As previously announced, the former office of PreAward Services is now the Office of Sponsored Programs reflecting the expanded scope with the addition of Sponsored Programs Accounting. The Office of Sponsored Programs provides a one-office approach to the full life cycle of research administration in assisting faculty, staff and administrators in obtaining and administering funding from non-university sources to support K-State's creative and scholarly activities.

The OSP is led by Paul Lowe, associate vice president for research and director, who serves as K-State’s authorized institutional approval and signatory for all sponsored program proposals, awards, grants, agreements and project specific financial reporting and Mollie Robbins-Wint, associate director, Lisa Duer, associate director - contract negotiations and Megan Webb, assistant director - sponsored programs accounting.

OSP, located in 103 Fairchild Hall, has expanded its services to the following primary functions.

Pre-award services

Mollie Robbins-Wint, associate director

1. Providing complete proposal services, including assembling proposals, reviewing and reconciling sponsor guidelines, formatting for eRA submission requirements, recommending submission status and submitting in required format to external funding party.
2. Reviewing project awards to ensure conformity with university and regents’ policy, state and federal laws and regulations and assist faculty members with any revisions required as a condition of funding and facilitate the routing, acceptance and on-boarding of these projects at K-State.
3. Facilitating the development, routing, review and submission of project modifications requiring prior approval, in accordance with federal regulations or external sponsor contract requirements. Functions supported include no-cost time extensions, budget revisions, change in PI effort, change in project personnel assignments, relinquishments, project closeouts, changes to project scope and other such project modifications requiring sponsor prior approval.
4. Overseeing data capture, analytics and reporting.
5. Managing eRA systems development, operations and training.

Sponsored programs accounting

Megan Webb, assistant director

Provides fiscal administration services for grants and contracts funded from external sources for the purpose of research and other creative and scholarly activities at K-State. Fiscal administration oversight and management services provided by sponsored programs accounting include:

1. Establishing and maintaining the official file for each agreement for audit purposes.
2. Preparing and submitting required financial reports to sponsors.
3. Invoicing, collection, and deposit of funds from sponsors.
4. Monitoring and reviewing expenditures for compliance with sponsor guidelines and regulations, including costs committed as matching or cost sharing.
5. Documenting personnel expenses (effort) as required by federal government requirements.
6. Preparing reporting requirements as part of the sponsored award closeout process, as dictated by federal regulations and grant-specific terms and conditions, such as final invention reports, equipment/ inventory reports, etc.
7. Serving as primary contact for all financial audits involved in sponsored agreements, including the State of Kansas Federal Statewide Single Audit.

Contract negotiation and subcontracting

Lisa Duer, associate director

1. Reviewing, negotiating, and making recommendations for execution of all contracts, subcontracts and agreements received to facilitate or fund sponsored research, instructional and public services projects.
2. Developing and maintaining a library of innovative contracting template agreements.
3. Assisting with pre-award discussions and potential collaborative teaming questions with sponsors relating to contracting terms and approaches.

The OSP staff listing and their areas of responsibility may be found on the OVPR website.

You can reach OSP by calling 785-532-6804, by individual email or MS Teams, or via group email at research@k-state.edu.

Register for Research Connections and engage to be entered to win a gorgeous custom-made Science as Art piece! Science as Art demonstrates the beauty of science and invites us to appreciate the world around us. These art pieces are created by members of our region or the university community to showcase the beauty of science. Pictured from left to right are “Small Specimen, Big Possibilities" by Erika Geisbrecht, “Layers of Regrowth" by Julie Tucker, “Breaking a Bottleneck in Bee Research" by Tommy Theis and "Greater Spaces, Better Places" by Tommy Theis. 

Register to attend or exhibit at Research Connections.

Last chance: Excellence in Innovation and Economic Engagement Award applications due today

K-State faculty and staff, centers, institutes, and units engaging in innovation and economic prosperity are invited to submit a two-page narrative for the K-State Excellence in Innovation and Economic Engagement Award by 11:59 pm today, to ecodevo@k-state.edu. 

Award winners are selected based on the award criteria – including the key questions, illustration and metric – by an external committee of innovation and economic prosperity practitioners. 

This award recognizes exemplary economic engagement across efforts in talent, innovation and place — plus the intersections of these categories. 

• Talent: focus on education and workforce development. 
• Innovation: focus on innovation and technology-based economic development. 
• Place: focus on social, cultural, or community development. 

