, test facilities, data, research expertise) to be provided by the collaborating entity. Any collaboration letter may be no longer than a single page, with fonts and margins consistent with PAPPG standards. No more than five (5) letters may be included.

TTP proposals: Letters of collaboration from transition partners and the PI's university Technology Transfer Office (TTO) or similar organization are encouraged. Letters may include details indicating the worthiness of the effort, level of anticipated collaboration, and specific transition or technology maturation benefits anticipated from the work. Any collaboration letter may be no longer than a single page.

ACCESS TO EXPERIMENTAL RESEARCH INFRASTRUCTURE

PIs may consider utilizing NSF-supported research infrastructure (such as the Platforms for Advanced Wireless Research, FABRIC, Chameleon, CloudLab) when formulating their research plans and submitting proposals. Descriptions of the capabilities of each system and their availability can be found at their websites: https://advancedwireless.org/, https://fabric-testbed.net/, https://www.chameleoncloud.org/, https://cloudlab.us/.

III. Award Information

Anticipated Type of Award: Continuing Grant or Standard Grant

Estimated Number of Awards: 90

NSF anticipates approximately 15 EDU awards, 35 Small awards, and 25 Medium awards.

Anticipated Funding Amount: $69,000,000 per year, dependent on the availability of funds.

IV. Eligibility Information

Who May Submit Proposals:

Proposals may only be submitted by the following:

• Institutions of Higher Education (IHEs) - Two- and four-year IHEs (including community colleges) accredited in, and having a campus located in the US, acting on behalf of their faculty members. Special Instructions for International Branch Campuses of US IHEs: If the proposal includes funding to be provided to an international branch campus of a US institution of higher education (including through use of subawards and consultant arrangements), the proposer must explain the benefit(s) to the project of performance at the international branch campus, and justify why the project activities cannot be performed at the US campus.
• Non-profit, non-academic organizations: Independent museums, observatories, research laboratories, professional societies and similar organizations located in the U.S. that are directly associated with educational or research activities.

Who May Serve as PI:

As of the date the proposal is submitted, any PI, co-PI, or other senior project personnel must hold either:

• a tenured or tenure-track position,
or
• a primary, full-time, paid appointment in a research or teaching position

at a US-based campus of an organization eligible to submit to this solicitation (see above), with exceptions granted for family or medical leave, as determined by the submitting organization. Individuals with primary appointments at for-profit non-academic organizations or at overseas branch campuses of U.S. institutions of higher education are not eligible.

Proposals from Minority Serving Institutions (MSIs) are particularly encouraged.

Limit on Number of Proposals per Organization:

There are no restrictions or limits.

Limit on Number of Proposals per PI or co-PI: 4

An individual can participate as PI, co-PI, or senior personnel on no more than four SaTC proposals. There is a limit of:

• two proposals designated as CORE (across Small and Medium);
• one proposal designated as TTP (across Small and Medium); and
• one proposal designated as EDU.

These limits apply for the period from October 1st to September 30th of the following year to all proposals in response to this solicitation and are unrelated to any limits imposed in other NSF solicitations.

To treat everyone fairly and consistently, these eligibility constraints will be strictly enforced. If an individual exceeds these limits, only proposals received within the limits will be accepted, based on earliest date and time of proposal submission. No exceptions will be made.

Proposals that are withdrawn or returned without review will not count against this proposal limit.

Additional Eligibility Info:

Subawards are not permitted to overseas campuses/offices of US-based proposing organizations.

V. Proposal Preparation And Submission Instructions

A. Proposal Preparation Instructions

Full Proposal Preparation Instructions: Proposers may opt to submit proposals in response to this Program Solicitation via Research.gov or Grants.gov.

• Full Proposals submitted via Research.gov: Proposals submitted in response to this program solicitation should be prepared and submitted in accordance with the general guidelines contained in the NSF Proposal and Award Policies and Procedures Guide (PAPPG). The complete text of the PAPPG is available electronically on the NSF website at: https://www.nsf.gov/publications/pub_summ.jsp?ods_key=pappg. Paper copies of the PAPPG may be obtained from the NSF Publications Clearinghouse, telephone (703) 292-8134 or by e-mail from nsfpubs@nsf.gov. The Prepare New Proposal setup will prompt you for the program solicitation number.
• Full proposals submitted via Grants.gov: Proposals submitted in response to this program solicitation via Grants.gov should be prepared and submitted in accordance with the NSF Grants.gov Application Guide: A Guide for the Preparation and Submission of NSF Applications via Grants.gov. The complete text of the NSF Grants.gov Application Guide is available on the Grants.gov website and on the NSF website at: (https://www.nsf.gov/publications/pub_summ.jsp?ods_key=grantsgovguide). To obtain copies of the Application Guide and Application Forms Package, click on the Apply tab on the Grants.gov site, then click on the Apply Step 1: Download a Grant Application Package and Application Instructions link and enter the funding opportunity number, (the program solicitation number without the NSF prefix) and press the Download Package button. Paper copies of the Grants.gov Application Guide also may be obtained from the NSF Publications Clearinghouse, telephone (703) 292-8134 or by e-mail from nsfpubs@nsf.gov.

In determining which method to utilize in the electronic preparation and submission of the proposal, please note the following:

Collaborative Proposals. All collaborative proposals submitted as separate submissions from multiple organizations must be submitted via Research.gov. PAPPG Chapter II.E.3 provides additional information on collaborative proposals.

