National Science Foundation

Nilanjan Sarkar and Meiyi Ma have received Civic Innovation Challenge planning grants from the National Science Foundation. The purpose of the NSF CIVIC program is to accelerate the transition to practice of foundational research and emerging technologies into communities through civic-engaged research. Read More

The Quality Education for Minorities Network, in partnership with Vanderbilt University and other universities, has been awarded funding for a conference on supporting underrepresented minorities in STEM. Read More

Vanderbilt researcher Nilanjan Sarkar is partnering with Lorraine Mion of the Ohio State University and two Middle Tennessee long-term care facilities to investigate how augmented reality technologies can ease loneliness among residents. Read More

Vanderbilt University has been chosen by the National Science Foundation to lead the new Mid-South Innovation Corps Hub, a group of nine universities that make up a regional coalition of diverse, tech-forward institutions to promote inclusive innovation, spur economic development and prosperity and transform Midsouth metro areas into growth and commercialization centers for STEM-related technologies. Read More

Julián F. Hillyer, professor of biological sciences, and his research team discovered how mosquito immune and circulatory systems are related. This work may lead to the development of novel strategies that protect beneficial insects or harm detrimental ones. Read More

Vanderbilt School of Engineering’s Frist Center for Autism and Innovation, working in partnership with Fisk University, has won a $1.9 million grant from the National Science Foundation to create a system of programs to support neurodiverse students in engineering majors and careers. Read More

Historically Black colleges and universities offer high-quality education and produce leaders from various backgrounds, mainly being African American. Predominately White institutions can utilize practices that make HBCUs successful to mentor and graduate students of all backgrounds.  Est. reading time: 3.5 mins.  Read More

For the 2022 cycle, six Vanderbilt biomedical Ph.D. students and one undergraduate student in a biomedical lab were awarded the National Science Foundation Graduate Research Fellowship Program. Additionally, five biomedical Ph.D. students received an honorable mention. Read More

Graduate student measures the coevolution of genes in genomes; method may fundamentally change how we identify genes with similar functions. Read More

Sixteen engineering graduate students have been awarded the highly competitive government-funded National Science Foundation Graduate Research Fellowship. Three engineering undergraduate students also received NSF fellowships. Read More

Vanderbilt professor H. Richard Milner IV will become president of the American Educational Research Association this month when the organization meets in San Diego. Milner, Vanderbilt’s first elected president of AERA, is a researcher, scholar and leader of urban education and teacher education. Read More

Faculty at Vanderbilt University and Vanderbilt University Medical Center achieved a significant milestone in 2021: more than $1 billion in research funding awarded from external organizations.  Read More

President Joe Biden has announced his intent to appoint Vice Provost for Research Padma Raghavan to the President’s Committee on the National Medal of Science. Raghavan is Vanderbilt University’s vice provost for research and a professor of computer science. Read More

Vanderbilt and Chalmers University of Technology are teaming up to build a self-driving biological laboratory that uses microfluidics, artificial intelligence and machine learning to create a third-generation robot scientist that designs and conducts the massive number of experiments needed to fully characterize cellular signals and pathways and optimize biotechnologies. Read More

Over the past decade, Larisa DeSantis, paleontologist and associate professor of biological sciences, has worked with a team of former Vanderbilt undergraduate and graduate students, postdoctoral scholars and experts from across the globe to show how species can be both generalized at the species level and specialized individually—a probable key to their success. Read More

By Aaron Conley Systems biology and the Lopez lab The history of hermeneutics started with Aristotle—parts comprise the whole. To understand the whole, we need to understand the parts. And to understand the parts, we need to understand them in the context of the whole. Carlos F. Lopez, associate… Read More

Vanderbilt University researchers from the departments of physics and astronomy, math, electrical engineering, and history have received a $3 million National Science Foundation Research Traineeship Award to establish a graduate certificate program in the emerging field of multimessenger astronomy. Read More

Startup fostered at Vanderbilt earns accolades as it reimagines cybersecurity. Winning these awards earned the team $750,000 from the U.S. Air Force and $25,000 with mentorship from JPMorgan Chase leadership. Read More

Keivan Stassun joins leading astronomers to write "Astro2020," a once-in-a-decade guide for astronomy research, prioritizing gargantuan telescopes on the ground and in orbit as well as increased diversity and inclusion. Read More

Vanderbilt archaeologist and historical anthropologist Steve Wernke and postdoctoral fellow Giles Morrow are exploring the remains of a 16th-century church high in the Andes Mountains of Peru, all while giving Vanderbilt students a front-row seat to the research using virtual reality, artificial intelligence and geospatial technologies. Read More