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To fulfill its statutory mandates, the Environmental Protection Agency
(EPA) is involved in a broad range of environmental science activities.
EPA's R&D program provides the scientific and technical basis for
the Agency's decisionmaking, and complements the more fundamental research
supported by agencies such as NIEHS and NSF.
Types of Environment and Natural Resources Research Supported
- Risk Assessment: EPA develops risk assessment methodologies
for both human health and ecological systems, as well as the complex
data needed to reduce scientific uncertainties for decisions. The human
health research programs provide critical support needed to develop
more refined assessments of pollutant effects on human health and more
realistic exposure estimates. The focus of EPA's ecological risk assessment
program is to reduce uncertainty at the watershed, regional, and national
scales through monitoring, modeling, and assessment activities.
- Ecology: EPA is developing place-based ecosystem
protection approaches for more effective management of ecosystems in
the Pacific Northwest, the Great Lakes, and South Florida; is developing
methodologies for both ecological and biodiversity risk assessment;
and conducts research to develop ecological indicators of resource condition.
- Monitoring and Data Management: The Agency develops,
evaluates, and demonstrates a variety of new field instrumentation for
monitoring and sampling of pollutants and environmental conditions in
the atmosphere, surface waters, sub-surface, biota, and human microenvironments.
EPA has developed and manages the Integrated Risk Information System
(IRIS) - an on-line database used world-wide for human health risk assessment
information. EPA focuses on user-friendly distribution of data to the
state and local governments and other industrial and community groups.
- Environmental Technology: In addition to applied
R&D to support specific environmental programs, EPA's Technology
Research, Development, and Demonstration Program, which includes both
engineering and policy studies, is shifting its emphasis to pollution
prevention. This research addresses all media and includes the full
range of prevention, monitoring, control, and remediation technologies
and approaches.
- Socioeconomic Research: The Agency has increased
its emphasis on socioeconomic R&D directed at accurate valuation
methods, integrated assessment tools, and data and methods for addressing
environmental justice issues. These efforts emphasize information on
consequences of changes in environmental regulations to the size, structure,
and performance of economic markets and impacts on individual behavior.
Another research focus is the continued development and appropriate
use of such methods (e.g., contingent valuation) for ascribing value
to environmental services.
Research Funding Opportunities
EPA has made a major commitment to include the best scientists from this
country's universities, colleges, and research institutions in its research
program. The EPA Office of Research and Development (ORD) has made major
changes during the past 2 years, and as part of those changes has started
the Science to Achieve Results (STAR) Program, consisting of the following
three components:
- Focused Requests for Applications (RFAs) are targeted at specific
research topics defined by the ORD Strategic Plan that address the science
needs of the EPA program offices and regions. This component supports
investigators from universities and other not-for-profit research institutions
who complement the expertise in ORD laboratories. A portion of the program
is conducted jointly with other Federal agencies.
- The Exploratory Research Grants Program provides support for
(i) investigator-initiated grants in broad areas such as environmental
chemistry and physics, and health and ecological effects of pollution
that are not covered by the RFAs; and (ii) Early Career Research Awards,
which recognize outstanding scientists and engineers at the onset of
their careers.
- The Graduate Fellowship Program provides support for masters
and doctoral students in environmental sciences and engineering. This
program supports development of the Nation's environment and technology
base that will provide the expertise needed to address environmental
concerns in the future. This program is announced nationally and provides
broad opportunities to apply. Applicants are judged by external peer
reviewers and are selected based on their record and potential for the
future.
Applicants for STAR grants must propose relevant research based on excellent
science, as determined through external peer review by experts drawn from
throughout the national scientific community. Information on STAR competitive
research grants is available from the EPA at the following address:
U.S. Environmental Protection Agency
National Center for Environmental Research and Quality Assurance (8703)
401 M Street, SW
Washington, D.C. 20460
202.260.3837 (voice)
202.260.2039 (fax)
http://www.epa.gov /select"grants" (WWW)
FY96 Opportunities
In FY96, subject to the availability of funds, EPA will award STAR grants
in research categories of special interest to the EPA mission. Some of
the opportunities listed below had closing dates that have already past,
but are included to provide a description of the Agency's areas of interest
and contact points for those areas. It is likely that many of these will
be ongoing and may have additional solicitations in the future:
- Ecological Assessment supports research leading to the development
of scientific understanding and techniques required for effective ecological
risk assessment and ecosystem protection at a regional ecosystem scale,
and for addressing regional scale vulnerabilities in the United States
to global climate change.
