Federal Agencies Award Nearly $50M for Robotics Research, Release Second Call for Proposals

The National Science Foundation (NSF), in partnership with NASA, the National Institutes of Health and the U.S. Department of Agriculture awarded nearly $50 million to grantees for the development and use of robots that cooperatively work with people to enhance individual human capabilities, performance and safety. These awards mark the first round of awards of the Obama administration's National Robotics Initiative (NRI), a federal program established in 2011 to spur innovative robotics research and applications emphasizing the realization of co-robots acting in direct support of and in a symbiotic relationship with human partners. Awardees represented universities from across the country including Arizona State University, Carnegie-Melon University, Georgia Institute of Technology, Idaho State University, Michigan State University, Stanford University and the University of Utah. Read the press release...

NSF and its partners also released a new $15 million funding announcement for the National Robotics Initiative to support up to 40 new robotics research projects across two funding tracks:

• Small projects — One or more investigators spanning 1 to 5 years (up to 30 awards); and,
• Large projects — Multi-disciplinary teams spanning 3 to 5 years (up to 10 awards).

Proposals for small projects are due December 11, 2012. For large projects, proposals are due Jan 23, 2013. Read the funding announcement...