NSF-NIST Scholars in Residence

America's leadership in advanced biotechnology and the bioeconomy is vital to the global competitiveness, national security, and economic growth of the United States. The U.S. National Science Foundation (NSF) works to secure America's bioeconomy now and into the future through strategic investments in foundational and use-inspired research, technology translation, research infrastructure, and training. The U.S. National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST) has been a global leader in standards development, convening industry stakeholders and fostering standards adoption, and has long supported the development of standards in areas such as the bioeconomy as a key component of technology translation and commercialization. 

NSF and NIST are announcing a Bioeconomy Standards Scholar-in-Residence Initiative (hereinafter "the Initiative") to catalyze the development of standards and metrics for the bioeconomy. Through the Initiative, researchers (graduate students, postdoctoral fellows, faculty members, and professionals from industry) will have the opportunity to spend dedicated time in a NIST laboratory learning first-hand to develop standards in fields associated with the bioeconomy and biotechnology, and to foster adoption of those standards. These scholars will play a pivotal role in enabling commerce through the development of standards and metrics to help meet the following objectives:

• Develop machine readable code for one or more standardized protocols.
• Develop biological or physical objects that enable calibration and/or benchmarking.
• Enable AI-ready data standardization and integration.
• Other objectives identified jointly by the applying scholar and NIST.

NIST will focus on these broadly applicable objectives and workflows commonly used for engineering microorganisms. Robust workflows will greatly accelerate engineering biology R&D and will enable curation of high quality, AI-ready data for prediction of function from sequences. The Initiative will make use of the state-of-the-art integrated laboratory automation systems at the Living Measurement Systems Foundry within NIST, and the expertise of the full-time staff who will serve as Hosts. For more information see the "Engineering Biology Metrics and Technical Standards for the Global Bioeconomy" report. This report summarizes input from stakeholders (e.g., industrial developers across all levels of maturity, academics, funders, regulatory bodies) and documents the most enabling standards that should be developed for those who need them.

All protocols and data standards will be made publicly available immediately after verification.

NIST's intent is to use existing programs, such as the NIST Guest Researcher program, to provide laboratory and office space for the scholar, mentoring in standards development, as well as reagents and supplies for experiments carried out at NIST, subject to the policies and procedures of the relevant NIST program.

Proposals for NSF-NIST Bioeconomy Standards Scholars-in-Residence Initiative must align with NIST priorities for development of bioeconomy standards.

There is a two-step process for proposal submission, a white paper submitted to NIST followed by a full proposal submitted to NSF.

Proposers must submit a white paper (800 word maximum) to NIST outlining the proposed project to the following email address (synbiostandards@nist.gov). This paper should be accompanied by a biographical sketch of the applicant in the standard NSF format. If the potential scholar applicant is a postdoctoral fellow or graduate student who is not an NSF eligible PI, then both a biographical sketch of their NSF eligible PI mentor and of the potential scholar should be submitted.

The white paper should also indicate how the residency will be structured. The purpose of this white paper is to ensure that the suggested project aligns with the priorities and capabilities of NIST before a full proposal is submitted. Proposers are strongly encouraged to contact NIST prior to submission of a white paper. Based on the review of this white paper, NIST will supply the applicant with a letter of invitation.

Instructions for white paper submission are provided here: https://nsf-gov-resources.nsf.gov/files/nsf-nist-white-paper-submission-instructions.pdf. Proposers should submit the white paper to NIST prior to February 1 to allow adequate time for NIST to review the submission for alignment with priorities and for the proposer to then develop a full proposal for NSF submission, if invited.