Two winners will be selected to account for both 2022 and 2023. At least one of the two winners selected will be an applicant who intentionally advanced talent, innovation or place in accordance with K-State’s Economic Prosperity Plan.  

Finalists will be recognized at the K-State Research Connections event on Wednesday, Oct. 18, 2023. Each winner will receive a commemorative plaque, along with a certificate and a $1,000 grant to advance their economic engagement efforts.  

Visit the award website for full submission details or email questions to ecodevo@k-state.edu. 

K-State has received funding from the State of Kansas to support Biomanufacturing Training and Education. We will use some funding in the first year to support equipment acquisition to support research and/or teaching activities in biomanufacturing, related biosciences, and enabling technologies.

A total of $1M will be available. Requests for OVPR funding in the range of $100,000 to $250,000 are invited. Departments/colleges must provide a 25% match on top of the requested funds.

To apply for this funding, send a request (maximum of two pages) containing the following information, together with a current price quote, to ord@k-state.edu no later than October 15, 2023.

Required information:

• Requestor/principal investigator name, department, college
• Equipment description, vendor, and cost
• Justification for request:
• New research/instruction to be made possible
• Anticipated users
• How this purchase will increase K-State’s biomanufacturing/bioscience capabilities
• A letter committing required matching funds
• Description of the plan for maintaining the equipment, training users, and location in which it is to be housed.

Awards will be announced by November 15, 2023.

The Gordon and Betty Moore Foundation is pleased to share with you the nomination call for 2024 Moore Inventor Fellows. Inspired by Gordon Moore’s passion for discovery, this fellowship seeks to identify outstanding early-stage inventors. We are looking for individuals who are harnessing science and technology solutions to enhance scientific research, strengthen environmental conservation, or improve the experience and outcomes of patient care. 

The Moore Inventor Fellows program recognizes inventors at select research universities and organizations. The foundation has allocated nearly $34 million through 2026 to support 50 Moore Inventor Fellows.

We invite you to nominate two individuals from your institution for this opportunity. 

Fellows will receive funding for three years at a level of $200,000 per year from the Moore Foundation. In addition to funds for the fellow, the foundation will provide $25,000 each year to the institution to cover costs associated with administering the grant award, resulting in a total three-year award of $675,000. Host institutions are required to contribute $50,000 in annual support of the inventor’s work.  

Because K-State can only submit two nominations, internal nominations, faculty name, department, rank, and 2 to 3 sentences on why this person should be nominated must be first sent to ordlimitedsubs@k-state.edu by 5 p.m. on October 10. If there are more than two nominations, the Office of Research Development will have an internal competition with pre-nomination packages due October 31.

11:30 a.m.-12:30 p.m.

Thursday, September 28

Join NIJ’s Research Assistantship Program, or RAP, which offers highly qualified doctoral students the opportunity to bring their expertise to NIJ to work across offices and program areas to obtain practical and applied research experience.

RAP is a research-focused professional development opportunity for doctoral students from all academic disciplines. NIJ provides funds to participating universities to pay salaries and other costs associated with research assistants. A Q&A session will conclude the webinar.

A recording and transcript will also be available after the webinar, posted online, and shared with registered attendees

Register to attend.

2-3 p.m.

Wednesday, Oct. 4

Please join the Ethical and Responsible Research Program, or ER2, to discuss questions about the program with the program director.

Office hours take place over Zoom, generally on Wednesdays.

To join, use the Ethical and Responsible Research office hour Zoom link.

All meetings during office hours are 1-on-1. Guests are seen in the order they join. You may have to wait if others join before you.

1-2:30 p.m.

Thursday, Oct. 5

This interagency program solicitation aims to support the development of transformative high-risk, high-reward advances in computer and information science, engineering, mathematics, statistics, behavioral, and/or cognitive research to address pressing questions in the biomedical and public health communities. Transformations hinge on scientific and engineering innovations by interdisciplinary teams that develop novel methods to intuitively and intelligently collect, sense, connect, analyze, and interpret data from individuals, devices, and systems to enable discovery and optimize health. Solutions to these complex biomedical or public health problems demand the formation of interdisciplinary teams ready to address these issues while advancing fundamental science and engineering.

This webinar is the second and last of the informational solicitation webinar series. This discussion will cover the program solicitation and end with Questions and Answers.

Register to attend.

1-2 p.m.

Wednesday, Oct. 11

Join the Division of Molecular and Cellular Biosciences at the National Science Foundation for our next virtual office hour on Tool Development for Molecular and Cell Biology. 

