Penn State and IISc are seeking proposals to foster collaborative, sustainable, self-supporting research and education programs. The expected outcome of projects is to become long-term collaborative programs integrating academics and students from both universities.
The 2024/2025 Collaboration Program will provide seed funds to joint faculty teams focused on Global Challenges or matters of bilateral importance to India and the United States for a duration of about 12 months.
Successful proposals will be those that (i) demonstrate potential to be sustainable through external funding sources and (ii) will involve a clear collaborative effort between faculty members on both IISc and Penn State sides.
Collaboration Development Fund Overview
1. Up to fourthree awards are expected to be made
2. Each award is a one-time award with no opportunity for renewal
3. A maximum of US$10,000 or equivalent per project, combined by Penn State (US$ 5,000) and IISc (INR 5.0 Lakhs). Lower amounts may be requested for projects requiring less funding.
Eligible and Ineligible Expenses:
1. From Penn State: Allowable expenses include travel, accommodation, and meal costs; organization of joint meetings and workshops ; cost of developing shared online resources; temporary administrative/technical support, e.g., of students; lab supplies and other expenditures in support of the long-term project development; publication/dissemination of results. From IISc: The allowable expenses include travel, accommodation and related expenses of main and additional applicants (including students).
2. The seed grant funds cannot be used for faculty salaries or honoraria; indirect/administrative costs; to hire a consultant or contractor; or for general equipment expenses (laptops, iPads, printers, etc.).
Proposal Eligibility
To be eligible for support:
1. Each proposal requires a minimum of one academic from both Penn State and IISc; however, it is strongly recommended that each institution include more than one applicant.
2. Primary applicants must meet the following criteria:
o At IISc, the main applicant must be a permanent faculty or fixed-term academic staff member (where the end date of the fixed-term contract does not fall during the project implementation period)
o At Penn State, the main applicant must be a full time, early career, tenure track or tenured faculty
3. Additional applicants can include professional staff and PhD students
4. Proposals are endorsed by faculty leadership at each institution as follows:
o At IISc, by the ChairDean of the department/centrefaculty or their delegate
o At Penn State, by the head of the department or Dean of the college
Proposal Evaluation
1. A panel composed of faculty and administrators from Penn State and IISc will evaluate and select the projects to be funded
2. Funding priority will be given to projects that:
a. Are of high academic quality
b. Show strategic merit and alignment with the research and education priorities of IISc and Penn State
c. Advance a self-supporting collaborative concept with the potential to produce scholarship of high academic value over at least a 5-year timeframe
d. Strengthen the connectivity and relationship between IISc and Penn State in the research domain
e. Create a team with multiple faculty and students at each university
f. Show interdisciplinarity
g. Reflect short-term and long-term prospects of the project in terms of expected results and funding
3. Preferred elements include those that go beyond research only and address internationalization topics such as:
a. Student engagement: innovative learning abroad, including of underrepresented students
b. Involvement of multiple campuses (e.g. any of Penn State’s Commonwealth Campuses)
c. Joint doctoral training or co-supervision opportunities.
4. Additional aspects are desirable, but not a requirement for eligibility
a. Co-funding of projects by the Faculty/College, Department, School, Centre/Institute, or external bodies
b. Engagement with industry partners
c. Impact and dissemination of results
Proposal Format
1. Submit a joint application via Penn State’s unified system: (the link of the template; not the final one) https://psu.infoready4.com/#competitionDetail/1898319
2. The application should include:
a. Completed Application Document attached to this callompetition
b. 1-page CV of each project participant
c. Letter/email from a Penn State department head acknowledging support of the project
d. Letter/email from the Chair of theadepartment/centre at IISc IISc Faculty Dean or delegate (e.g. Associate or Deputy Dean International or Research) acknowledging support of the project
3. Combine all documents into one pdf
Key Dates
1. Proposals open for submission: April 17, 2024
2. Proposal submission due: May 20, 2024
3. Anticipated award announcement: July 1, 2024
4. Mid-project report submission due: January 6, 2025
5. Final financial report submission due: April 17, 2025
6. Final report submission due: August 1, 2025
Contact
It is highly recommended that researchers interested in this program should contact the Penn State/ IISc coordinators in advance to preparing an application.
Penn State University:
Anna Marshall, Penn State Global awm15@psu.edu
+1 814-863-1963
Indian Institute of Science:
Amita Sneh, Office of the International Relations iro.admin@iisc.ac.in and chair.oir@iisc.ac.in
List of Successful IISc-PSU joint seed funds projects:
| S.No. | Name of the IISc PI’s | Name of the Penn state PI’s | Title of proposal |
| 1 | Prof. KJ Vinoy and Dr. Sundeep Prabhakar Chepuri | Prof. Ram M. Narayanan and Prof. Michael T. Lanagan | Sensing and Communications with Reflective Intelligent Surfaces |
| 2 | Prof. Parimal Parag | Prof. Ting He | Large-scale Distributed Learning for Democratizing Future AI |
| 3 | Dr. Chirag Jain | Prof. Paul Medvedev | Democratization of genome assembly |
| 4 | Prof. M. S. Bobji | Dr. Shreyash Gulati | Pesticide transport by means of a vortex ring |