National Science Foundation Fostering Grant Success

1
National Science Foundation Fostering Grant
Success

• 2007 Joint Statistical Meetings
• Salt Lake City
• Grace Yang,
• Program Director
• Div. Of Mathematical Sciences

2

• Introduction of the Division of
• Mathematical Sciences
• The Statistics Probability Program
• Funding opportunities
• Some research highlights in statistics
• Proposal writing tips

3
DMS in a Nutshell
Directorate
Division
Core Program
Algebra Number Theory
BIO
AST
Analysis
CISE
ENG
Applied Math
CHE
GEO
Computational Math
NSF
MPS
DMS
Geometric Analysis/Topology/ Foundations
SBE
DMR
Infrastructure
EHR
PHY
Math Biology
Statistics Probability
4
Division of Mathematical Sciences

• Supports a lion share of the mathematics research
  in the US
• Supports 50 of the research in statistics in the
  US
• Typical support 1-2 months of summer salary,
  some graduate student support.

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The Statistics Program

• Upcoming deadline for submitting proposals
• Window of opportunities Oct. 23Nov.7
• Supports the development of innovative,
  cutting edge research in statistical theory and
  methods
• Supports conferences, workshops, catalytic
  activities
• Single Principal Investigator
• Focused Research Group
• Interdisciplinary Research
• Integration of Research and Education
• International Collaboration

6
Statistics Program

• Proposals are reviewed by the panel. If
  necessary, mail reviews are used.
• Statistics Program Contacts
• Rong Chen rchen_at_nsf.gov (leaving)
• Gabor Szekley gszekley_at_nsf.gov
• Yazhen Wang Incoming
• Grace Yang gyang_at_nsf.gov

7
The Probability Program

• Supports research on the theory and applications
  of probability, subfields include
• Discrete probability
• Stochastic processes
• Interacting particle systems
• Stochastic differential and partial differential
  equations
• Markov processes
• Limit theory
• Program Contacts
• Dean Evasius devasius_at_nsf.gov

8
Funding Opportunities

• Beyond the core programs
• Golden time for statistics

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Career Program

• Goal Encourage young investigators to develop a
  research and teaching-oriented career in
  academia.
• 5-year 400k (min) awards. Division-wide
  competition, funding from the division and
  individual programs.

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CAREER (cont)

• PI must be a PhD, untenured, in a tenure-track
  position no previous CAREER award
• Highly competitive, prestigious award
• Proposals must include plan both for innovative
  research, and innovative education programs.
  Integrate research and education.
• International dimensions encouraged
• Research partners cannot be co-PIs
• Deadline in July (check the NSF website for
  update)

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• Cross-cutting topics on stochastic systems (known
  as AMC-SS)
• The Mathematical Science Priority Area (MSPA)
• Computational Science Training for Undergraduates
  in the Mathematical Sciences (CSUMS)
• National Institutes in the Mathematical Sciences

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Broad Themes of MSPA

• Interdisciplinary Research Focus Primarily on
  Three Scientific Themes
• mathematical and statistical challenges posed by
  massive data sets
• managing and stochastic modeling of uncertainty
• modeling complex nonlinear systems

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MSPA Overview - continued

• MSPA Specific Competitions
• Collaborations in the Mathematical Geosciences
  (CMG)
• Joint NSF/NIGMS Initiative on Mathematical
  Biology
• Upcoming Proposal Due Date Oct 1, 2007
• Interactions between Mathematical Sciences and
  Computer Science (MCS)
• Interdisciplinary Training for Undergraduates in
  Biological and Mathematical Sciences (UBM)
• MSPA Interactions
• DMS and Engineering
• DMS and Physical Sciences

14
National Institutes in Mathematical Sciences

• DMS currently supports seven math science
  institutes
• IMA, IPAM, MSRI
• ARCC (AIM Research Conference Center), IAS, MBI,
  SAMSI (resulting from 2001-2002 competition)
• Check out whats happening at those institutes
• http//www.mathinstitutes.org/