See PAPPG Chapter II.D.2 for guidance on the required sections of a full research proposal submitted to NSF. Please note that the proposal preparation instructions provided in this program solicitation may deviate from the PAPPG instructions.

The following information SUPPLEMENTS (note that it does NOT replace) the guidelines provided in the PAPPG and NSF Grants.gov Application Guide. See also Section II, Program Description, in this solicitation for additional guidance.

All proposals must be submitted to the CNS division, regardless of the proposal's designation.

Proposal Titles:

Proposal titles must begin with the acronym SaTC, followed by a colon, and the acronym that indicates the designation. Select an acronym from the following list:

• SaTC core research designation: CORE;
• Transition to Practice designation: TTP; or
• Cybersecurity Education designation: EDU.

CORE proposals can be Small or Medium. The acronym, CORE, should be followed by a colon, then the project size class (Small or Medium) followed by a colon, and then the title of the proposed project. For example, if you are submitting a CORE Small proposal, the title of your proposal would be SaTC: CORE: Small: Title. Similarly, since TTP proposals can be Small or Medium, the acronym TTP should be followed by a colon, the project class (Small or Medium) followed by a colon and then the title of the proposed project.

If you submit a proposal as part of a set of collaborative proposals, the words "Collaborative Research" followed by a colon should appear at the beginning of the title, before the "SaTC" acronym. For example, if you are submitting a collaborative set of proposals for a Medium project to the SaTC TTP designation, the title of each proposal would be Collaborative Research: SaTC: TTP: Medium: Title. Please note that if submitting via Research.gov, the system will automatically insert the prepended title "Collaborative Research" when the collaborative set of proposals is created.

Project Summary:

SaTC proposals are grouped into "review panels" of related proposals for merit review and discussion. Panelists are selected for their expertise in the panel topic area. The suggested topic areas indicate the areas of panelist expertise that are most important for understanding the innovative aspects of the proposal.

To facilitate this grouping, all proposals must include a prioritized list of 1-3 keywords separated by ";". The keywords must be drawn from the list of topic areas listed below, described in detail in Section II, that best characterizes the project. Proposals submitted to the EDU designation must choose Cybersecurity Education as one of the keywords; proposals submitted to the TTP designation must choose Transition to Practice as one of the keywords.

• Authentication and Access Control
• Cryptography, Applied
• Cryptography, Theoretical
• Cyber-Physical Systems
• Cybersecurity Education
• Data Science, ML and AI
• Formal Methods and Language-based Security
• Hardware Security Architecture
• Hardware Security Design
• Human-Centric Computing
• Information Integrity
• Intrusion Detection
• Mathematics and Statistics
• Networking, Wired
• Networking, Wireless
• Privacy, Applied
• Privacy, Theoretical
• Social, Behavioral and Economic Sciences
• Software
• Systems
• Transition to Practice

Project Description:

Describe the research and education activities to be undertaken in up to 15 pages. See also Section II, Program Description, in this solicitation for additional guidance.

Supplementary Documents:

In the Supplementary Documents Section, upload the following:

1. (required) A list of Project Personnel and Partner Institutions (required. Note: in collaborative proposals, the lead institution should provide this information for all participants):

Provide current, accurate information for all personnel and institutions involved in the project. NSF staff will use this information in the merit review process to manage reviewer selection. The list must include all PIs, co-PIs, Senior Personnel, paid/unpaid Consultants or Collaborators, Subawardees, Postdocs, and project-level advisory committee members. This list should be numbered and include (in this order) Full name, Organization(s), and Role in the project, with each item separated by a semi-colon. Each person listed should start a new numbered line. For example:

1. Mei Lin; XYZ University; PI
2. Jak Jabes; University of PQR; Senior Personnel
3. Jane Brown; XYZ University; Postdoctoral Researcher
4. Rakel Ademas; ABC Inc.; Paid Consultant
5. Maria Wan; Welldone Institution; Unpaid Collaborator
6. Rimon Greene; ZZZ University; Subawardee

2. Collaboration Plan (required for Medium projects with more than one PI):

Because the success of collaborative research efforts is known to depend on thoughtful coordination mechanisms that regularly bring together the various participants of the project, all Medium proposals with more than one investigator must include a Collaboration Plan of up to 2 pages. The length of and degree of detail provided in the Collaboration Plan should be commensurate with the complexity of the proposed project. Where appropriate, the Collaboration Plan might include: 1) the specific roles of the project participants in all organizations involved; 2) information on how the project will be managed across all the investigators, institutions, and/or disciplines; 3) identification of the specific coordination mechanisms that will enable cross-investigator, cross-institution, and/or cross-discipline scientific integration (e.g., yearly conferences, graduate student exchange, project meetings at conferences, use of the grid for video conferences, software repositories, etc.), and 4) specific references to the budget line items that support collaboration and coordination mechanisms. If a Medium proposal with more than one investigator does not include a Collaboration Plan of up to 2 pages, that proposal will be returned without review.

Collaboration plans are optional for Small and EDU proposals with multiple investigators and/or institutions.

