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Proposals to FAPESP's Research Program on eScience: Regular Research Grants and Thematic Project Research Grants

1) Introduction

The State of São Paulo Research Foundation, FAPESP, makes this call for research proposals public and invites the interested researchers associated to higher education and research institutions in the State of São Paulo to submit research proposals to the FAPESP eScience Research Program, in the conditions as described here.

The main goal of the eScience program is to encourage bold, novel, and unconventional approaches to world class multidisciplinary research involving joint collaboration of computer scientists and researchers in other fields of knowledge.

2) Relevant topics for this call for research proposals

Examples of relevant topics for this call for research proposals are as follows. This CRP is not restricted to these topics and additional issues that fit in any eScience area are welcome.

• eScience algorithms, models and human-computer interfaces, including

  • Mathematical models

  • Data science, including machine learning and statistical methods for data analysis

  • Data planning and e-infrastructure for FAPESP programs BIOTA, BIOEN and Climate Change

  • Signal processing

  • Digital repositories and data management

  • Extreme scale approaches, including big data

• Cyberinfrastructure to support eScience, including

  • Novel hardware

  • Novel uses of cyberinfrastructure

  • Software, services, protocols, and research tools

• eScience target domains, including:

  • Agricultural Sciences

  • Arts, humanities, and social sciences

  • Engineering and physical sciences, including Astrophysics and Astroinformatics

  • Bioinformatics, biology, and health, including Precision Medicine

  • Climate & earth sciences

  • eScience practice and education

3) Application requirements

The application requirements of this CRP must be followed rigorously. Please, read them carefully. Applications that fail to comply with these requirements will not be considered.

a. Applications should be submitted to FAPESP only through the SAGE online system as Regular Research Grants (www.fapesp.br/137) or Thematic Project Research Grants (www.fapesp.br/176) following their conditions and restrictions unless explicitly stated in this CRP.

b. To submit a proposal, log into the SAGe platform (www.fapesp.br/sage) and choose: Propostas >> Nova Proposta Inicial. At the 'Incluir Proposta' page choose ‘Outras Linhas de Fomento’ and at the next page click [+] to expand the ‘Programas de Inovação Tecnológica’ option. Next, expand option ‘eScience – Programa de Pesquisa em eScience’ to select the modality of your choice (‘eScience – Programa de Pesquisa – Regular’ or ‘eScience – Programa de Pesquisa – Temático’). Then click at ‘Confirmar’ to start writing the proposal, following the usual procedures for Regular or Thematic Project awards and considering the specific conditions of this CRP (details about SAGe are described in the Annex II , below, in Portuguese).

c. Only researchers associated to higher education and research institutions in the State of São Paulo, Brazil may submit applications.

d. Applications submitted to the above grant modalities already in review by FAPESP and that relate to the aforementioned topics may be included in this CRP. To do so, the applicant should submit the Adhesion to the Program Form (Formulário de Adesão ao Programa) and additional documentation. This request will be evaluated and, if applicable, the applicants will be informed. 

4) Characteristics of the research proposals

Given the particularities of eScience, all fundable projects should clearly present the following (see Annex I, Guidelines to Research Project, below, for more details):

• Engagement of both computer scientists and scientists from another (target) domain: at least one collaborator from Computer Science (CS) and one from another scientific domain.

• Evidence of research in CS: eScience is concerned with joint exploration of how advances in Computer Science research can help face core science and technology challenges in other fields, and vice-versa. Therefore, projects must have a solid core of CS research.

• Evidence of benefits to research in the target domain: Projects must clearly indicate expected scientific results in the target domain.

• Evidence of offering training in eScience practices: Given the lack of qualified labor to meet the specific demands of multidisciplinary projects, projects are encouraged to show how they will offer training that combines computing practices with those of the target domain.

• Dissemination of results: the research results should be widely disseminated using established academic channels, such as papers in high-impact international conferences and refereed journals. All selected projects should moreover result in a detailed Web presence. Additional channels for community development include regional workshops, graduate seminars, open source software projects, and curriculum components such as courses or courseware.

