UM Research Funding News

Proposal and Award Activity

UM faculty and staff submitted 34 external funding proposals and received 12 external funding awards during February 2010. For a complete listing, see the Monthly Report.

Faculty Travel Support

In February , $2,524 was awarded through the ORSP's Faculty Travel Support program to help support research-related travel. The program provides funds for UM faculty members to take part in development activities that will lead to new or extended research, scholarly or creative work, but typically does not support travel to a conference for presentation of completed work unless the request includes specific development activities beyond the conference itself.

Examples of research purposes for which faculty have recently received support include:

  • Participate in advanced concepts seminar
  • Consult with experts about research project while at conference
  • Conduct on-site library research on primary source material
  • Meet with book collaborators and publishers while at conference
  • Attend special focus symposium and meet with subject expert

Faculty Travel Support guidelines, application, and FAQ are available from the ORSP Internal Support page.

Additional Information

Speaking of COS

Perfecting Your Profile? Don't Skip the Expertise Sections!

When you log in to COS Expertise to update your profile, be sure to include entries in the free-text boxes titled Expertise and Research Interests, Other Expertise, Future Research, Industrial Relevance, and Additional Terms. You can easily copy and paste information from other sources into these fields.

All these sections are extremely important because they help the COS Expertise Editors assign terms in the database that describe your work using the controlled vocabulary of COS Keywords. Once your profile is created, you can manage your own Keywords via the Options link on your COS Workbench (see the Workbench FAQ page for instructions).

Expertise and Research Interests should contain a summary of your expertise and interests in your primary field/s of study for which you are best known and for which you seek collaboration and funding. Other Expertise might include any academic, consulting, or business experience you have that would not qualify for the Expertise section, as well as society or professional development experiences. Industrial Relevance would include descriptions of the impact your research has or could have on any industry, or you might create a list of industries to which your research has relevance. In the Additional Terms section, you can also add words or short phrases describing your research interests.

REMEMBER — as a part of its continuing effort to develop and promote UM research and researchers, the ORSP offers the COS Profile Entry Service. Faculty and research staff who wish to enter or update profile information can e-mail a CV to the UM COS Liaison.

Don’t know about COS?

Check out our COS page, the January 2005, September 2006, and March 2007 newsletter articles, and/or the COS home page. COS is for all UM faculty in all academic disciplines and research areas.

A Few Program Announcements and Deadlines

NSF Linguistics ~ Deadline July 15

This program supports scientific research that focuses on human language as an object of investigation. The program supports research on the syntactic, semantic, phonetic, and phonological properties of individual languages and of language in general; the psychological processes involved in the use of language; the development of linguistic capacities in children; social and cultural factors in language use, variation, and change; the acoustics of speech and the physiological and psychological processes involved in the production and perception of speech; and the biological bases of language in the brain.

NSF Faculty Early Career Development Program ~ Deadlines July 20-22

The Faculty Early Career Development (CAREER) Program is an NSF-wide activity that offers the NSF’s most prestigious awards in support of the early career-development activities of those teacher-scholars who most effectively integrate research and education within the context of the mission of their organization.  NSF encourages submission of CAREER proposals from junior faculty members at all CAREER-eligible organizations and especially encourages women, members of underrepresented minority groups, and persons with disabilities to apply. Deadlines are July 20 for Biological Sciences; Computer and Information Sciences and Engineering; and Education and Human Resources; July 21 for Engineering; and July 22 for Geosciences; Mathematical and Physical Sciences; Social, Behavioral, and Economic Sciences; and Office of Polar Programs.

Additional Resources

Some Upcoming Events

Southern Bioproducts and Renewable Energy Conference ~ April 13-14 in Tunica

Advocates for biomass utilization and renewable energy development from across the state and region will gather in Tunica, Mississippi on April 13-14, 2010, to learn, plan and network. The theme of the conference “Growing the Regional Biobased Economy” will be the rallying cry for researchers, project developers, and policy makers who will explore the critical pathway the state and Southern region must take to advance a new energy future that is cleaner, vibrant and more secure. This year's conference, hosted by the Mississippi Biomass and Renewable Energy Council, will continue cooperative efforts among Mississippi leaders to bring a new energy economy to life. Other activities include a student research poster competition and the awarding of the Undergraduate Biomass Studies Scholarship (applications due March 31).

Who Should Attend: Agricultural, forestry, environmental, academia, business and labor leaders; corporate, state, and national government partners; and all other renewable energy champions.

Bits & Pieces

NASA ESMD Systems Engineering Paper Competition

Exploration Systems Mission Directorate (ESMD) Space Grant Project proudly announces the 4th annual Systems Engineering Paper Competition.  This competition is designed to enable NASA to contribute to our Nation’s efforts in achieving excellence in science, technology, engineering and math (STEM) education, which is critical to the future of space exploration. The paper must cover one of the following ESMD areas: Spacecraft, Propulsion, Lunar and Planetary Surface Systems and Ground Operations. Winning teams receive cash scholarships and VIP seating at an upcoming launch at Kennedy Space Center, FL. The deadline to register is April 16, 2010 and papers are due April 23, 2010. For details visit the website.

Congratulations from the VCRSP

The Office of Research and Sponsored Programs oversees funding for research, service, and education projects. These activities complement the fundamental aspects of The University of Mississippi’s mission and are among its most tangible contributions to the future. Funding for these activities is one of the best measures of a university’s success in engaging with national and international communities.

All of us who have sought funding to test our ideas know that it is difficult and that the communities to which we belong are highly competitive. That spirit of competition is critical and it contributes more than a little to the relief and excitement a researcher feels on receiving a funding award.

Listed below are our colleagues who have been notified of external funding awards in the last calendar month. Please join me in congratulating them. The news of their discoveries and the importance of their contributions are part of all of our futures and the future of Ole Miss.

Alice M. Clark Signature

Alice M. Clark, Ph.D.
Vice Chancellor for Research and Sponsored Programs

Summary of Awards Received in February 2010

PI Name PI Department/Unit Co-PI Name/s
Abadie, AnnCenter for the Study of Southern Culture
Cavaglia, MarcoPhysics and Astronomy
Clancy, ThomasNational Center for Justice and Rule of Law
Cremaldi, Lucien MPhysics and Astronomy
Eftink, MauriceGraduate School
Haley, BryanSociology and AnthropologyJohnson, Jay K
Li, Xing CongNational Center for Natural Products ResearchKhan, Shabana
Murray, Nathan (2 awards) Jamie Whitten National Center for Physical Acoustics
Owens, Scott GHealth, Exercise Science and Recreation ManagementLoftin, Mark
Rimoldi, John MMedicinal Chemistry
Slattery, MarcPharmacognosy
  • February 2010 Report: A list of awards received and proposals submitted by The University of Mississippi in the previous month.
  • February Proposals Submitted: 34 from 31 Principal Investigators
  • February Awards Received: 12 totaling $1,509,171
  • FY10 Year-to-Date Number of Active Sponsored Projects: 497
  • FY10 Year-to-Date Number of Active Investigators: 267