3. Data Management Plan (required):

Proposals must include a Supplementary Document of no more than two pages labeled "Data Management Plan." The data management plan must be substantive and specific to the project and should address all project-relevant aspects of data privacy and security. In addition to addressing how the project will conform to NSF's policy on the dissemination and sharing of research results, the Data Management Plan should address the following topics if they are relevant to the project:

• Handling of sensitive data: sensitivity of the data to be collected, ethics of data collection and identification of harms that could arise from its collection or inadvertent dissemination, techniques that will be used to protect the privacy of individuals and organizations associated with the data, and plans to request Institutional Review Board (IRB) approval for data collection, aggregation, and analysis.
• Data sharing: methods for providing other researchers with controlled access to datasets and the time period during which data will be available. If the project will develop software or hardware, the Data Management Plan should discuss not only what access other researchers will have to source code or hardware design artifacts (e.g., specific open source licenses) and the physical location of the data repository (e.g., commercial cloud, private server, campus server), but also the method by which other researchers may access these products of the project (e.g., GitHub repository).
• Authorization for data access and protection of data: policies for authorizing access to the data and techniques (including security protections) that will be used to prevent the unauthorized dissemination of the data.

For additional information on the Dissemination and Sharing of Research Results, see: https://www.nsf.gov/bfa/dias/policy/dmp.jsp.

4. Broadening Participation in Computing (BPC) Plans for Medium projects:

Each Medium project with a lead or non-lead organization (department, school, or institute) that primarily carries out research and education in computer science, computer engineering, information science, and/or other closely-related field must include a BPC plan as a supplementary document at the time of submission. Each plan should begin with the heading "Broadening Participation in Computing (BPC) Plan –" followed by either "Standalone" or "Connected".

• A Standalone BPC Plan does not include Departmental BPC Plans. Instead, the BPC activities of all PIs are listed in a single document that is up to 3 pages for the whole project and specifically addresses all five elements of a BPC plan: (1) the goal and context of the proposed activity, (2) intended population(s), (3) strategy, (4) measurement, and (5) PI engagement. This option must be used if one or more of the collaborating institutions do not have a Departmental BPC Plan verified by BPCnet.
• A Connected BPC Plan may be used when each PI and co-PI will engage in an activity listed in a Verified Departmental BPC Plan from their institution. Note that the (1) goal and context, (2) intended population, (3) strategy, and (4) measurement are already addressed in Verified Departmental BPC Plans. Therefore, a Connected BPC Plan is a document that only has to address the following, organized as:
  • up to 2 pages that describe (5) what strategies in the departmental plan the PI and co-PIs will focus on, their specific roles, and their preparation for their work;
  • followed by the verified Departmental BPC Plans from each institution.

The BPC plans should be submitted as one document (including departmental plans for Connected BPC plans) under the "Supplementary Documents" section by the lead institution. The BPC plan should not be utilized as a space to elaborate on other broader impact activities unrelated to addressing members of groups underrepresented in computing.

Any organizational resources that support BPC activities should also be described in the Facilities, Equipment and Other Resources section of the proposal (for additional information about Facilities, Equipment and Other Resources, see PAPPG Chapter II.D.2) if not already described in a linked departmental plan.

For Medium projects where none of the PIs or co-PIs are from computing organizations as described above, a BPC plan is not required. To emphasize this point, PIs are encouraged to include a statement titled "Broadening Participation in Computing Plan" and the text "no PIs on this project are in computing organizations, so no BPC plan is required".

No other Supplementary Documents, except as permitted by the NSF Proposal & Award Policies & Procedures Guide (such as RUI Certifications and RUI Impact Statements), are allowed.

Single Copy Documents:

Collaborators and Other Affiliations Information: Proposers should follow the guidance specified in PAPPG Chapter II.D.2.

Note the distinction to item (1) under Supplementary Documents above: the listing of all project participants is collected by the project lead and entered as a Supplementary Document, which is then automatically included with all proposals in a project. The Collaborators and Other Affiliations are entered for each participant within each proposal and, as Single Copy Documents, are available only to NSF staff.

Submission Checklist:

In an effort to assist proposal preparation, the following checklist is provided as a summary reminder of the items that should be checked before submitting a proposal to this solicitation. For the items marked with (RWR), the proposal may be returned without review if the required item is non-compliant as of the date of proposal submission.

• The last line of the Project Summary must consist of the word "Keywords" followed by a colon and between 1-3 keywords, separated by semi-colons, corresponding to the list of topic areas listed above.
• (RWR) The Project Description must have a section labeled "Relevance to Secure and Trustworthy Cyberspace" (or "Relevance to SaTC") that discusses the potential impact of the research with respect to the goals of the SaTC program and justifies the selection of the keywords.
• (RWR) The maximum budget shown on the Cover Sheet and on the budget sheets must not exceed $600,000 for Small proposals, $1,200,000 for Medium proposals, and $400,000 ($500,000 if special conditions listed above are met) for EDU proposals.
• (RWR) If more than one PI is involved, a collaboration plan (up to 2 pages) must be provided for Medium projects as a Supplementary Document, even if all investigators are affiliated with the same institution.
• (RWR) For Medium proposals, when a BPC plan is required, the BPC plan must be submitted as a Supplementary Document with a title clearly identifying it as such. Collaborative proposals should submit one BPC plan, as described in the proposal preparation instructions.
• A Project Personnel and Partner Institutions list as a Supplementary Document should be included.

