NIST Centers of Excellence Program: An Update

Visiting Committee on Advanced Technology

June 11-12, 2013

Willie E. May

NIST Associate Director for Laboratory Programs 

Outline for Today’s Discussion

• Brief Overview of NIST Centers of Excellence Program

• How do CoEs differ from NIST’s Joint Institutes?

• Update on Status and Implementation Plans

• Initial focus on Advanced Materials Discovery

• Why?

• Other areas under consideration 
NIST Centers of Excellence Program

• NIST’s ability to impact innovation and 

competitiveness in a rapidly changing 

environment requires building of new capacity 

and competencies.

• Co-locating measurement science capabilities 

in hubs of innovation will help accelerate tech 

development. 

NIST will 

• Create multidisciplinary centers of excellence 

to assist in building or expanding capacity in 

critical areas of emerging technology

• Leverage multidisciplinary capabilities of 

Centers back into NIST core activities

This Program will assist NIST in building new capacity and competencies it 

needs to carryout its mission in a dynamic and fluid technological 

environment. 
Objectives of Centers of Excellence

Broadly defined, the objectives of the Centers are to:

 Provide an interdisciplinary environment in which NIST, academia, and industry 

can collaborate in pursuing research focused on innovations in measurement 

science and development of new technology focused on emerging areas of 

national need

 Foster expanded development of expertise in measurement science and its role 

in innovation through the education and training of scientists and engineers

 Enhance technical innovation through earlier alignment of measurement science 

with emerging and innovative new fields of research

 Further expand NIST’s Laboratory Program’s footprint beyond our Gaithersburg 

and Boulder campuses 
Institute for Bioscience and 

Biotechnology Research (IBBR)

NIST + University of Maryland College 

Park+ UMD Medical School

JILA

NIST + University of Colorado

NIST four “Joint Institutes” ...have all become integral parts of our 

research and measurement service programs

Hollings Marine Laboratory

NIST + NOAA + SCDNR + College of Charleston + 

Medical University of South Carolina 

Joint Quantum Institute

NIST + University of Maryland + NSA
National Cybersecurity Center of Excellence (NCCoE) 

 Public-private collaboration to design, implement, test, and 

demonstrate integrated cybersecurity solutions and promote their 

widespread adoption. 

 Center hosts “Use Cases” that:

– Represent complex cybersecurity business challenges 

– Require an integrated solution that has clear benefits for one or more 

particular industry sectors 

 Results from NCCoE projects will be shared with the broad IT user 

and vendor communities.

 “Use Cases” demonstrate cybersecurity principles and practices 

that are feasible for businesses and measure them against 

standards.

– Health Care IT Use Case - Q4FY12

– Cloud IT Use Case - Q1FY13

– Continuous Monitoring Use Case - Q1FY13

www.nist.gov/itl/csd/nccoe-022112.cfm

www.nist.gov/public_affairs/factsheet/upload/nccoe.pdf

The State of Maryland and Montgomery County, Md., will partner with NIST 

in the New National Cybersecurity Center of Excellence.

A Memorandum of Understanding was signed Feb. 21, 2012

Photo Credit: NIST
Different Niches for new CoEs and Current Partnerships

NIST Joint Institutes and new NCCoE:

 have proven to be mutually beneficial partnerships between 

NIST and various academic institutions that have enhanced 

the depth and quality of NIST research in several areas

 alignment is at the Operating Unit level where:

– single-OU focused 

– lifetime not specified, but none have been terminated; JILA partnership 

has existed for ~50 years ; IBBR for 25 years; HML for more than 12 

years. 

• JILA – AMO physics

• IBBR – biotech

• HML – marine science

• JQI – quantum science

New “Centers of Excellence”:

 will be based on cooperative agreements between NIST and academic and/or industrial 

partners with the specific objective of assisting NIST in building new capacity and 

competencies in critical areas 

– supplements NIST’s IMS (ne Competence Building) Program in that regard

– expected to exist for time sufficient for NIST to build the sought after capacity

 aligned at NIST Laboratory Program level; multi-lab involvement expected 
Centers of Excellence Program Implementation

•

• with Spend Plan that Requests only $7M in FY13

o due to:

− Timing of anticipated allocation of funds; still not released

− Desire to initially standup one pilot center as potential model for others 

• Focus of First New Center – Advanced Materials Discovery

On March 21, 2013, Congress approved the FY13 Full-Year Continuing Resolution to fund 

the federal government for the remainder of the fiscal year. Included in the budget 

statement was language instructing NIST to use $20M of the STRS appropriation line to

establish Centers of Excellence (COE):

“Centers of Excellence.—The creation of centers of excellence is 

supported, and $20,000,000 is included, as requested, to establish 

these centers on a competitive basis.”
Centers of Excellence Program Implementation Cont’d

• NIST is working with the IDA’s Science and Technology 

Policy Institute (STPI) to scan research and technology 

space to identify emerging science/technology areas.

• Input also was solicited from the NIST Laboratory 

Leadership 

• Plan is to establish 2-3 additional competitively-selected 

centers to assist in new capacity building in emerging 

areas of national need, including, but not limited to:

Funds Requested in FY2014 Budget to Complete Program Build Out

− Advanced Communications

− Big Data

− Quantitative Biology

− Complex Systems

− Synthetic Biology

− Carbon-based Nanomaterials

− Clean Energy Systems

− Nondestructive Evaluation

− Disaster Resilience

− Sustainable Engineered Materials
Expectations of the Advanced Materials Center of Excellence 

New Center is expected to:

 Assist NIST in recapturing a leadership position/role in materials discovery 

and development to complement NIST’s world-class capabilities in materials 

characterization

 Provide training opportunities for young scientists and engineers in materials 

discovery and characterization 

 Create a targeted recruitment pool for staff in this critical and expanding area

 Demonstrate use of the tools and resources developed through the Materials 

Genome Initiative for strengthening the U.S. Materials Development 

enterprise
What’s Next for Establishing Advanced Materials CoE

• Federally Funded Opportunity(FFO) is in final stages of clearance for publication

− targeted for mid-June launch

− open for 30 - 45 days

− publicized through webinars and at key Advanced Materials related and Materials 

Genome meetings 

A Competitive Proposal Should:

 Provide evidence of resources to support the Center and its activities

 Demonstrate expertise and strong technical research agenda in Advanced Materials 

discovery (development, modeling, and simulation)

 Clearly articulate plans to engage industry in providing input to direction and focus of Center 

research 

 Substantiate ability to providing a cohesive, collaborative, and multidisciplinary research 

environment. 

 Provide for the use of tools and resources developed by the Materials Genome Initiative that 

will serve as a foundation for strengthening domestic industry. 

 Include plans for:

– training opportunities for young scientists and engineers in materials discovery and 

characterization

– collaboration model for integrating NIST research staff into center activities

– involvement of under-represented students
Thanks for Your Attention 

Questions or Comments?