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CSUMSComputational Science Training for
Undergraduates in Mathematical Sciences

• New DMS-DUE program that came to existence in
  June 2006 (NSF 06-559)
• Future Proposal due dates
• October 17, 2006 October 17, 2007
• October 17, 2008 October 17, 2009
• Enhance computational aspects of the education
  and training of undergraduate students in
  mathematics and statistics
• Better prepare undergrad students for fields that
  require background in math/stat and computation
• Expand and broaden undergraduate research
  experiences
• Strengthen research/education culture of
  institutions, create models with broad influence

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Research Training Groups

• Next Proposal Deadline
• June 5, 2007
• Solicitation NSF 05-595 (EMSW21)
• Supports research vertically integrated research
  groups
• Focused on a major research theme
• At least three faculty members
• Involve undergrads, grads, and postdocs
• Students and postdocs must be US citizens or
  nationals
• Awards
• Duration 3-5 years
• Amount Up to 500,000 per year
• Number 3-5 awards per year

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International Collaborations

• Division of Mathematical Sciences encourages
  international collaborations
• Supports international conferences, travel grants
  for foreign investigators who are conducting
  collaborative researches with the US researchers
• Examples
• Institute for Pure and Applied Mathematics
  (IPAM)
• has started a program supporting US students
  to study
• in Beijing
• NSF-NSFC program supporting US
  mathematicians/statisticians to conduct research
  in China

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• Award Examples

19
Phenomenon of subdiffusion Conformation
fluctuation of biomolecules does not agree with
Brownian diffusion (Samuel Kou, Yale)
20
Chunming Zhang New statistical tools for
studying brain function. Event-related (efMRI).
Goal is to locate specific regions in human
brains when specific tasks are performed. Better
estimate of HRF is obtained by using
nonparametric statistical method with spatial
information over the entire brain.
21
Monthly global temp (dg C, relative to the
1961-60 mean), Jan.56-Dec.90Green curve is the
estimated trend under monotone constraint. Purple
line is outside the conf.band suggesting
nonlinear increasing pattern
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How do we get these pictures?

• Statistics Program Directors send you e-mail
  request for submission of highlights of your NSF
  sponsored research. Instructions for submission
  are provided
• Some of these get selected and posted on the NSF
  website as highlights
• Need your help to increase the response rate!

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Proposal Submission and writing tips
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Important Changes

• Submission window Oct 23 Nov 7
• Proposal will be returned without review if
  received after Nov 7
• Full panel review
• Only a small number of proposals will be mail
  reviewed

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Warning grants.gov is coming

• May be enforced for all FY07 proposals
• May be difficult to use
• Your SRO may not know how to handle it
• Treat Oct 23 as your deadline so you will have
  two weeks to fight with grants.gov
• Do not wait until the last minute to submit
• Dont ask us about questions relating to
  FastLane. Call FastLane.
• Read the solicitation carefully and follow it to
  the letter. -- We do check compliances

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NSF (07-140)

• New Proposal Award Policies Procedures Guide
  A Proposal must conform to
• Black font color and fort size of 10 points or
  larger
• Only use the type faces
• Window Arial, Helvetica, Palatino Linotype or
  Georgia
• Macintosh Arial, Helvetica, Palatino or Georgia
• TeX Computer Modern

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Dont

• Dont use small fonts or narrow margins (dont
  annoy reviewers)
• Dont use less than 15 pages
• Dont jam in too many ideas or problems
• Dont have typos (show respect)
• Dont be discouraged if you fail for a couple of
  times. Keep trying

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Broader Impact

• At least half page
• Societal impact
• Education course development
• Training Graduate and undergraduate, under
  represented groups
• Dissemination publications, talks, making
  software available to public, e.g. R code
• Be innovative

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• Dont blame us if you dont get an award
• (Not enough money to fund all the meritous
  proposals)

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• Check the NSF website regularly
• Need your help to increase to the response rate
  for submission of highlights and serving on the
  panel

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• Thank You
• Grace Yang
• gyang_at_nsf.gov