NSF MRI: Decreasing the Probability of Rejection

1. NSF MRI: Decreasing the Probability of Rejection Jeanine Cook Klipsch School of Electrical and Computer Engineering New Mexico State University

2. History • Very computationally intensive research, but no infrastructure to do it! • Submitted white paper to VPR  assembled team • Scrambled to get into QEM • Elected PI (even though most junior) • Began writing, based on what I learned at QEM • If you haven’t started writing, it’s not too late!

3. Advice • Take good notes here • On the trip home, rewrite them in electronic form • Do everything they tell you to do • Don’t do what they tell you NOT to do!

4. The End!!!! Any Questions????

5. Our MRI Proposal • Acquisition of computational infrastructure to support different types of modeling and simulation • Cardiac • Computer architecture • Fire • Chemical (phytoremeditation) TEAM: 2 Electrical Engineers, 1 Mechanical Engineer, 2 Physicists

6. Acquisition of a Large Beowulf Cluster for Research and Education in Science and Engineering • Justify need for equipment • Specification of proposed equipment • Intellectual merit • Research Description • Results from prior NSF support • Project plan • Research • Education • Management plan • Broader impact • Impact of infrastructure

7. Justify Need for Equipment - 1 • Describe need based on research objective • Describe specific performance requirements in context of resource demands to perform specific research • How many FLOPS to get research done before you die???

8. Justify Need for Equipment - 2 • Describe existing resources and limitations • Are there resources on campus or in the vicinity? • List them and their specifications • Do you have/can you get access? • What limitations on this access that hinder your research? • Also include access restrictions in equipment specification table • From this, equipment specification should easily fall out and be justified!

9. Justification for Equipment - 3 • Justify through not only research, but also education • Students will learn to operate and use state-of-the-art equipment • Will increase the value of their education and value in job market

10. Intellectual Merit: Research Description • MRI proposals reviewed based on same old two criteria • Intellectual Merit • Broader Impact • Of research • Of having this equipment on your campus • Each member of team wrote brief description of their research

11. Results from Prior NSF Support • If you are junior faculty, may not have results from prior NSF funding. • Seek out another more senior faculty member who may benefit from having same equipment and recruit them to be an investigator

12. Project Plan • Research • Have solid plan/timeline • When do you expect to order the equipment? • When do you expect it to be operational? • When do you expect initial research results to be generated? • Education • What student population will be involved using equipment? • Undergraduates, graduates???? • Will it be used for course work as well as research? • What about training? • Wokshops/tutorials • User meetings/research

13. Management Plan - 1 • Have firm plan on how use of equipment will be managed • How will time/utilization be shared among investigators? • What about investigator collaborators? Will they have access?? • How will equipment be maintained? (Even after award period??) • Budget for maintenance • Budget for costs to house equipment • Air conditioning • Cooling

14. Management Plan – 2 • Will equipment be available to other faculty and students after award period? Sometime during award period? • For research and education? • How will this be managed? • Through proposal process?? • Who will review these? • Will there be a fee?

15. Broader Impact of Infrastructure - 1 • What impacts will acquiring this equipment have? Who will be impacted? • Investigators will be able to perform earth-shattering research that otherwise would go undone • Will other faculty, staff, students benefit from this equipment? • List potential users across campus • List potential courses that may utilize equipment

16. Broader Impact of Infrastructure - 2 • What diverse populations will benefit? • Ethnic minorities • Women • Persons with disabilities • Be sure to include statistics from significant minority programs on campus which may draw student/faculty participants • AGEP • AAMP • ADVANCE • RASEM Many of these are supported by NSF!!!

17. General Advice to Avoid Problems - 1 • If you assemble a team • Be sure you really know who you’re working with and that personalities and objectives don’t clash • Even though it’s not necessarily collaborative research, you will be affiliated with co-investigators at least for the duration of the award

18. General Advice to Avoid Problems - 2 • Specifying equipment when working with team • Have everyone specify requirements and equipment • Assimilate requirements and equipment specs into list of options • Define decision-making process • Democratic vote? • PI gets the last say? • Unbiased stakeholder helps decide?

19. General Advice to Avoid Problems - 3 • Start the budget early • Get quotes from vendors that include educational pricing • Warning: If they know what your budget is, that’s what the equipment will cost! • Create a budget that is darn close to the average award size (not possible in all cases) • NSF may ask you to revise budget to close to average award size

20. General Advice to Avoid Problems - 4 • On final budget • Make sure that vendor has addressed every detail of options on equipment • Anything that the vendor states that they’ll “throw in”, get it in writing • Save all correspondence during the quotation process • Don’t forget to leave some time for sole source justification if necessary • Purchasing department can help • Vendor can help • If you need more money, ask • Research Center • VPR • Dean If you just brought in $250K, they will likely help if reasonable amount of extra funds are needed.

21. Good Luck!