Proposals that do not comply with the requirements marked as RWR will be returned without review.

B. Budgetary Information

Cost Sharing:

Inclusion of voluntary committed cost sharing is prohibited.

Other Budgetary Limitations:

Project budgets must include funding for one or more project representatives (PI/co-PI/senior researcher or NSF-approved replacement) to attend the first SaTC PI meeting held after the beginning of the award. The first PI meeting for awards made under this solicitation is expected to be held in Fall 2024, and approximately every two years thereafter. These requirements for PI meeting attendance apply to collaborative proposals as a whole, not to each part of a project.

C. Due Dates

• Full Proposal Deadline(s) (due by 5 p.m. submitter's local time):

       Proposals Accepted Anytime

D. Research.gov/Grants.gov Requirements

For Proposals Submitted Via Research.gov:

To prepare and submit a proposal via Research.gov, see detailed technical instructions available at: https://www.research.gov/research-portal/appmanager/base/desktop?_nfpb=true&_pageLabel=research_node_display&_nodePath=/researchGov/Service/Desktop/ProposalPreparationandSubmission.html. For Research.gov user support, call the Research.gov Help Desk at 1-800-381-1532 or e-mail rgov@nsf.gov. The Research.gov Help Desk answers general technical questions related to the use of the Research.gov system. Specific questions related to this program solicitation should be referred to the NSF program staff contact(s) listed in Section VIII of this funding opportunity.

For Proposals Submitted Via Grants.gov:

Before using Grants.gov for the first time, each organization must register to create an institutional profile. Once registered, the applicant's organization can then apply for any federal grant on the Grants.gov website. Comprehensive information about using Grants.gov is available on the Grants.gov Applicant Resources webpage: https://www.grants.gov/web/grants/applicants.html. In addition, the NSF Grants.gov Application Guide (see link in Section V.A) provides instructions regarding the technical preparation of proposals via Grants.gov. For Grants.gov user support, contact the Grants.gov Contact Center at 1-800-518-4726 or by email: support@grants.gov. The Grants.gov Contact Center answers general technical questions related to the use of Grants.gov. Specific questions related to this program solicitation should be referred to the NSF program staff contact(s) listed in Section VIII of this solicitation.

Submitting the Proposal: Once all documents have been completed, the Authorized Organizational Representative (AOR) must submit the application to Grants.gov and verify the desired funding opportunity and agency to which the application is submitted. The AOR must then sign and submit the application to Grants.gov. The completed application will be transferred to Research.gov for further processing.

The NSF Grants.gov Proposal Processing in Research.gov informational page provides submission guidance to applicants and links to helpful resources including the NSF Grants.gov Application Guide, Grants.gov Proposal Processing in Research.gov how-to guide, and Grants.gov Submitted Proposals Frequently Asked Questions. Grants.gov proposals must pass all NSF pre-check and post-check validations in order to be accepted by Research.gov at NSF.

When submitting via Grants.gov, NSF strongly recommends applicants initiate proposal submission at least five business days in advance of a deadline to allow adequate time to address NSF compliance errors and resubmissions by 5:00 p.m. submitting organization's local time on the deadline. Please note that some errors cannot be corrected in Grants.gov. Once a proposal passes pre-checks but fails any post-check, an applicant can only correct and submit the in-progress proposal in Research.gov.

Proposers that submitted via Research.gov may use Research.gov to verify the status of their submission to NSF. For proposers that submitted via Grants.gov, until an application has been received and validated by NSF, the Authorized Organizational Representative may check the status of an application on Grants.gov. After proposers have received an e-mail notification from NSF, Research.gov should be used to check the status of an application.

Vi. NSF Proposal Processing And Review Procedures

Proposals received by NSF are assigned to the appropriate NSF program for acknowledgement and, if they meet NSF requirements, for review. All proposals are carefully reviewed by a scientist, engineer, or educator serving as an NSF Program Officer, and usually by three to ten other persons outside NSF either as ad hoc reviewers, panelists, or both, who are experts in the particular fields represented by the proposal. These reviewers are selected by Program Officers charged with oversight of the review process. Proposers are invited to suggest names of persons they believe are especially well qualified to review the proposal and/or persons they would prefer not review the proposal. These suggestions may serve as one source in the reviewer selection process at the Program Officer's discretion. Submission of such names, however, is optional. Care is taken to ensure that reviewers have no conflicts of interest with the proposal. In addition, Program Officers may obtain comments from site visits before recommending final action on proposals. Senior NSF staff further review recommendations for awards. A flowchart that depicts the entire NSF proposal and award process (and associated timeline) is included in PAPPG Exhibit III-1.

A comprehensive description of the Foundation's merit review process is available on the NSF website at: https://www.nsf.gov/bfa/dias/policy/merit_review/.

Proposers should also be aware of core strategies that are essential to the fulfillment of NSF's mission, as articulated in Leading the World in Discovery and Innovation, STEM Talent Development and the Delivery of Benefits from Research - NSF Strategic Plan for Fiscal Years (FY) 2022 - 2026. These strategies are integrated in the program planning and implementation process, of which proposal review is one part. NSF's mission is particularly well-implemented through the integration of research and education and broadening participation in NSF programs, projects, and activities.

