Each year, the US National Science Foundation (NSF) organizes thematic international Global Center programs. This year, the call for funding is focused on challenging bioeconomy topics for future solutions. The deadline for applications is 11 June 2024.

The Global Centers program is an NSF-led effort, implemented in partnership with other international funding agencies, to encourage and support large-scale collaborative use-inspired research to address global challenges through the bioeconomy and may include research from any combination of scientific disciplines supported by NSF.

The program will expect proposals for holistic, multidisciplinary projects that demonstrate integration of all international teams as well as the relevant scientific disciplines, including educational and social sciences necessary to achieve use-inspired outcomes. The aim of the program is to provide inspiring and impactful research that addresses the global bioeconomy challenges through two main themes and the cross-cutting themes that support them to build the knowledge base.

Within the general theme of Bioeconomy, proposals submitted in the framework of this call must be centered on either or both of the two subtopics: 

  • Subtopic 1: Leveraging Biodiversity Across the Tree of Life to Power the Bioeconomy
  • Subtopic 2: Biofoundries, using the Design-Build-Test-Learn process in biology.

All proposals must integrate both of the two crosscutting themes into the proposed work: 

  • Crosscutting Theme A: Public engagement and co-generation of research activities to strengthen the global science and technology enterprise
  • Crosscutting Theme B: Workforce Development and Education. 

The deadline for applications is 11 June 2024.

Funding agencies in Finland

In Finland, the program is funded by Business Finland (7 million euros) and Research Council of Finland (3 million euros), whose contributions may complement each other. Finland is preparing to fund two Finnish consortia of €5 million as part of the international NSF Global Centers project consortium.

The funding period is 5 years, e.g. January 2025 – December 2029.

Application requirements

The application requirements (such as eligibility, budget specs and instructions for submission) differ depending on the national funder. The proposal to NSF must be submitted by the US lead organisation.

Read more on the pages below:

Info session: A webinar will be arranged 27 March 16-16:45. Read more and register here.

Please contact research@hanken.fi as soon as possible if you are interested in this call.