Funder: National Science Foundation
Due Dates: July 15, 2025 (CAREER) | Rolling (Other proposals)
Funding Amounts: Typical unsolicited awards: up to 3 years, supporting 1 grad student and 1 month PI time/year; CAREER awards: 5 years; budgets for multi-investigator projects may be larger.
Summary: Supports fundamental and applied research on combustion, fire prediction, clean energy, and fire prevention to advance public safety, environmental quality, and energy efficiency.
Key Information: Proposals are jointly reviewed by NSF and AFOSR; contact the program director before submitting proposals outside core areas or for RAPID/EAGER/GOALI types.
Description
The Combustion and Fire Systems program, part of NSF's Transport Phenomena cluster, funds research that advances fundamental understanding and predictive capabilities in combustion and fire science. The program's overarching goal is to generate new knowledge that supports clean energy, climate change mitigation, environmental protection, and public safety. Research outcomes are expected to include new experimental, theoretical, and computational tools, cleaner and more efficient power generation technologies, pollutant reduction strategies, and improved fire prevention and suppression methods.
This program is a joint funding area with the Air Force Office of Scientific Research (AFOSR), and proposals are reviewed collaboratively by NSF and AFOSR using the NSF merit review process.
Due Dates
- Faculty Early Career Development (CAREER) proposals: July 15, 2025 (annual, mid-July)
- Unsolicited, RAPID, EAGER, and GOALI proposals: Accepted anytime (rolling submission)
- Conference, workshop, and supplement proposals: Discuss with program director before submission
Funding Amount
- Unsolicited proposals: Awards generally up to 3 years. Single-investigator budgets typically support one graduate student (or equivalent) and up to one month of PI time per year. Multi-investigator projects may receive larger budgets.
- CAREER awards: 5-year duration.
- Total program funding: Estimated at $4,654,000 (subject to availability).
- No cost-sharing or matching required.
- Budgets significantly larger than typical should be discussed with the program director prior to submission.
Eligibility
- Eligible applicants: Unrestricted; open to all types of entities (universities, colleges, non-profits, for-profits, etc.), subject to NSF policies.
- Principal Investigators: Strongly encouraged to contact the program director before submitting proposals outside the core research areas or for special proposal types (RAPID, EAGER, GOALI).
Application Process
- Submission: Proposals must comply with the NSF Proposal & Award Policies & Procedures Guide (PAPPG) and the specific requirements of this program.
- Review: Proposals are jointly reviewed by NSF and AFOSR using the NSF merit review process.
- Proposal types:
- Unsolicited research proposals
- Faculty Early Career Development (CAREER) proposals
- RAPID (Rapid Response Research)
- EAGER (EArly-concept Grants for Exploratory Research)
- GOALI (Grant Opportunities for Academic Liaison with Industry)
- Conference, workshop, and supplement proposals
- Special instructions:
- Discuss RAPID, EAGER, GOALI, and conference/workshop/supplement proposals with the program director before submission.
- Proposals not compliant with the PAPPG will be returned without review.
- Proposals should clearly address novelty, transformative potential, and societal/industry impact.
Research Areas of Interest
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Basic combustion science:
- Combustion of gas, liquid, and solid fuels across a range of conditions
- Supercritical combustion, advanced propulsion, flame synthesis, fuel design integration
- Chemical kinetics, analytical/numerical methods, advanced diagnostics
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Combustion science for clean energy:
- Efficiency improvement, pollution reduction
- Renewable/carbon-free fuels, biomass pyrolysis/gasification/oxidation
- Oxy-fuel and chemical looping combustion for carbon capture
-
Fire prevention and mitigation:
- Building and wildland fire dynamics, spread prevention, growth inhibition, suppression
- Wildland-urban interface fire prediction and mitigation
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Turbulence-chemistry interactions:
- Turbulent flow and chemical kinetics at high Reynolds/Karlovitz numbers
- Multi-scale experiments and simulations, direct numerical simulation (DNS)
- Data assimilation and advanced computational methods
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Innovative proposals outside these areas may be considered, but prior consultation with the program director is strongly recommended.
Additional Information
- Joint NSF-AFOSR funding: Actual funding agency and format determined post-review.
- Recent awards: Browse funded projects
- Program compliance: Strict adherence to the PAPPG is required.
External Links
Contact Information