One of the strategic objectives in support of NSF's mission is to foster integration of research and education through the programs, projects, and activities it supports at academic and research institutions. These institutions must recruit, train, and prepare a diverse STEM workforce to advance the frontiers of science and participate in the U.S. technology-based economy. NSF's contribution to the national innovation ecosystem is to provide cutting-edge research under the guidance of the Nation's most creative scientists and engineers. NSF also supports development of a strong science, technology, engineering, and mathematics (STEM) workforce by investing in building the knowledge that informs improvements in STEM teaching and learning.

NSF's mission calls for the broadening of opportunities and expanding participation of groups, institutions, and geographic regions that are underrepresented in STEM disciplines, which is essential to the health and vitality of science and engineering. NSF is committed to this principle of diversity and deems it central to the programs, projects, and activities it considers and supports.

A. Merit Review Principles and Criteria

The National Science Foundation strives to invest in a robust and diverse portfolio of projects that creates new knowledge and enables breakthroughs in understanding across all areas of science and engineering research and education. To identify which projects to support, NSF relies on a merit review process that incorporates consideration of both the technical aspects of a proposed project and its potential to contribute more broadly to advancing NSF's mission "to promote the progress of science; to advance the national health, prosperity, and welfare; to secure the national defense; and for other purposes." NSF makes every effort to conduct a fair, competitive, transparent merit review process for the selection of projects.

1. Merit Review Principles

These principles are to be given due diligence by PIs and organizations when preparing proposals and managing projects, by reviewers when reading and evaluating proposals, and by NSF program staff when determining whether or not to recommend proposals for funding and while overseeing awards. Given that NSF is the primary federal agency charged with nurturing and supporting excellence in basic research and education, the following three principles apply:

• All NSF projects should be of the highest quality and have the potential to advance, if not transform, the frontiers of knowledge.
• NSF projects, in the aggregate, should contribute more broadly to achieving societal goals. These "Broader Impacts" may be accomplished through the research itself, through activities that are directly related to specific research projects, or through activities that are supported by, but are complementary to, the project. The project activities may be based on previously established and/or innovative methods and approaches, but in either case must be well justified.
• Meaningful assessment and evaluation of NSF funded projects should be based on appropriate metrics, keeping in mind the likely correlation between the effect of broader impacts and the resources provided to implement projects. If the size of the activity is limited, evaluation of that activity in isolation is not likely to be meaningful. Thus, assessing the effectiveness of these activities may best be done at a higher, more aggregated, level than the individual project.

With respect to the third principle, even if assessment of Broader Impacts outcomes for particular projects is done at an aggregated level, PIs are expected to be accountable for carrying out the activities described in the funded project. Thus, individual projects should include clearly stated goals, specific descriptions of the activities that the PI intends to do, and a plan in place to document the outputs of those activities.

These three merit review principles provide the basis for the merit review criteria, as well as a context within which the users of the criteria can better understand their intent.

2. Merit Review Criteria

All NSF proposals are evaluated through use of the two National Science Board approved merit review criteria. In some instances, however, NSF will employ additional criteria as required to highlight the specific objectives of certain programs and activities.

The two merit review criteria are listed below. Both criteria are to be given full consideration during the review and decision-making processes; each criterion is necessary but neither, by itself, is sufficient. Therefore, proposers must fully address both criteria. (PAPPG Chapter II.D.2.d(i). contains additional information for use by proposers in development of the Project Description section of the proposal). Reviewers are strongly encouraged to review the criteria, including PAPPG Chapter II.D.2.d(i), prior to the review of a proposal.

When evaluating NSF proposals, reviewers will be asked to consider what the proposers want to do, why they want to do it, how they plan to do it, how they will know if they succeed, and what benefits could accrue if the project is successful. These issues apply both to the technical aspects of the proposal and the way in which the project may make broader contributions. To that end, reviewers will be asked to evaluate all proposals against two criteria:

• Intellectual Merit: The Intellectual Merit criterion encompasses the potential to advance knowledge; and
• Broader Impacts: The Broader Impacts criterion encompasses the potential to benefit society and contribute to the achievement of specific, desired societal outcomes.

The following elements should be considered in the review for both criteria:

1. What is the potential for the proposed activity to
   1. Advance knowledge and understanding within its own field or across different fields (Intellectual Merit); and
   2. Benefit society or advance desired societal outcomes (Broader Impacts)?
2. To what extent do the proposed activities suggest and explore creative, original, or potentially transformative concepts?
3. Is the plan for carrying out the proposed activities well-reasoned, well-organized, and based on a sound rationale? Does the plan incorporate a mechanism to assess success?
4. How well qualified is the individual, team, or organization to conduct the proposed activities?
5. Are there adequate resources available to the PI (either at the home organization or through collaborations) to carry out the proposed activities?

Broader impacts may be accomplished through the research itself, through the activities that are directly related to specific research projects, or through activities that are supported by, but are complementary to, the project. NSF values the advancement of scientific knowledge and activities that contribute to achievement of societally relevant outcomes. Such outcomes include, but are not limited to: full participation of women, persons with disabilities, and other underrepresented groups in science, technology, engineering, and mathematics (STEM); improved STEM education and educator development at any level; increased public scientific literacy and public engagement with science and technology; improved well-being of individuals in society; development of a diverse, globally competitive STEM workforce; increased partnerships between academia, industry, and others; improved national security; increased economic competitiveness of the United States; and enhanced infrastructure for research and education.