• Data management plan: A major characteristic of eScience projects is its dependency on data management practices, and the need of making results public, to allow reuse and collaboration with other groups. Therefore, all projects should provide indication of how they intend to manage the data produced during the project (where the term “data” is taken on the large, and includes files, algorithms, software, samples, models, curriculum material and others).

5) Benefits and obligations specific to the eScience program 

The eScience Program will have periodic workshops with mandatory attendance for all the PI's involved with the program and, in some cases, their collaborators and students. These workshops will be a special opportunity to update all involved on the research conducted in the field and to have access to new data and information before publishing. 

Proposals must explicit which efforts will be made for the results of selected projects (including intellectual property of these results) to be largely available. The results should be accessible under an open source license approved by the OSI (www.opensource.org/licenses), in the case of software, or under a Creative Commons license (www.creativecommons.org), in the case of documentation, technical reports, and associated documents. These considerations also apply to databases, datasets, workflows, etc. generated by the project.  

6) Funds available for this call for research proposals

a. The total amount of resources available for the grants selected by this call for research proposals is R$ 4 million (four million reais) (approximately equivalent to USD 1 million).

b. The adequacy of the requested funding (including fellowships) as related to the proposal’s goals and the qualification of the proposing research team is a primary review consideration.

c.) FAPESP reserves the right to propose lower funding levels for some of the proposals.

7) Allowable costs

The following items can be included in the budget:

a. Costs: all the costs traditionally funded by FAPESP in the Grant modality chosen by the applicant (Regular Research Grant or Thematic Project Research Grant) and described at www.fapesp.br/137 and www.fapesp.br/176.

b. Fellowships:

b.1) The duration of any fellowship cannot be longer than the duration of the grant. The supervisor/advisor must be the PI or a co-PI (approved by FAPESP) of the grant.

b.2) The adequacy of the requested fellowships as related to the proposal’s goals and the qualification of the proposing research team is a primary review consideration. The Program encourages proposals that include the participation of Post- Doctorate level researchers.

b.3) Exceptionally for this Call, proposals submitted as Regular Research Grants may request fellowships of the following types: Technical Training (TT), Scientific Initiation (IC), Masters (MS) and Post-Doctoral (PD).

b.4) Proposals submitted as Thematic Project Research Grants may request fellowships of the following types: Technical Training (TT), Scientific Initiation (IC), Honours Doctorate (DD), Scientific Journalism (JC), Special Education Program (EP), and Post-Doctoral (PD). Exceptionally for this Call, the proposal may include requests for Masters (MS) and Doctorate (DR) level fellowships.

8) Proposal formatting

8.1) Project duration

a. Applications submitted as Regular Research Grants will have a maximum duration of 24 months.

b. Applications submitted as Thematic Project Research Grants will have a maximum duration of 48 months.

8.2) Proposal language and formatting .

a. All text contents and attached documents submitted must be in English as non-Portuguese speaking reviewers may be used.

b. The Research Project must be written in Times New Roman with font size 11, or equivalent, and 1.5 paragraph spacing.

c. Exceptionally for this call, Thematic Projects must have a maximum of thirty (30) pages.

8.3) Required documents, project and budget organization

a. All proposals must be submitted according to the rules and procedures of the program chosen by the applicant (Regular Research Grants and Thematic Projects Research Grants), exception made to any additional requirements mentioned in this call.

b. CV Summary according to FAPESP model (in English) for the PIs, co PIs and associated researchers.

c. The Research Project must be in English and must cover all items of the guidelines described in Annex I of this call for research proposals. Please use the headings listed in Annex 1 as section headings.

9) Intellectual property rights

a. According to Brazilian law, the host institution is the owner of any intellectual property resulting from the research project.

b. The PI and his/her institution are responsible for safeguarding the above mentioned intellectual property.

c. In consideration of the funding provided by FAPESP, the institution that employs the PI will grant FAPESP a non-exclusive, royalty-free license to any intellectual property arising from the research project.

d. If the research project results in patentable inventions, the researcher must notify FAPESP. The PI and his/her institution will retain the right to use the technology for research and teaching purposes.

e. If the host institution receives royalties for technology resulting from the research project, FAPESP will receive a percentage of those royalties. A separate agreement will document this.

f. If the PI wishes to use any pre-existing intellectual property in the research project, they must obtain adequate rights from the owner in order to grant the licenses to FAPESP as stated above.