Program Directors will be present to address your questions.

Please register to attend.

2-3 p.m.

Monday, Oct. 16

ExpandAI Office hours are provided for your convenience. NSF Program Directors representing different categories of MSIs will be available on the days and times listed to answer your questions about the program. Feel free to join/leave at any point during the meeting.

To join, simply follow the event link below. You do not need to turn on your microphone or share your camera to join. Responses will be provided to questions typed into the Zoom chat window. Office hours will not be recorded but will be held regularly as advertised. Come prepared with your questions or simply join in to listen.

Join the Office Hours.

October 12-13, 2023

Denver, Colorado

Calling all land-grant colleagues!

Join the North Central Region Water Network in Denver, Colorado to discuss how we can work together across institutions to address vulnerability associated with climate change, protect and restore our waters for future generations, and advance culturally rich and sustainable food systems and food sovereignty. 

The North Central Region Water Network, The First Americans Land-Grant Consortium, or FALCON, and partners from across the North Central Region are excited to host a workshop for 1862, 1890, and 1994 land-grant colleagues working on climate and water-related issues.

This in-person workshop will be held ahead of the FALCON Annual Conference, starting mid-day on October 12 and ending at 1 p.m. on October 13 in Downtown Denver, Colorado.

Together, we will create actionable recommendations to improve collaborations among land-grant institutions in ways that will increase our ability to provide climate and water programming in equitable and just ways with a focus on serving Black and Indigenous communities.

Learn more.

November 28-30

Gaylord National Harbor in Washington D.C.

This is our 12th annual program, bringing together defense, private industry, federal agencies, and academic leadership to accelerate applications for state-of-the-art technology solutions. Our unique Innovation Partner packages for Defense TechConnect 2023 offers exceptional networking, showcase, pitch, and expo opportunities for your organization. By participating, you will have the chance to be front and center at one of the largest dedicated emerging tech and innovation matchmaking conferences of the year. Become a TechConnect Innovation Partner!

In addition to Defense TechConnect 2023, we are co-locating two conferences - SBIR/STTR Fall Innovation and Smart Cities 2023. This collaboration will provide a unique opportunity for networking and knowledge exchange.

Save the date and mark your calendars for this premier event! Already prepared to apply? Go ahead and submit your technology applications.

Research team develops smallest antibody scaffold Fox 8

K-State to host Digital Agriculture and Advanced Analytics Symposium Farms.com

K-State Receives Grants For Cattle, Swine Vaccine Development Feed Lot Magazine

Rolling Hills Zoo rhino's cause of death still unknown but K-State research finds surprise Salina Journal

K-State launches next-gen Institute for Digital Agriculture, Advanced Analytics JC Post

K-State 105 partnership initiative to expand FHSU-led Small Business Development Center operations in northwest Kansas Great Bend Tribune

K-State Develops System Elevating Organic Produce Safety Kansas Ag Connection

Researchers discover biomarker for tracking depression recovery

Using a novel deep brain stimulation (DBS) device capable of recording brain signals, researchers have identified a pattern of brain activity or “biomarker” related to clinical signs of recovery from treatment-resistant depression. The findings from this small study are an important step towards using brain data to understand a patient’s response to DBS treatment. The study was published in Nature and supported by the National Institutes of Health’s Brain Research Through Advancing Innovative Neurotechnologies® Initiative, or The BRAIN Initiative®. NIH

A potential blood test for Parkinson’s disease

In a new study, an NIH-funded research team led by Dr. Laurie Sanders from Duke University developed a blood test to detect damage to the DNA in mitochondria, called mtDNA. They built their test, which they call Mito DNADX, on polymerase chain reaction, or PCR, technology. Results were published on August 30, 2023, in Science Translational Medicine. NIH

Scientists zero in on timing, causes of ice age mammal extinctions in Southern California

The end of the last ice age also marked the end for more than three dozen genera of large mammals in North America, from mammoths and mastodons to bison and saber-toothed cats. Details of the precise timing and circumstances, however, have remained murky ever since. NSF

Ancient DNA reveals an early African origin of cattle in the Americas

In a study funded in part by the U.S. National Science Foundation and published in Scientific Reports, researchers at the University of Florida analyzed ancient DNA from Spanish settlements in the Caribbean and Mexico. Their results indicate cattle were imported from Africa as far back as the early 1600s, more than 100 years before their arrival was officially documented. NSF

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