External Funding

OPPORTUNITY: Leveraging Network Infrastructure to Conduct Innovative Research for Women, Children, Pregnant and Lactating Women, and Persons with Disabilities (UG3/UH3 – Clinical Trial Optional)

FUNDING AGENCY: NIH

AWARD AMOUNT: $6,250,000

FULL PROPOSAL DEADLINE: July 15, 2026

DESCRIPTION: The purpose of this Notice of Funding Opportunity (NOFO) is to leverage NICHD clinical research network infrastructure relevant to infants, children, women, including those who are pregnant and lactating, and persons with disabilities to conduct innovative, multisite, investigator-initiated clinical trials and observational studies.

This NOFO’s goals are to conduct and support laboratory research, clinical trials, and studies with people that explore health processes. NICHD researchers examine growth and development, biologic and reproductive functions, behavior patterns, and population dynamics to protect and maintain the health of all people. To examine the impact of disabilities, diseases, and defects on the lives of individuals. With this information, the NICHD hopes to restore, increase, and maximize the capabilities of people affected by disease and injury. To sponsor training programs for scientists, doctors, and researchers to ensure that NICHD research can continue. By training these professionals in the latest research methods and technologies, the NICHD will be able to conduct its research and make health research progress until all children, adults, families, and populations enjoy good health. NICHD’s mission is to lead research and training to understand human development, improve reproductive health, enhance the lives of children and adolescents, and optimize abilities for all.

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OPPORTUNITY: Peer Reviewed Medical Research Program: Research Advancement Award

FUNDING AGENCY: DOD

AWARD AMOUNT: $1,400,000

LETTER OF INTENT DEADLINE: July 16, 2026

FULL PROPOSAL DEADLINE: July 30, 2026

DESCRIPTION: The FY26 DoD Peer Reviewed Medical Research Program (PRMRP) Research Advancement Award supports use-inspired basic research that builds on preliminary data to advance understanding of diseases and conditions relevant to military and public health. Projects may span a wide range of disciplines and approaches, so long as they address one of the program’s congressionally directed topic areas and aim to generate impactful knowledge with potential to improve patient care or quality of life. This opportunity is intended for investigators seeking to validate or expand promising early findings, with projects ranging from hypothesis-driven studies to the extension of more mature datasets. Awards support collaborative and innovative work with clear relevance to key biomedical challenges. Researchers from diverse fields are encouraged to explore whether their work aligns with the program’s broad thematic areas and strategic goals, particularly where it may have dual-use relevance for military and civilian populations.

NOTE: See NOFO on the link provided for details of priority areas.

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OPPORTUNITY: Accelerating the Pace of Substance Use Research Using Existing Data

FUNDING AGENCY: NIH

AWARD AMOUNT: $500,000–$1,000,000

FULL PROPOSAL DEADLINE: July 17, 2026

FULL PROPOSAL DEADLINE: Proposals Accepted by 03 December 2026 as well.

DESCRIPTION: NIDA intends to commit $2 million in FY 2026 to award 2-4 applications, with an additional $2 million for 2-4 applications focused on HIV research, in response to this and the companion R21 RFA RFA-DA-26-056. Application budgets are not limited but need to reflect the actual needs of the proposed project. The scope of the proposed project should determine the project period. The maximum project period is 5 years. Abstract: The purpose of this notice of funding opportunity (NOFO) is to invite applications proposing innovative analysis of existing social science, behavioral, administrative, and neuroimaging data to study the etiology and epidemiology of substance using behaviors (defined as alcohol, tobacco, prescription, and other substances) and related disorders, prevention of substance use and HIV, and health service utilization. This NOFO encourages the analyses of public use and other extant community-based or clinical datasets to their full potential in order to increase our knowledge of etiology, trajectories of substance using behaviors and their consequences including morbidity and mortality, risk and resilience in the development of psychopathology, strategies to guide the development, testing, implementation, and delivery of high quality, effective and efficient services for the prevention and treatment of substance use disorder and HIV. Primary data collection is not allowed for applications in response to this NOFO.

