STEWARDSHIP SCIENCE ACADEMIC ALLIANCES PROGRAM CENTERS OF EXCELLENCE

Defense Programs, within the Department of Energy's (DOE) National Nuclear Security Administration (NNSA), directs research and development activities to maintain the safety, security, and effectiveness of the nation's nuclear weapons stockpile. This nuclear deterrent remains a vital part of our national security infrastructure. It maintains strategic stability, deters potential adversaries, and reassures our allies and partners of our security commitments. Since 1992, the United States has observed the moratorium on underground nuclear testing while significantly decreasing the size of its nuclear arsenal. National Policy required NNSA and its weapons laboratories to institute the science-based Stockpile Stewardship Program (SSP) to ensure the safety, security, and effectiveness of the stockpile, while allowing the country to pursue a variety of nonproliferation and disarmament goals.

The SSP combines sophisticated experiments, highly accurate physics modeling, and improved computational power to simulate and predict nuclear weapon performance over a wide range of conditions and scenarios.

The Stewardship Science Academic Alliances (SSAA) Program was established in 2002 to support state-of-the-art research at U.S. academic institutions in areas of fundamental physical science and technology of relevance to the SSP mission. The SSAA Program provides the research experience necessary to maintain a cadre of trained scientists at U.S. universities to meet the nation's current and future SSP needs, with a focus on those areas not supported by other federal agencies. It supports the DOE/NNSA's priorities both to address the workforce specific needs in science, technology, engineering, and mathematics and to support the next generation of professionals who will meet those needs.

Defense Programs Office of Strategic Partnership Programs announces their interest in receiving applications for new or renewal cooperative agreement financial assistance awards for Centers of Excellence for research in the Stewardship Science Academic Alliances (SSAA) Program. Only applications for cooperative agreements awards will be accepted for this solicitation, no grant applications will be considered.

The specific areas of interest are:

1. Advanced Characterization of Materials Properties under Extreme Conditions

2. Low Energy Nuclear Science

3. Radiochemistry

4. High Energy Density Physics

Cooperative Agreement Applicant Responsibility. The applicant, if successful, will be the responsible authority regarding the settlement and satisfaction of all contractual and administrative issues, including but not limited to, disputes and claims arising out of any agreement between the applicant and the FFRDC contractor.

The Master Government List of FFRDCs is available at: http://www.nsf.gov/statistics/ffrdclist/

ADDRESS TO REQUEST APPLICATION PACKAGE

Application forms and instructions are available at Grants.gov. To access these materials, go to https://www.Grants.gov, select Search Grants and then enter the Assistance Listing number (81.112) and/or the NOFO number shown on the cover of this NOFO. Select the Apply button to access the application package. You are encouraged to review the Applicant FAQs in Grants.gov as you prepare and submit your application.

Applications submitted through www.FedConnect.net will not be accepted.