10) Communications regarding this call for research proposals

10.1) Application submission

Applications must be submitted to FAPESP exclusively through the SAGE online system – see item 3 of this CRP

10.2) Queries

Please send all queries about this call for research proposals to eScience@fapesp.br. In order to speed up the processing of the query, please use "eScience Call" as the email subject.

Queries for this call will be dealt by:
Virginia Sanches Subiñas
Technical Advisor
Scientific Directorate
FAPESP

11) Review process

Project evaluation and monitoring will follow FAPESP mechanisms and workflows. Evaluation of all projects will consider evidence of CS research and actual impact on the target domain’s research. Some specific issues apply to the eScience FAPESP program:

• Post-docs: The program encourages proposals that include the participation of post-docs, considered as a positive element in proposal evaluation.

• Collaboration via co-supervision: Proposals that consider fellowships with co-supervision of computer scientists and scientists from another domain are encouraged. In this case, the fellowship plan must indicate the co-supervision.

• Collaborations in the State of São Paulo: The program encourages the creation of networks for collaboration and student interchange. Researchers should look for collaborations with centers in the State with incipient research background, such as recently established departments. This is considered a means to foster new strong research groups.

• International collaborations: The program encourages projects that foster international collaboration with groups of excellence working in the field. Indication of such collaborations will be a positive element in proposal evaluation.

• Involvement of industry and research centers: The program encourages the collaboration with research centers and industries. This is desirable from two points of view – additional funding, and increasing the impact of the results.

• Support from the Host Institution: The program requires equivalent funding by the Host Institution of Information Technology personnel to match TT (IT Technical Training) fellowships above level 3 requested in this Call (e.g., junior or senior systems analysts that will work for the project in software design, development and documentation).

12) Schedule

Applications must follow the schedule below:

Event	Dates
Publication of the call for research applications at FAPESP website.	November 19, 2015
Last day to submit applications	March 21, 2016
Communication of results of the review process	August, 2016

13) Communication of results 

FAPESP will publish the selected proposals on its website (www.fapesp.br), and will inform the PIs directly by e-mail. 

14) Grants, progress analysis and evaluation 

Approved proposals will be the object of a Grant Contract. FAPESP, the Principal Investigator and a legal representative of the host institution will sign the grant.

Progress reports and financial reports due on the dates established in the Grant Contract will be used to evaluate the outcomes of the research project.

15) Grant cancellation

FAPESP grants itself the right to cancel any grant if a significant event justifies its cancellation in the opinion of FAPESP Scientific Directorate. Cancellation does not reduce the possibility of other sanctions.
 

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Annex I

 

Guidelines for the Research Project

FAPESP eScience Program

- Items 1 through 9 should necessarily be part of the Research Project along with usual suggested sections for each Grant modality. This call establishes the limit of twenty (20) pages for Regular Grants or thirty (30) pages for Thematic Projects with 1.5 spacing and font equivalent to Times New Roman 11. These page limits includerelevant publications, Figures and Tables as necessary and references.

- Please use section titles as listed in items from 1 through 11 of the following table:

Item	Section Title	Description
	Title Page	- Title, names of Principal Investigators and their host institutions, start and end dates.
	Table of Contents	- Table of Contents referring to the page number of each section.
1	Abstract	- In English and in Portuguese. 20 lines maximum.
2	Statement of scientific problem(s) to be tackled by the proposed project	- Description of the scientific challenges and their relevance. - Significance and relevance for the FAPESP eScience Program. This should include a description of the contribution to Computer Science and to the target domain. - Summary of preliminary results, if any.
3	Specific aims and Expected Results	- List of the Proposal’s aims, with a short description of each one. - Description of the knowledge that will be created and how it will be disseminated to the community. - Description of the expected impacts of the results in science, education, industry, society, environment etc.
4	Means and methods	- Description of the methods and means to overcome the challenges of the project. - Relevant references regarding these challenges and the methods and means proposed.
5	Timetable	- Estimate of Project completion. - List of the milestones used to assess the progress of the project and its completion.
6	Data management plan	- Description of data, samples, models, software, curriculum materials, or other materials to be produced by the project. Mechanisms and formats for storing these data and making them accessible. - Types of data to be shared, sharing policy, and plans for doing so, including the period of time the data will be retained and shared, how these data are to be managed. - Legal and/or ethical restrictions on access to such data, provisions for privacy, security and others, when applicable.
7	Dissemination and evaluation	- Description of the evaluation of the results and their proposed dissemination to the pertinent community. In particular, consider policies to share data and software produced by the project. - Evidence of offering training in eScience practices.
8	Additional Funds and Resources	- Description of additional funds requested and already available from other sources (e.g., from the host institution or other agencies). Resources may be assets, goods, services, infrastructure, equipment, among others.
9	References	- References cited in the preceding items. ATTENTION: Items 10 and 11 are not included in the page limitation.
10	Work plans for each of the fellowships requested	- For each of the fellowships requested, a work plan of 2 pages or less must be included, indicating the type of fellowship, advisor or supervisor (who must be a PI or co-PI), start date and duration, title and proposed activities. Also, indicate co-supervisor, if any. - It is not necessary to specify the name of the candidate. If the proposal is approved, the PI will be responsible for the selection of the candidates for each fellowship through a public selection process. The candidate chosen by the PI must be validated by FAPESP.
11	Provision of human resources by host institution	- For projects demanding TT Fellowships above level 3, the host institution(s) should provide written guarantee (in English) of equivalent funding of Information Technology personnel to match the fellowships – e.g., junior or senior systems analysts that will work for the project in software design, development and documentation

 

Annex II   

Instruções específicas sobre o uso do SAGe

1. É necessário que o Pesquisador Responsável pela proposta seja cadastrado no sistema SAGe:

(i) Pesquisadores que não possuem cadastro no SAGe devem inicialmente realiza-lo acessando a página do SAGe no endereço www.fapesp.br/sage, clicar em Sem cadastro? e preencher os dados solicitados. Não basta apenas cadastrar-se como usuário, é necessário completar os dados cadastrais;

(ii) Pesquisadores do Estado de São Paulo, já cadastrados, devem realizar o login no SAGe com identificação e senha usuais para acessar a página inicial do sistema.

2. Na página Inicial do sistema (Home) selecionar, dentre as opções do menu “Acesso Rápido – Atividades do Pesquisador”, o link Nova Proposta Inicial;

3. O sistema disponibilizará na página seguinte o menu “Incluir Proposta – Selecionar Linha de Fomento”, selecionar o link Outras linhas de fomento;

4. Ao expandir a opção Programas de Inovação Tecnológica constarão:
eScience - Programa de Pesquisa em eScience > eScience - Projeto de Pesquisa - Regular;
eScience - Programa de Pesquisa em eScience > eScience - Projeto de Pesquisa – Temático;

5. Selecionar a opção desejada conforme a modalidade de Auxílio à Pesquisa de interesse (Regular ou Projeto Temático). A partir daí incluir os dados solicitados em todas as abas, inclusive a lista de documentos a serem anexados;

6. Atenção para a obrigatoriedade de preenchimento de todos itens marcados com “ * “. É necessário submeter o projeto ao final do preenchimento. Projeto salvo não significa projeto submetido;

7. No caso de dúvidas, na página inicial do SAGe pode ser usado o link Manuais e, na página Manuais, buscar esclarecimentos na lista Manuais de Apoio aos Pesquisadores;

8. IMPORTANTE: Recomenda-se fortemente verificar periodicamente as pendências da proposta utilizando a opção "Validar" do SAGE. Isso pode ser feito repetidas vezes, à medida que a proposta for construída, permitindo que sejam tomadas em tempo as providências necessárias à submissão. Ao selecionar a opção Validar , o sistema SAGe apresentará as pendências impeditivas para submissão da proposta considerando os itens que foram inseridos. Em caso de dúvidas sobre a utilização do SAGE, além dos Manuais, a FAPESP disponibiliza ainda atendimento pelo Setor de Informações (11 3838-4000). Atenção para o Cronograma da Chamada (item 12).

 

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