The US National Nanotechnology Initiative has made its budget request for 2018 according to a Dec. 5, 2017 anouncement by Lynn L. Bergeson and Carla Hutton at the Nano and Other Emerging Chemical Technologies blog on the JD Supra website (Note: A link has been removed),
On November 30, 2017, the National Nanotechnology Initiative (NNI) published a supplement to the President’s 2018 budget. The supplement also serves as NNI’s annual report and summarizes the progress made in achieving NNI’s goals, the research and development (R&D) activities and plans of the participating agencies, and the agency investments in each program component area. The President’s 2018 Budget requests $1.2 billion for the NNI, “a continued investment in support of innovation promoting America’s competitiveness, economic growth, and national security.” The NNI investments proposed for 2018 reflect an emphasis on broad, fundamental research in nanoscience to provide a continuing pipeline of new discoveries that will enable future transformative commercial products and services. …
The November 30, 2017 NNI Supplement to the President’s 2018 Budget can be found here. Click on the download button (or go here) for the full supplement which includes explanations for the initialisms, e.g., PCA, STIR, etc. and sections such as this about key points,
Key Points about the 2016–2018 NNI Investments
• Reductions in overall NNI investments for 2018 relative to 2016–2017 and previous years are consistent with the goal of the President’s 2018 Budget to prioritize Federal resources on areas that industry is not likely to support, over later-stage applied research and development that the private sector is better equipped to pursue.
• The actual NNI investments reported by the participating agencies for 2016 ($1.56 billion) are significantly larger than 2016 estimated investments published in the 2017 Budget ($1.43 billion) and 2016 requested investments published in the 2016 Budget ($1.50 billion). This change is due largely to the fact that an increasing proportion of agencies’ nanotechnology investments are coming from “core” R&D programs, where the high success rate of nanotechnology-related proposals cannot be anticipated in advance.
• Total funding for PCA 1, Nanotechnology Signature Initiatives and Grand Challenges, for 2018 (nearly $200 million, representing over 16% of the NNI total) reflects the emphasis on focused investments in R&D that advances interagency cooperation and public/private partnerships in support of national priorities, as a key part of the overall NNI funding strategy.
• The NNI’s Nanotechnology-Inspired Grand Challenge for Future Computing is a new investment category in the President’s 2018 Budget, included for the first time under PCA 1. This challenge helps to address renewed international competition for U.S. leadership in semiconductor manufacturing and downstream information technology industries. For 2016, agencies are reporting over $140 million in investments under the NNI budget crosscut (including related research under the Nanoelectronics NSI) in this sector, which is critical for both national security and economic competitiveness.
• The increase in the percentage of total NNI investments in PCA 2, Foundational Research (from 36% in 2016 to nearly 40% in the 2018 Budget) reflects the Budget’s focus on supporting early-stage R&D, and is consistent with calls by NNI advisory bodies to maintain a pipeline of basic research that will lead to the innovations of the future.
• Proportional NNI investments in PCA 3 (Nanotechnology-Enabled Applications, Devices, and Systems) hold steady at about 24% of the total NNI investments for 2016–2018, down slightly from 25% in 2015.
• NNI agencies continue to provide consistent, proportional funding for PCA 4 (Research Infrastructure and Instrumentation) for 2016–2018, at 15–16% of the NNI total. The 2018 request ($179 million, representing about 15% of the NNI total investment) includes sustained support for NSF’s National Nanotechnology Coordinated Infrastructure network of university-based nanotechnology user facilities. The President’s 2018 Budget for DOE requests continued support for three of the original five Nanoscale Science Research Centers. PCA 4 also includes research to develop novel or improvedinstrumentation, which is critical to continued progress in nanotechnology and to maintain U.S. competitiveness internationally.
• PCA 5 (Environment, Health, and Safety—EHS) investments are a key element of the NNI’s strategy to ensure responsible development of nanotechnology. For 2016–2018, the proportional research investments reported under PCA 5 (see Appendix A for definitions) are approximately 6% of the NNI total for 2016 and 2017, and 5.5% in the 2018 Budget. In addition to the PCA 5 investments, some research reported under other PCAs (e.g., PCA 1 and PCA 4) also contributes to the overall EHS research portfolio.
• The return of the Department of Justice’s National Institute of Justice (NIJ) to the NNI budget crosscut in the 2018 President’s Budget is another example of where nanotechnology innovations initially funded by basic research agencies are now coming to fruition in R&D programs focused on applications, devices, and systems that directly contribute to national priorities.
• Investments in SBIR and STTR funding by the participating agencies, reported outside of the formal NNI funding crosscut tabulated in the budget tables shown above, play a critical role in transitioning nanotechnology innovations into products for commercial and public benefit (NNI Goal 2), as discussed below. [pp. 14-17 (print) pp. 22-25 [PDF)]
Happy reading!