Proposers are reminded that reviewers will also be asked to review the Data Management Plan and the Postdoctoral Researcher Mentoring Plan, as appropriate.

Additional Solicitation Specific Review Criteria

For multi-investigator Medium proposals, reviewers will be asked to:

• Comment on the extent to which the project scope justifies the level of investment requested, and the degree to which the Collaboration Plan adequately demonstrates that the participating investigators will work synergistically to accomplish the project objectives.
• Comment on whether key personnel, and especially lead PIs, have allocated adequate time for both their individual technical contributions and the leadership of collaborative activities necessary to realize the synergistic effects of larger-scale research.

For all Medium proposals, comment on whether the Broadening Participation in Computing (BPC) plan meaningfully addresses the five elements of a BPC Plan: (1) the context of the proposed activity, (2) intended population(s), (3) strategy, (4) preparation, and (5) measurement.

Proposals submitted with the Transition to Practice (TTP) designation will be evaluated with careful attention to the following:

• The degree to which the project plan addresses system development milestones and an evaluation plan for the working system;
• The degree to which a target user group or organization who (that) will serve as an early adopter of the technology is identified;
• The deployment plan for implementing the capability or prototype system into an operational environment;
• The novelty of the intended system, software, or architecture;
• The composition of the proposal team, which should demonstrate not only technical expertise but also skills in project management and systems development;
• The appropriateness of the budget for the effort; and
• The extent of collaboration with the university TTO or similar organization from the PI's institution.

B. Review and Selection Process

Proposals submitted in response to this program solicitation will be reviewed by Ad hoc Review and/or Panel Review.

Reviewers will be asked to evaluate proposals using two National Science Board approved merit review criteria and, if applicable, additional program specific criteria. A summary rating and accompanying narrative will be completed and submitted by each reviewer. The Program Officer assigned to manage the proposal's review will consider the advice of reviewers and will formulate a recommendation.

After scientific, technical and programmatic review and consideration of appropriate factors, the NSF Program Officer recommends to the cognizant Division Director whether the proposal should be declined or recommended for award. NSF strives to be able to tell proposers whether their proposals have been declined or recommended for funding within six months. Large or particularly complex proposals or proposals from new recipients may require additional review and processing time. The time interval begins on the deadline or target date, or receipt date, whichever is later. The interval ends when the Division Director acts upon the Program Officer's recommendation.

After programmatic approval has been obtained, the proposals recommended for funding will be forwarded to the Division of Grants and Agreements or the Division of Acquisition and Cooperative Support for review of business, financial, and policy implications. After an administrative review has occurred, Grants and Agreements Officers perform the processing and issuance of a grant or other agreement. Proposers are cautioned that only a Grants and Agreements Officer may make commitments, obligations or awards on behalf of NSF or authorize the expenditure of funds. No commitment on the part of NSF should be inferred from technical or budgetary discussions with a NSF Program Officer. A Principal Investigator or organization that makes financial or personnel commitments in the absence of a grant or cooperative agreement signed by the NSF Grants and Agreements Officer does so at their own risk.

Once an award or declination decision has been made, Principal Investigators are provided feedback about their proposals. In all cases, reviews are treated as confidential documents. Verbatim copies of reviews, excluding the names of the reviewers or any reviewer-identifying information, are sent to the Principal Investigator/Project Director by the Program Officer. In addition, the proposer will receive an explanation of the decision to award or decline funding.

VII. Award Administration Information

A. Notification of the Award

Notification of the award is made to the submitting organization by an NSF Grants and Agreements Officer. Organizations whose proposals are declined will be advised as promptly as possible by the cognizant NSF Program administering the program. Verbatim copies of reviews, not including the identity of the reviewer, will be provided automatically to the Principal Investigator. (See Section VI.B. for additional information on the review process.)

B. Award Conditions

An NSF award consists of: (1) the award notice, which includes any special provisions applicable to the award and any numbered amendments thereto; (2) the budget, which indicates the amounts, by categories of expense, on which NSF has based its support (or otherwise communicates any specific approvals or disapprovals of proposed expenditures); (3) the proposal referenced in the award notice; (4) the applicable award conditions, such as Grant General Conditions (GC-1)*; or Research Terms and Conditions* and (5) any announcement or other NSF issuance that may be incorporated by reference in the award notice. Cooperative agreements also are administered in accordance with NSF Cooperative Agreement Financial and Administrative Terms and Conditions (CA-FATC) and the applicable Programmatic Terms and Conditions. NSF awards are electronically signed by an NSF Grants and Agreements Officer and transmitted electronically to the organization via e-mail.

*These documents may be accessed electronically on NSF's Website at https://www.nsf.gov/awards/managing/award_conditions.jsp?org=NSF. Paper copies may be obtained from the NSF Publications Clearinghouse, telephone (703) 292-8134 or by e-mail from nsfpubs@nsf.gov.

More comprehensive information on NSF Award Conditions and other important information on the administration of NSF awards is contained in the NSF Proposal & Award Policies & Procedures Guide (PAPPG) Chapter VII, available electronically on the NSF Website at https://www.nsf.gov/publications/pub_summ.jsp?ods_key=pappg.