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OPPORTUNITY: NSF Trailblazer Engineering Impact Award (TRAILBLAZER)

FUNDING AGENCY: NSF

AWARD AMOUNT: $3,000,000

LETTER OF INTENT DEADLINE: January 20, 2026

PRELIMINARY APP DEADLINE: March 10, 2025

FULL PROPOSAL DEADLINE: July 24, 2026

DESCRIPTION: The NSF Trailblazer Engineering Impact Award (TRAILBLAZER) program supports individual investigators who propose novel research projects with the potential to innovatively and creatively address new areas of fundamental or applied research, catalyze development of new industries or capabilities that increase the leadership position for the country, and/or make significant progress towards addressing a national need or grand challenge, particularly in current priority areas including, but not limited to, artificial intelligence (AI), bioengineering, quantum engineering, robotics, and nuclear engineering. TRAILBLAZER will support engineers and scientists who leverage their distinctive track record of innovation and creativity to pursue new research directions that are distinct from their previous or current research areas. All funded TRAILBLAZER projects will form an NSF TRAILBLAZER cohort, and principal investigators will be expected to participate in an annual meeting. TRAILBLAZER investigators may also be invited to additional activities.

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OPPORTUNITY: Urban, Indoor, and other Emerging Agricultural Production Research, Education, and Extension Initiative

FUNDING AGENCY: USDA

AWARD AMOUNT: $50,000–$500,000

FULL PROPOSAL DEADLINE: July 27, 2026

DESCRIPTION: The UIE program (ALN 10.333) supports research, education, and extension activities through competitive grants designed to address key production and market challenges of local, regional, and national importance. The authorization covers the full food value chain, including production, harvesting, transportation, aggregation, packaging, distribution, and market development.

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OPPORTUNITY: DoD Broad Funding Announcement

FUNDING AGENCY: US Army Medical Research and Acquisitions

AWARD AMOUNT: $140,000–$4,500,000

FULL PROPOSAL DEADLINE: Deadline Varies

DESCRIPTION: The United States Army Research and Material Command has announced several (50+) NOFOs for medical research. Due throughout June and July, these opportunities range in funding amounts from $140,000 to $4,500,000. Topics include Alzheimer’s, Breast Cancer, Lateral Sclerosis, Cancer research, Spinal Cord Injury, Multiple Sclerosis, Hearing Restoration, Lung Cancer, Pancreatic Cancer, Tuberous Sclerosis, Ovarian Cancer, Tick-borne Disesase, Arthritis, Vision Research, Lupus, HIV/AIDS and prevention.

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OPPORTUNITY: Broad Agency Announcement for Extramural Biomedical Research and Development

FUNDING AGENCY: USAMRAA

AWARD AMOUNT: $10,000,000

FULL PROPOSAL DEADLINE: July 31, 2026

DESCRIPTION: A primary emphasis of the USSOCOM Biomedical, Human Performance, and Canine Research Program is to identify and develop techniques, knowledge products, and materiel (medical devices, drugs, and biologics) for early intervention in life-threatening injuries; prolonged field care (PFC); human performance optimization; canine medicine/performance; brain health; immune response; automation of systematic reviews and metanalysis; and novel post-traumatic stress, depression, and anxiety treatment. Special Operations Forces (SOF) medical personnel place a premium on medical equipment that is small, lightweight, ruggedized, modular, multi-use, and designed for operation in extreme environments. The equipment must be easy to use, require minimum maintenance, and have low power consumption. Drugs and biologics should optimally not require refrigeration or other special handling. All materiel and related techniques must be simple, effective, and easily modified for commercialization. Research projects may apply existing scientific and technical knowledge for which concept and/or patient care efficacy have already been demonstrated to meet SOF requirements. The proposed research must be relevant to active-duty service members, veterans, military beneficiaries, and/or the American public. Relevant research must be responsive to the health care needs of the U.S. Armed Forces, family members of the U. S. Armed Forces, U.S. Veterans, and civilian populations.

