The National Science Foundation has invested more than $35 million in new research projects to advance the domestic production of biological materials and create cybersecurity and sustainability approaches for the biomanufacturing sector.
Ten projects will each receive up to $3 million in research grants over four years through the Future Manufacturing program for fundamental research and workforce development and 11 projects will each get up to $500,000 in seed grants to develop multidisciplinary teams and generate preliminary results relevant to their proposed research grant proposals, NSF said Thursday.
“NSF will continue to push the frontiers of what is possible — advances such as the manufacturing of biological therapeutics, manufacturing in space and underwater, and optimizing manufacturing with AI — to improve our nation’s prosperity, competitiveness and quality of life,” said NSF Director Sethuraman Panchanathan.
To date, the agency has invested more than $137 million in Future Manufacturing projects to overcome scientific, technological, economic, educational and social barriers to advancing manufacturing capabilities for U.S. companies.