Contacts:
Robert Menzer
202.260.5779 (voice)
menzer.robert@epamail.epa.gov
Barbara Levinson
202.260.5983 (voice)
levinson.barbara@epamail.epa.gov
- Exposure of Children to Pesticides research support is intended
to stimulate studies on children's cumulative exposure to pesticide
classes such as, but not limited to, pyrethroids, cholinesterase inhibitors,
and triazine herbicides, including assessment of multiple pathways and
routes of exposure, evaluation of exposure from various sources, and
assessment of cumulative exposures to specific classes of pesticides.
Closing Date: March 1, 1996
Contact:
Chris Saint
202.260.1093 (voice)
saint.chris@epamail.epa.gov
- Air Quality research will generate new scientific knowledge
on tropospheric ozone and air toxics to help EPA meet its statutory
responsibilities under the Clean Air Act to establish and periodically
revise, as appropriate, criteria and National Ambient Air Quality Standards
for pollutants, and to control toxic air pollutant emissions from sources.
Contact:
Deran Pashayan
202.260.2606 (voice)
pashayan.deran@epamail.epa.gov
- Analytical and Monitoring Methods program is intended to stimulate
research on significantly new approaches (rather than stepwise improvement
to existing methodologies) for environmental monitoring -- to meet a
critical need for techniques that are inexpensive to purchase, operate,
and maintain, and that use little or no toxic chemicals and generate
little or no hazardous waste.
Contact:
David Friedman
202.260.3535 (voice)
friedman.david@epamail.epa.gov
- Drinking Water research will foster better methods for detection,
measurement, and control of microbial pathogens in drinking water systems,
and will identify drinking water disinfection by-products and develop
a better understanding of their effects on human health. Applied in
the risk assessment framework, this research will help identify the
level of disinfection that will destroy the greatest number of pathogenic
microbial organisms while creating the least residual level of chemical
that is likely to cause other effects.
Contact:
Sheila Rosenthal
202.260.7334 (voice)
rosenthal.sheila@epamail.epa.gov
- Environmental Fate and Treatment of Toxics and Hazardous Waste
research competition will support studies on the fate and mobility of
contaminants in soils and groundwater, and the assessment of risks of
contaminated soils and treatment residuals, with the purpose of advancing
new risk assessment techniques and new site characterization and remediation
techniques that will help in the development of more realistic risk
assessments and more cost-effective cleanups.
Contact:
William Stelz
202.260.5798 (voice)
stelz.william@epamail.epa.gov
- Environmental Statistics solicits proposals to establish (by
means of a 5-year cooperative agreement) a National Research Center
on Statistics and the Environment that will provide a national capability
to identify and perform cutting-edge research in environmental statistics,
thereby furthering the application of statistics to the environmental
sciences and facilitating the professional development of future environmental
statisticians.
Contact:
Chris Saint
202.260.1093 (voice)
saint.chris@epamail.epa.gov
- High Performance Computing research is aimed at developing
high performance computing technologies for use in environmental assessment
and management, with particular attention to proposals that target research
on problemsolving environments, parallel algorithms, and data access
and analysis techniques.
Contact:
Chris Saint
202.260.1093 (voice)
saint.chris@epamail.epa.gov
- General Solicitation invites applications for 1) exploratory
research in areas of biology, chemistry, physics, human health, socioeconomics,
and engineering that are not covered in the other RFAs, with a focus
on aspects of pollution identification, characterization, abatement,
or control of the effects of pollutants on human and biological systems;
and 2) Early Career Research Awards to support outstanding scientists
and engineers at the onset of their careers in U.S. colleges, universities,
and not-for-profit institutions.