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OPPORTUNITY: Promise Neighborhoods Program

FUNDING AGENCY: U.S. Dept of Education

AWARD AMOUNT: $6,000,000

FULL PROPOSAL DEADLINE: August 6, 2026

DESCRIPTION: The purpose of the PN program is to significantly improve the academic and developmental outcomes of children and youth living in the most distressed communities of the United States, including ensuring school readiness, high school graduation, and access to a community-based continuum of high-quality services. The FY 2026 competition includes priorities, selection criteria, and requirements. The absolute priorities are: Non-Rural and Non-Tribal Communities, Rural Communities, and Tribal Communities. The competitive preference priorities are: Promoting Evidence-Based Literacy, Meaningful Learning Opportunities—High-Quality Interventions or Accelerated Learning Supports for Students and Supporting Families, and Meaningful Learning Opportunities—Career Connected Learning.

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OPPORTUNITY: Human-Environment and Geographical Sciences Program (HEGS)

FUNDING AGENCY: NSF

AWARD AMOUNT: $20,000–500,000

FULL PROPOSAL DEADLINE: August 7, 2026

DESCRIPTION: The objective of the Human-Environment and Geographical Sciences Program is to support basic scientific research about the nature, causes, consequences, or evolution of the spatial dimensions of human behaviors, activities, and dynamics as well as their interactions with environmental and social processes across a range of scales. Contemporary geographical research encompasses diverse research traditions and methodologies. Recognizing the breadth of the field’s contributions to science, the HEGS Program welcomes proposals for empirically grounded, theoretically engaged, methodologically rigorous, and generalizable research that advances geographical and geospatial sciences. Because the National Science Foundation’s mandate is to support fundamental scientific research, the HEGS program cannot fund research that takes as its primary goal humanistic interpretations or findings that are not generalizable or reproducible. HEGS welcomes proposals that utilize quantitative, qualitative, or mixed methods in novel ways. However, a proposal that applies geographical or geospatial methods to a geographic problem without proposing how that problem provides an opportunity to make a theory-testing or theory-expanding contribution to geographical science, broadly defined, will be returned without review. HEGS supported projects are expected to yield results that will enhance, expand, and transform fundamental geographical theory and geospatial methods and that will have broader impacts that benefit society. Generally, successful HEGS proposals should describe clear and detailed plans for data collection (including sample selection if appropriate), justification for proposed methods, plans for data analysis, attention to confounding variables, and efforts to address biases (e.g., confirmatory biases, selection biases, etc.). Competitive HEGS proposals should substantiate the validity of findings and generalizability to broader contexts.

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OPPORTUNITY: Scaling AI Safety for a Multi-Agent World

FUNDING AGENCY: Schmidt Sciences, Google, ARIA, Cooperative AI Foundation

AWARD AMOUNT: $300,000–$1,000,000

FULL PROPOSAL DEADLINE: August 8, 2026

DESCRIPTION: AI agents are increasingly being deployed in multi-agent settings. While most present-day cases involve teams of agents orchestrated by a single actor (or ‘principal’), we are beginning to see the emergence of more complex ecosystems of agents deployed by different actors across shared digital infrastructure. These multi-principal, multi-agent interactions create new opportunities for cooperation and shared benefit (Dafoe et al., 2021), but also new risks, which means focusing only on the safety and alignment of individual models is insufficient (Hammond et al., 2025).

More research is therefore urgently needed to understand safety and risk through a system-level, multi-agent lens – developing methods to analyse emergent collective dynamics, building infrastructure for trustworthy interaction between agents, and creating scalable approaches for monitoring and control of increasingly complex networks of AI systems. While some of these problems will be addressed by market forces, we expect others to fall through the gaps. This funding call aims to fill those gaps, catalysing the foundational scientific research needed to understand, evaluate, and control risks emerging from large-scale ecosystems of interacting AI agents, deployed by multiple actors.