Administrative and National Policy Requirements

Build America, Buy America

As expressed in Executive Order 14005, Ensuring the Future is Made in All of America by All of America's Workers (86 FR 7475), it is the policy of the executive branch to use terms and conditions of Federal financial assistance awards to maximize, consistent with law, the use of goods, products, and materials produced in, and services offered in, the United States.

Consistent with the requirements of the Build America, Buy America Act (Pub. L. 117-58, Division G, Title IX, Subtitle A, November 15, 2021), no funding made available through this funding opportunity may be obligated for an award unless all iron, steel, manufactured products, and construction materials used in the project are produced in the United States. For additional information, visit NSF's Build America, Buy America webpage.

Special Award Conditions:

For all awards, special award conditions will require that at least one representative (PI/co-PI/senior researchers or NSF-approved replacement) from each SaTC project attend the first SaTC PI meeting held after the beginning of the award. The first PI meeting for awards made under this solicitation is expected in Fall 2024.

CISE plans to conduct an evaluation of the BPC pilot. This evaluation may be conducted by a third-party, working in coordination with and on behalf of NSF. Awardees of Medium projects must participate in this evaluation and provide information about project outcomes to support it.

C. Reporting Requirements

For all multi-year grants (including both standard and continuing grants), the Principal Investigator must submit an annual project report to the cognizant Program Officer no later than 90 days prior to the end of the current budget period. (Some programs or awards require submission of more frequent project reports). No later than 120 days following expiration of a grant, the PI also is required to submit a final project report, and a project outcomes report for the general public.

Failure to provide the required annual or final project reports, or the project outcomes report, will delay NSF review and processing of any future funding increments as well as any pending proposals for all identified PIs and co-PIs on a given award. PIs should examine the formats of the required reports in advance to assure availability of required data.

PIs are required to use NSF's electronic project-reporting system, available through Research.gov, for preparation and submission of annual and final project reports. Such reports provide information on accomplishments, project participants (individual and organizational), publications, and other specific products and impacts of the project. Submission of the report via Research.gov constitutes certification by the PI that the contents of the report are accurate and complete. The project outcomes report also must be prepared and submitted using Research.gov. This report serves as a brief summary, prepared specifically for the public, of the nature and outcomes of the project. This report will be posted on the NSF website exactly as it is submitted by the PI.

More comprehensive information on NSF Reporting Requirements and other important information on the administration of NSF awards is contained in the NSF Proposal & Award Policies & Procedures Guide (PAPPG) Chapter VII, available electronically on the NSF Website at https://www.nsf.gov/publications/pub_summ.jsp?ods_key=pappg.

Awardees must report BPC activities and outcomes in the Special Reporting Requirements section of annual reports submitted to NSF. That section of the annual report should include:

• A summary of what each PI and co-PI did, including any changes to the plan;
• Numbers of events, participants, and participant demographics (if there are barriers to collecting this data, describe those limitations and provide the best estimates possible); and
• A reflection (supported by data if available) on progress, an unexpected challenges or results, and anything planned.

VIII. Agency Contacts

Please note that the program contact information is current at the time of publishing. See program website for any updates to the points of contact.

General inquiries regarding this program should be made to:

• Jeremy J. Epstein, Lead Program Director, CISE/CNS, telephone: (703) 292-8338, email: jepstein@nsf.gov
• Cindy Bethel, Program Director, CISE/IIS, telephone: (703) 292-4420, email: cbethel@nsf.gov
• Robert Beverly, Program Director, CISE/OAC, telephone: 703-292-7068, email: rbeverly@nsf.gov
• Daniel R. Cosley, Program Director, CISE/IIS, telephone: (703) 292-8832, email: dcosley@nsf.gov
• Sol Greenspan, Program Director, CISE/CCF, telephone: (703) 292-8910, email: sgreensp@nsf.gov
• Timothy Hodges, Program Director, MPS/DMS, telephone: (703) 292-5359, email: thodges@nsf.gov
• Karen Karavanic, Program Director, CISE/CNS, telephone: (703) 292-2594, email: kkaravan@nsf.gov
• Sara Kiesler, Program Director, SBE/SES, telephone: (703) 292-8643, email: skiesler@nsf.gov
• Rosa A. Lukaszew, Program Director, ENG/ECCS, telephone: (703) 292-8103, email: rlukasze@nsf.gov
• Daniela Oliveira, Program Director, CISE/CNS, telephone: (703) 292-4352, email: doliveir@nsf.gov
• Victor P. Piotrowski, Program Director, EDU/DGE, telephone: (703) 292-5141, email: vpiotrow@nsf.gov
• Andrew D. Pollington, Program Director, MPS/DMS, telephone: (703) 292-4878, email: adpollin@nsf.gov
• Phillip A. Regalia, Program Director, CISE/CCF, telephone: (703) 292-2981, email: pregalia@nsf.gov
• Ambareen Siraj, Program Director, EDU/DGE, telephone: (703) 292-8182, email: asiraj@nsf.gov
• Anna Squicciarini, Program Director, CISE/CNS, telephone: (703) 292-5177, email: asquicci@nsf.gov
• Xiaogang (Cliff) Wang, Program Director, CISE/CNS, telephone: (703) 292-2812, email: xiawang@nsf.gov
• ChunSheng (Sam) Xin, Program Director, EDU/DGE, telephone: (703) 292-7353, email: cxin@nsf.gov
• Li Yang, Program Director, EDU/DGE, telephone: (703) 292-2677, email: liyang@nsf.gov

For questions related to the use of NSF systems contact:

• NSF Help Desk: 1-800-381-1532
• Research.gov Help Desk e-mail: rgov@nsf.gov

For questions relating to Grants.gov contact:

• Grants.gov Contact Center: If the Authorized Organizational Representatives (AOR) has not received a confirmation message from Grants.gov within 48 hours of submission of application, please contact via telephone: 1-800-518-4726; e-mail: support@grants.gov.

