CFP: http://www.nsf.gov/pubs/2011/nsf11589/nsf11589.htm
Deadline: December 14, 2011
Awards: Estimated program budget, size and number of awards is subject to the availability of funds. Pending availability of funds, approximately $5,000,000 will be available for proposals submitted in response to this solicitation. The typical size of a S2I2 Conceptualization award is expected to be $500,000 for 1 year.
The SI2 program includes three classes of awards:
- Scientific Software Elements (SSE): SSE awards target small groups that will create and deploy robust software elements for which there is a demonstrated need that will advance one or more significant areas of science and engineering.
- Scientific Software Integration (SSI): SSI awards target larger, interdisciplinary teams organized around the development and application of common software infrastructure aimed at solving common research problems. SSI awards will result in sustainable community software frameworks serving a diverse community.
- Scientific Software Innovation Institutes (S2I2): S2I2 awards will focus on the establishment of long-term hubs of excellence in software infrastructure and technologies that will serve a research community of substantial size and disciplinary breadth.
This solicitation is focused on the Scientific Software Innovation Institutes (S2I2) class of awards. Two subclasses of awards are planned for the S2I2 part of this program: Conceptualization Awards, which are planning awards aimed at organizing an interdisciplinary community and understanding their software requirements and challenges, and Implementation Awards, which will be made to implement community plans for software infrastructure, such as those developed by the conceptualization awards. Only S2I2 Conceptualization Awards will be made in FY12.
Scientific Software Innovation Institutes (S2I2) will focus on the establishment of long-term hubs of excellence in software infrastructure and technologies, which will serve a research community of substantial size and disciplinary breadth. It is expected that outcomes of S2I2 goes beyond the software itself and also includes the infrastructure and process by which software is developed and sustained in response to, and to successfully enable, transformative new science. These institutes will provide expertise, processes and architectures, resources, and implementation mechanism to transform computational science and engineering innovations and community software into robust and sustained software infrastructure for enabling science and engineering, which in turn will transform research practices and productivity. S2I2 proposals are expected to bring together interdisciplinary teams of scientists, engineers, and educators together with software engineers and technologists.
S2I2 awards are subdivided into Conceptualization and Implementation awards which are described below. Only Conceptualization awards will be made in FY12.
(a) Conceptualization Awards: S2I2 Conceptualization Awards are planning awards aimed at organizing an interdisciplinary community and understanding their software requirements and challenges. Example activities that may be undertaken as part of this award include focused workshops, special sessions at professional meetings, sandpits, focus groups, etc. These awards will typically be 1 year in duration. The product of a conceptualization award will be a strategic plan for enabling science and education through a sustained software infrastructure that will be freely available to the community, and will address the following elements:
- the science community and the specific grand challenge research questions that the S2I2 will support;
- specific software elements and frameworks that are relevant to the community, the sustainability challenges that need to be addressed, and why addressing these challenges will be transformative;
- appropriate software architectures and lifecycle processes, development, testing and deployment methodologies, validation and verification processes, end usability and interface considerations, and required infrastructure and technologies;
- the required organizational, personnel and management structures and operational processes;
- the requirements and necessary mechanisms for human resource development, including integration of education and training, mentoring of students, postdoctoral fellows as well as software professionals, and proactively addressing diversity and broadening participation;
- potential approaches for long-term sustainability of the software infrastructure as well as the software; and
- potential risks including risks associated with establishment and execution, necessary infrastructure and associated technologies, community engagement, and long-term sustainability.
The strategic plan resulting from the conceptualization phase is expected to serve as the conceptual design upon which a subsequent S2I2 Implementation proposal could be based.