The call has been inspired by three recent papers. First, Google DeepMind’s “Distributional AGI Safety” outlines the safety implications of highly capable AI systems emerging not as single monolithic agents, but through coordinated networks of specialised sub-AGI systems with differential access to tools, data, memory, and resources. Second, ARIA’s “Scaling Trust” programme thesis argues that, in a world of increasingly capable networked agents acting across digital and physical environments, coordination infrastructure that lets agents enter into ‘contracts’ securely, programmatically, at scale, and without intermediaries can preserve pluralism and unlock new forms of coordination. Finally, the Cooperative AI Foundation’s “Multi-Agent Risks from Advanced AI” report argues that interacting populations of AI agents introduce qualitatively new failure modes beyond single-agent systems, including collusion, conflict, destabilising dynamics, emergent agency, and novel multi-agent security vulnerabilities. These perspectives in turn build on earlier work by Minsky (1986), Huberman (1988), Wooldridge & Jennings (1995), Manheim (2018), Drexler (2019), Critch & Krueger (2020), Clifton (2020), Dafoe et al. (2020), Conitzer & Oesterheld (2023), Chan et al. (2025), Kolt (2025), Hadfield & Koh (2025), and Tomašev et al. (2025), among many others.

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OPPORTUNITY: Early Stage Innovations for In Situ Resource Utilization

FUNDING AGENCY: NASA

AWARD AMOUNT: $1,500,000

FULL PROPOSAL DEADLINE: August 13, 2026

DESCRIPTION: Through ESI, Space Technology Research Grants (STRG) Program within RTMD solicits proposals from U.S. institutions of higher education (IHEs) for innovative, early-stage space technology research of high priority to NASA. Proposals are sought on specific space technologies that are currently at low Technology Readiness Levels (TRLs). The solicitation exclusively seeks proposals that are primarily responsive to civil-space needs and use cases and not terrestrial and/or non-civil-space applications.

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OPPORTUNITY: NIH Director’s New Innovator Award (DP2 Clinical Trial Optional)

FUNDING AGENCY: NIH

AWARD AMOUNT: $475,000

FULL PROPOSAL DEADLINE: August 17, 2026

DESCRIPTION: The NIH Director’s New Innovator Award supports early-stage investigators of exceptional creativity who propose bold and highly innovative research projects with the potential to produce a major impact on broad, important areas relevant to the mission of NIH. Applications in any area within the biomedical sciences are welcome; topics may involve basic, translational, or clinical research. The NIH Director’s New Innovator Award complements other ongoing efforts by NIH and its Institutes and Centers to fund early-stage investigators. The NIH Director’s New Innovator Award is a component of the High-Risk, High-Reward Research (HRHR) program of the NIH Common Fund.

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OPPORTUNITY: Innovative Approaches to Kidney Cancer Research

FUNDING AGENCY: DOD

AWARD AMOUNT: $120,000

FULL PROPOSAL DEADLINE: August 21, 2026

DESCRIPTION: Supports highly innovative, untested, potentially groundbreaking concepts in kidney cancer.

NOTE: Letter of intent required before submitting a full application.

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OPPORTUNITY: Innovative Approaches to Kidney Cancer Research

FUNDING AGENCY: DOD

AWARD AMOUNT: $120,000

FULL PROPOSAL DEADLINE: August 21, 2026

DESCRIPTION: Supports highly innovative, untested, potentially groundbreaking concepts in kidney cancer.

NOTE: Letter of intent required before submitting a full application.

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OPPORTUNITY: NIH Director’s Transformative Research Award for Individual and Group Science (R01 Clinical Trial Optional)

FUNDING AGENCY: NIH

AWARD AMOUNT: Application budgets are not limited but must be commensurate with the scope of the proposed research.

FULL PROPOSAL DEADLINE: September 3, 2026

DESCRIPTION: The NIH Director’s Transformative Research Award supports individual scientists or groups of scientists proposing bold, groundbreaking, exceptionally innovative, original, and/or unconventional research with the potential to create new scientific paradigms, establish entirely new and improved clinical approaches, or develop transformative technologies. Applications in any area within the biomedical sciences are welcome; topics may involve basic, translational, or clinical research. No preliminary data are required. Projects must clearly demonstrate, based on the strength of the logic, a compelling potential to produce a major impact in a broad area of relevance to the NIH. The NIH Director’s Transformative Research Award is a component of the High-Risk, High-Reward Research (HRHR) program of the NIH Common Fund.

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