Issue: ORN-2026-07
NJIT Research Newsletter includes recent awards, and announcements of research related seminars, webinars, national and federal research news related to research funding, and Grant Opportunity Alerts (with links to sections). The Newsletter is posted on the NJIT Research Website https://research.njit.edu/funding-opportunities.
Special Announcements
CTR Workshop on PFAS Challenges:
Translational Research and Technology Innovations for PFAS Decontaminations
Full Announcement and Preliminary Program: Click Here
Sponsored by
NSF ART (Accelerating Research Translation) Program at NJIT
National Academy of Inventor (NAI) – NJIT Chapter
Co-organizers and Co-Chairs
Atam Dhawan, Senior Vice Provost for Research, NJIT; Executive Director – Center for Translational Research
Nick DeNichilo, Vice Co-Chair, NJIT Board of Trustees; Former President &CEO at Mott MacDonald – North America (retired)
Siavash Isazadeh, Ph.D., P.E., Sr. Technical. Director, Technical, Strategy & Innovation, Veolia-North America
Richard Calbi Jr. P.E., P.P., Director of Operations – Ridgewood Water, NJ
Stewart Abrams, Director of Remediation Technology, Langan Engineering & Environmental Service
Date and Venue: April 24, 2026, 8.00 AM – 5.00 PM; Ballroom A&B, NJIT Campus Center
Breakfast and Light Lunch Provided
Registration Requested: Please Click Here to Register Now
The Center for Translational Research (CTR) workshop on PFAS Challenges is focused on translational research and innovative technologies for detecting and managing PFAS related contaminants in water, soil, air, infrastructure and consumable products. The CTR Workshop will engage faculty, research staff, undergraduate and graduate students and postdocs and external partners including major NJ universities, industry, utilities, business accelerators, government and community stakeholders who are pursuing or are interested in translational research and innovative technology development for removing the PFAS related contaminations in water, soil, air, infrastructure and environment for sustainable societies.
Who Should Attend: Faculty, research staff, undergraduate and graduate students and postdocs and external partners including major NJ universities, industry, utilities, business accelerators, government and community stakeholders who are pursuing or are interested in translational research and innovative technology development for removing the PFAS related contaminations in water, soil, air, infrastructure and environment for sustainable societies should attend and would be benefited from the workshop.
Why You Should Attend: As a follow up to the 2025 CTR PFAS Workshop on PFAS Challenges, the 2026 CTR workshop will focus on the recent advances and developments in PFAS detection, monitoring, destruction and remediation technologies with a new strategic initiative of establishing the New Jersey PFAS Partnership Innovation Consortium (NJ PFAS-PIC) as an industry-university-government-community ecosystem.
The CTR 2026 workshop attendees will have the opportunity to learn about recent developments and current and future challenges in PFAS decontamination technologies and associated regulatory policies for its societal impact from the leaders in industry, academia and government sectors.
In addition, the Industry-University-Community Showcase on Technology Innovations in PFAS Decontamination will feature more than 30 companies, academic research centers and laboratories, and global, national, state and regional utilities working in the cutting-edge of technology innovations and deployment for addressing the critical challenges of PFAS management in environment, soil, water, consumable products and infrastructure.
Preliminary Agenda
8.00 AM – 8.30 AM: Registration and Meet & Greet Networking with Breakfast
8.30 AM – 8.40 AM: Welcome Remarks and Program Outline
Atam Dhawan, Senior Vice Provost and Executive Director
Teik Lim, President, New Jersey Institute of Technology
Pradeep Fulay, Program Director, NSF – Accelerating Research Translation (ART) Program, Technology, Innovation and Partnership (TIP) Directorate
8.40 AM – 9.00 AM: Distinguished Keynote Presentation: Government Agency Perspective
New Jersey Department of Environmental Protection – To be announced
9.00 AM – 9.45 AM: Fireside Chat Session: NJ State and Industry Leaders on the Vision to Address PFAS Challenges with Innovation Ecosystems
NJ State Senate Leader – To be announced
Assemblywoman Lisa Swain, NJ Assembly Appropriations Chair
Speaker from Jersey Water Works – To be announced
Kendra Morris - Chief Executive Officer of Veolia's Regulated Water Business in North America
Moderator: Atam Dhawan
Distinguished Keynotes Session
9.45 AM -10.00 AM: Distinguished Keynote Presentation -1: PFAS and Clean Water Advocacy
Amy Goldsmith, NJ State Director, Clean Water Action, Clean Water Fund
10.00 AM – 10.15 AM: Distinguished Keynote Presentation -2: A Case Study
Richard Calbi Jr. P.E., P.P., Director of Operations – Ridgewood Water
10.15 AM – 10.30 AM: Q&A Panel with Distinguished Keynote Speakers
Moderator: Stewart Abrams, Director of Remediation Technology, Langan Engineering & Environmental Services
10.30AM – 10.45 AM: Coffee Break
10.45 AM – 11.45 PM: Distinguished Panel Session: Translational Research in PFAS Decontamination Technologies – Academic Translational Research Perspective
Dr. Robert Laumbach, M.D., M.P.H., C.I.H., Associate Professor of Environmental and Occupational Health and Justice, Director, Community Outreach and Engagement, Center for Environmental Exposure and Disease (CEED), Rutgers School of Public Health
Peter Jaffe, William L. Knapp ’47 Professor of Civil Engineering, Civil and Environmental Engineering, Princeton University
Arjun Venkatesan, Associate Professor, Civil and Environmental Engineering and Director, Emerging Contaminants Research Laboratory (ECRL), NJIT
