RFP NCEAS Call for Working Group Proposals

[Chris Merkord]

Full details can be found here: http://www.nceas.ucsb.edu/rfp

 

Overview of Call for Working Group Proposals

 

The National Center for Ecological Analysis and Synthesis (NCEAS) was initiated in 1995 to promote synthesis, analysis, and multidisciplinary collaboration directed toward addressing important questions in ecology and allied disciplines. The Center seeks projects that address the development and testing of important ecological ideas and theories using existing data, cutting-edge analysis of ecological information, research on data access and use, use of sound science in policy and management decisions, and investigating sociological issues that pertain to the science of ecology.

 

NCEAS requests proposals for Working Groups, with research to begin before the end of 2012. Funding is available for 6-12 projects. Our Science Advisory Board is most interested in proposals anticipated to return high impact results within the first year of the project, although researchers are invited to consider how their research might proceed over a 2 year period. Projects with explicit applications to biodiversity conservation, natural resource management, or disease ecology are of particular interest, but we will consider any topic that is aligned with our broader mission. Project co-funding is also welcomed. Principal investigators are strongly encouraged to contact NCEAS (proposal@nceas.ucsb.edu) to briefly discuss ideas before submitting proposals.

 

The Center provides comprehensive in-house computing capabilities, including support and training for resident and visiting scientists. As a result, NCEAS scientists become familiar with information management and develop a sense of its importance to their research. Training is enhanced because the Center is often viewed as a neutral party, dedicated to the general notion of data access rather than focusing on one type of data or approach.

 

It is critical that proposed activities take advantage of the Center's unique resources. NCEAS provides:

• an intellectually stimulating environment
  
• exceptional scientific support and computing facilities
  
• excellent linkages to a wide array of institutions and organizations dealing with similar issues
  
• access to UCSB's large pool of expertise in the ecological and environmental sciences, and
  
• physically attractive location and facility in downtown Santa Barbara
  

Data Expectations — Because NCEAS emphasizes using existing information, we have a strong commitment to developing means to locate, access, analyze and make data broadly available and to imbuing scientists and other users with a sense of sharing information. To this end we require that resident scientists and working groups agree, prior to initiating their activities at the Center, to making derived data (data resulting from analyses from which the original data cannot be reconstituted) publicly available. Furthermore, we strongly encourage researchers to document their original data and make these publicly accessible as well. See the NCEAS Data and Information Policy and Data Accessibilitysection below for details

 

Proposal Deadlines

 

Proposals for Working Groups should be submitted by 31 August 2012. Decisions will be announced in mid-October