National Science Foundation (NSF)
The National Cancer Institute (NCI), part of the National Institutes of Health, and the National Science Foundation (NSF) formed a collaboration in September 2005 to establish integrative training environments for U.S. science and engineering doctoral students to focus on interdisciplinary nanoscience and technology research with applications to cancer. Through this partnership, $12.8 million in grants are being awarded to four institutions over the next five years.
The National Science Foundation (NSF) is an independent federal agency created by Congress in 1950 "to promote the progress of science; to advance the national health, prosperity, and welfare; to secure the national defense…" With an annual budget of about $5.5 billion, NSF is the funding source for approximately 20 percent of all federally supported basic research conducted by America's colleges and universities. In many fields such as mathematics, computer science and the social sciences, NSF is the major source of federal backing.
The Integrative Graduate Education and Research Traineeship (IGERT) program, initiated in 1997 and now comprising approximately 150 projects nationwide, has been developed to meet the challenges of educating Ph.D. scientists, engineers, and educators in the U.S. with the interdisciplinary backgrounds, deep knowledge in chosen disciplines, and technical, professional, and personal skills to become, in their own careers, the leaders and creative agents for change. The program is intended to catalyze a cultural change in graduate education, for students, faculty, and institutions, by establishing innovative new models for graduate education and training for collaborative research that transcends traditional disciplinary boundaries. Projects funded through the IGERT program seek to increase the participation of underrepresented groups, including women and minorities, in doctorate programs in the engineering, science and mathematics fields, thereby tapping into a bountiful resource opportunity to advance cancer research.
For more information on the NCI-NSF collaboration, click here.
For more information on the National Science Foundation, please visit http://www.nsf.gov.
For more information on the IGERT Program, please visit http://www.igert.org.
For additional information on the specific programs awarded, please visit:
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