SaTC Questions: satc@nsf.gov

IX. Other Information

The NSF website provides the most comprehensive source of information on NSF Directorates (including contact information), programs and funding opportunities. Use of this website by potential proposers is strongly encouraged. In addition, "NSF Update" is an information-delivery system designed to keep potential proposers and other interested parties apprised of new NSF funding opportunities and publications, important changes in proposal and award policies and procedures, and upcoming NSF Grants Conferences. Subscribers are informed through e-mail or the user's Web browser each time new publications are issued that match their identified interests. "NSF Update" also is available on NSF's website.

Grants.gov provides an additional electronic capability to search for Federal government-wide grant opportunities. NSF funding opportunities may be accessed via this mechanism. Further information on Grants.gov may be obtained at https://www.grants.gov.

About The National Science Foundation

The National Science Foundation (NSF) is an independent Federal agency created by the National Science Foundation Act of 1950, as amended (42 USC 1861-75). The Act states the purpose of the NSF is "to promote the progress of science; [and] to advance the national health, prosperity, and welfare by supporting research and education in all fields of science and engineering."

NSF funds research and education in most fields of science and engineering. It does this through grants and cooperative agreements to more than 2,000 colleges, universities, K-12 school systems, businesses, informal science organizations and other research organizations throughout the US. The Foundation accounts for about one-fourth of Federal support to academic institutions for basic research.

NSF receives approximately 55,000 proposals each year for research, education and training projects, of which approximately 11,000 are funded. In addition, the Foundation receives several thousand applications for graduate and postdoctoral fellowships. The agency operates no laboratories itself but does support National Research Centers, user facilities, certain oceanographic vessels and Arctic and Antarctic research stations. The Foundation also supports cooperative research between universities and industry, US participation in international scientific and engineering efforts, and educational activities at every academic level.

Facilitation Awards for Scientists and Engineers with Disabilities provide funding for special assistance or equipment to enable persons with disabilities to work on NSF-supported projects. See Grant Proposal Guide Chapter II, Section D.2 for instructions regarding preparation of these types of proposals.

The National Science Foundation has Telephonic Device for the Deaf (TDD) and Federal Information Relay Service (FIRS) capabilities that enable individuals with hearing impairments to communicate with the Foundation about NSF programs, employment or general information. TDD may be accessed at (703) 292-5090 and (800) 281-8749, FIRS at (800) 877-8339.

The National Science Foundation Information Center may be reached at (703) 292-5111.

The National Science Foundation promotes and advances scientific progress in the United States by competitively awarding grants and cooperative agreements for research and education in the sciences, mathematics, and engineering. To get the latest information about program deadlines, to download copies of NSF publications, and to access abstracts of awards, visit the NSF Website at https://www.nsf.gov Location: 2415 Eisenhower Avenue, Alexandria, VA 22314 For General Information (NSF Information Center): (703) 292-5111 TDD (for the hearing-impaired): (703) 292-5090 To Order Publications or Forms:   Send an e-mail to: nsfpubs@nsf.gov or telephone: (703) 292-8134 To Locate NSF Employees: (703) 292-5111

Privacy Act And Public Burden Statements

The information requested on proposal forms and project reports is solicited under the authority of the National Science Foundation Act of 1950, as amended. The information on proposal forms will be used in connection with the selection of qualified proposals; and project reports submitted by proposers will be used for program evaluation and reporting within the Executive Branch and to Congress. The information requested may be disclosed to qualified reviewers and staff assistants as part of the proposal review process; to proposer institutions/grantees to provide or obtain data regarding the proposal review process, award decisions, or the administration of awards; to government contractors, experts, volunteers and researchers and educators as necessary to complete assigned work; to other government agencies or other entities needing information regarding proposers or nominees as part of a joint application review process, or in order to coordinate programs or policy; and to another Federal agency, court, or party in a court or Federal administrative proceeding if the government is a party. Information about Principal Investigators may be added to the Reviewer file and used to select potential candidates to serve as peer reviewers or advisory committee members. See System of Record Notices, NSF-50, "Principal Investigator/Proposal File and Associated Records," and NSF-51, "Reviewer/Proposal File and Associated Records." Submission of the information is voluntary. Failure to provide full and complete information, however, may reduce the possibility of receiving an award.

An agency may not conduct or sponsor, and a person is not required to respond to, an information collection unless it displays a valid Office of Management and Budget (OMB) control number. The OMB control number for this collection is 3145-0058. Public reporting burden for this collection of information is estimated to average 120 hours per response, including the time for reviewing instructions. Send comments regarding the burden estimate and any other aspect of this collection of information, including suggestions for reducing this burden, to:

Suzanne H. Plimpton
Reports Clearance Officer
Policy Office, Division of Institution and Award Support
Office of Budget, Finance, and Award Management
National Science Foundation
Alexandria, VA 22314