The Planning Grants for Engineering Research Centers competition was run as a pilot solicitation within the ERC program. Planning grants are not required as part of the full ERC competition, but intended to build capacity among teams to plan for convergent, center-scale engineering research.
Over 300 Billion dollars in damages were incurred in 2017 due to extreme weather in the U.S., a new record in terms of both direct and indirect losses. In addition to losses from weather-related events, extreme geologic and human-caused disasters can cause staggering financial burdens to the economy. The need for understanding what makes communities resilient whereby they can adapt and recover quickly from these events is fundamental to the survival of the nation. We propose that a key to understanding how to effectively and efficiently recovery from these extreme events is to examine natural systems that inherently resist, adapt, and evolve to ever-evolving stressors. Ecological resilience examines the ability of a natural system to respond to disturbances and measures the system's ability to return to a functioning state. While humans seek resiliency and sustainability through simplification and order, the diversity and complexity of natural systems is what makes them resilient & sustainable. Therefore, understanding the attributes that make a system resilient requires an understanding of both the individual components of the system and the interdependencies of these components. The uniqueness of this potential Engineering Research Center (ERC) is our hypothesis in that it is not the study of individual organisms that is the key to resilience, but the study of the systems that these organisms inhabit and enable. Nature has provided an avenue for developing analysis methods, models and systems that provide resilience to extreme events and conditions. The mission of this planning grant is to develop the team and structure of transdisciplinary research that examines the attributes of resilient natural systems, create collaborations between innovative researchers, and construct an infrastructure that allows for collaborative research leading to economic development through tech transfer. A successful grant would provide research leading to substantially improved national defense facilities and networks, the next generation of resilient and efficient infrastructure, and adaptable community planning. The knowledge gained would inform community leaders, planners, engineers and the public on mitigating the impact of and recovering from extreme events.
The integration of knowledge, disciplines and methods that span science and engineering required to provide comprehensive approaches to infrastructure and community resilience is found in natural systems. By considering multi-scale research from the organism to system levels, we anticipate dramatic increases to the state of the art in a) adaptable, sustainable and efficient materials and forms for use in infrastructure, b) leveraging the interdependencies in systems to improve human community resilience, c) developing algorithms for optimization, integration and adaptability of built infrastructure based on natural processes, and d) improved pedagogical approaches for development of innovative designers and community leaders. This planning grant will take a novel approach to developing transdisciplinary research teams that embrace both creativity and diversity, and that provide mechanisms for inclusion across institutional classifications. The model for the center will itself model natural systems by recognizing that interdependencies between researchers are as important as the expertise of the individual researchers. The research team recognizes that not all ERC planning grants will lead to successfully funded ERCs. However, the planning process will still provide significant broader impacts including development of 1) Multi-scale, transdisciplinary teams to appropriately tackle biomimicry for resilient and sustainable structures 2) Industrial partnerships for tech transfer, innovation and economic development in the area of biomimicry 3) Organizational structures that promote shared resources, engaged teaming and broad diversity, 4) An identified network of researchers capable of creative synthesis across disciplinary boundaries and 5) Recognition of diverse teaming beyond the limits of "visually identifiable" demographic diversity.
This award reflects NSF's statutory mission and has been deemed worthy of support through evaluation using the Foundation's intellectual merit and broader impacts review criteria.