Dibyendu “Dibs” Sarkar, Professor, Environmental Engineering, Founding Director, Stevens Center for Sustainability, Stevens Institute of Technology
Michael Van Ter Sluis, Vice President – Entrepreneurship, New Jersey Innovation Institute
Moderator: Judith Sheft, Executive Director New Jersey Commission on Science, Innovation and Technology
11.45 PM – 12.30 PM: PFAS Showcase Rapid Pitch Session -1: Technologies in Translation Presentations
Moderator: Shawn Chester, Professor, Mechanical and Industrial Engineering, and Associate Vice Provost for Research Collaborations, Office of Research, NJIT
11.45 PM – 12.30 PM: Parallel Session on Health Impact and Regulations
Moderator: Ali Pajooman, PFAS Program Manager for New Jersey at Veolia North America
12.30 PM - 1.15 PM: Lunch with Experts and Networking
1.15 AM - 2.15 PM: Distinguished Panel Session: Translational Research in PFAS Decontamination Technologies – Industry Technology Translation Perspective
Jason Hnatko, Engineer Manager for Emerging Contaminants, Allonnia
Charles Shafer, Director, Research and Testing Laboratory, CDM Smith
Brent Alspach, Director of Applied Research, Arcadis
Kenan Ozekin, Chief Research Officer, The Water Research Foundation
Lauren Weinrich, Research Analyst, American Water
Moderator: Siavash Isazadeh, Sr. Technical. Director, Technical, Strategy & Innovation, Veolia-North America
2.15 PM – 3.00 PM: PFAS Showcase Rapid Pitch Session -2: Technology Validation and Partnerships Presentations
Moderator: Shawn Chester, Professor, Mechanical and Industrial Engineering, and Associate Vice Provost for Research Collaborations, Office of Research, NJIT
2.15 PM – 3.00 PM: Parallel Session on Communication and Advocacy
Moderator: Paula Figueroa-Vega, Director, Jersey Water Works Collaborative & Organizational Development, New Jersey Future
3.00 PM – 3.30 PM: NJ PFAS-PIC Launch and Next Steps
Siavash Isazadeh, Sr. Technical. Director, Veolia-North America
Paige Jacob, PFAS Chemistry Program Manager, Battelle
Paula Figueroa, Director, Jersey Water Works
Richard Calbi Jr, Director of Operations – Ridgewood Water
Craig Arnold, Vice Dean of Innovation, Princeton University
Michael Zwick, Senior Vice President Research, Rutgers University
Edmund Synakowski, Senior Vice Provost for Research and Innovation, Stevens Institute of Technology
Moderator: Atam Dhawan
3.30 PM – 3.45 PM: Coffee Break and Networking
3.45 PM – 5.00 PM: Industry-University-Community Showcase: Technology Innovations in PFAS Decontamination
Grant Opportunity Alerts
NSF: Pathways to Enable Secure Open-Source Ecosystems (PESOSE); National Quantum and Nanotechnology Infrastructure (NQNI)
NIH: Forecast: NLM Institutional Grants for Research Training in Biomedical Informatics, Data Science, and AI; Advancing Bioinformatics, Translational Bioinformatics and Computational Biology Research (R01); BRAIN Initiative: Research Resource Grants for Technology Integration and Dissemination (U24)
Department of Defense/US Army/DARPA/ONR: Carderock BAA; ERDC Broad Agency Announcement
Department of Energy: Energy Frontier Research Centers (EFRCs)
NASA: B.2 Heliophysics Foundational Research
Recent Research Grant and Contract Awards
In the News
Republican lawmakers ask GAO to review current AI regulatory landscape: Lawmakers on the House Science, Space, and Technology Committee are asking the Government Accountability Office to conduct a “comprehensive review” of current federal and state laws regulating artificial intelligence to inform future legislative efforts. Committee Chairman Brian Babin, R-Texas, and Research and Technology Subcommittee Chairman Jay Obernolte, R-Calif., sent the letter to Comptroller General Gene Dodaro on Wednesday. The lawmakers cited policy actions like President Donald Trump’s executive order on AI signed during his first term in 2019 and an Office of Management and Budget memorandum from 2020 on agency rulemaking — along with recommendations from congressional AI working groups. More information is posted on the NextGov website.
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Tech bills: AI science challenge; protecting copyright content; and more: Sen. Cory Booker, D-N.J., introduced a bill on Feb. 9 that would ask the director of the National Science Foundation to spearhead award competitions for new artificial intelligence research and development. The AI Grand Challenges Act of 2026 seeks to create a new program helmed by NSF to incentivize new research in AI fields, particularly focusing on key policy areas like national security, cybersecurity, health, energy, transportation, manufacturing, quantum computing, materials science and more. The only mandated challenge in the measure would direct the head of the National Institutes of Health to take part in establishing a health-AI contest focused on cancer detection. The National Artificial Intelligence Advisory Committee would help NSF construct and launch the program, which would then be managed by the General Services Administration through the domain Challenges.gov. In keeping with the Stevenson-Wydler Technology Innovation Act of 1980, judges for the contest may include individuals from the private sector. More information is posted on the NextGov website.
Webinars and Events
Research Grant Opportunities:
National Science Foundation
National Institutes of Health
Department of Defense
Department of Energy
NASA
Proposal Submission and Streamlyne Information
The NJIT Proposal Submission Guidelines and Policy provides the expected institutional timeline for proposal submission. Streamlyne User Manuals are posted on https://research.njit.edu/streamlyne. For contact information on proposal submission, pre-award services and post-award grant management, please visit research website https://research.njit.edu/researchers and https://research.njit.edu/contact.