Contact:
Clyde Bishop
202.260.5727 (voice)
bishop.clyde@epamail.epa.gov
- Endocrine Disruptorsresearch will evaluate potential human
health effects associated with pollutants that may interfere with reproductive
and developmental processes in humans and wildlife, with a focus on
refining methods to monitor exposure; developing and validating biomarkers;
developing and validating test systems to screen for chemicals with
specific mechanisms of action; developing physiologically based pharmacokinetic,
physiologically based toxicokinetic, and biologically based dose-response
models; and refining and validating methods and models that relate effects
seen at subcellular levels to adverse impacts in individuals and populations.
Closing Date: May 1, 1996
Contact:
Robert Menzer
202.260.5779 (voice)
menzer.robert@epamail.epa.gov
- Role of Interindividual Variation in Human Susceptibility to Cancer
supports research recommended by the National Academy of Sciences on
identifying human genetic polymorphisms that can affect carcinogenic
risk from environmental agents, exploring the quantitative relationship
of these polymorphisms to the risk of cancer from environmental agents,
and examining the distribution of such polymorphisms in the general
environment.
Closing Date: May 1, 1996
Contact:
David Reese
202.260.7342 (voice)
reese.david@epamail.epa.gov
- Risk-Based Decisions for Contaminated Sediments supports research
needed for effective assessment and management of complex risks to aquatic
plants and animals from contaminated sediments, including studies to
identify hazards to indigenous aquatic plants and animals from contaminated
sediments, to improve the understanding of dose-response effects, to
reduce uncertainties in exposure assessments, and to improve treatment
of contaminated sediments.
Closing Date:May 1, 1996
Contact:
David Reese
202.260.7342 (voice)
reese.david@epamail.epa.gov
In addition, in cooperation with NSF, DOE, and the Office of Naval Research
of the U.S. Navy, ORD will issue a joint research grant on the following
topic of mutual interest:
- Bioremediation supports research to further the understanding
of the processes and/or environmental effects involved in the release,
movement, and assimilation of contaminants (with emphasis on mixtures
of chemicals), in order to determine broadly applicable techniques for
measuring the potential impacts of contaminants in complex matrices.
Closing Date: May 1, 1996
Contact:
Robert Menzer
202.260.5779 (voice)
menzer.robert@epamail.epa.gov
Also under a partnership with NSF, ORD will issue a joint research grant
on the following topics of mutual interest:
- Water and Watershed emphasizes multidisciplinary, fundamental
research on important scientific, engineering, and socioeconomic principles
for understanding, protecting, and restoring water resources and watershed
processes in the U.S. and other regions of the world. Investigators
are encouraged to bring together formerly disparate, state-of-the-art
approaches to address watershed-scale issues and explore new paradigms
that draw widely from different disciplines.
Closing Date: May 7, 1996
Contact:
Barbara Levinson
202.260.5983 (voice)
levinson.barbara@epamail.epa.gov
- Technology for a Sustainable Environment seeks research in
three areas: Chemistry, engineering, and measurement; assessment; and
feedback techniques for pollution prevention. The goal of this RFA is
to develop safer commercial substances and environmentally friendly
chemicals, and to develop novel engineering approaches for preventing
or reducing pollution. Also encouraged is research in physical sciences
and engineering that will lead to the development of novel measurement
and assessment techniques for pollution prevention.
Closing Date: May 7, 1996
Contact:
Stephen Lingle
202.260.5748 (voice)
lingle.stephen@epamail.epa.gov
- Decisionmaking and Valuation for Environmental Policy seeks
to advance research to help develop practical approaches to estimate
economic and social benefits and costs that are systematic and credible.
This competition is intended to support research projects in four areas:
(i) benefits of environmental policies and programs, (ii) costs of environmental
policies and programs, (iii) ecosystem protection, and (iv) normative
behaviors and environmental decisionmaking.
Closing Date: May 7, 1996
Contact:
Gregory C. Ondich
202.260.5753 (voice)
ondich.greg@epamail.epa.gov
FY96 Funding Opportunities for the Graduate Fellowship Program
In FY96, subject to the availability of funds, EPA will award approximately
100 new fellowships. The program offers up to $34,000 per year to cover
stipend, tuition, and expenses. Fellowships are for a period of 9-12 months
for each fellowship year. Masters level students may receive support for
up to 2 years, and doctoral students may be supported for a maximum of
3 years.
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