The University Industry Demonstration Partnership, of which Clemson University is a member, hosts a free webinar at 1 p.m. Thursday to introduce university faculty to opportunities available via the National Science Foundation’s Industry-University Cooperative Research Centers program.
Preliminary proposals for the NSF program are due in April, so register for this webinar and get started. This webinar will be presented by NSF Program Director Andre Marshall.
NSF’s Industry-University Cooperative Research Centers (IUCRC) Program was initiated in 1973 to develop long-term partnerships among industry, academe, and government. NSF invests in these partnerships to promote research programs of mutual interest, contribute to the nation’s research infrastructure base, enhance the intellectual capacity of the engineering or science workforce through the integration of research and education, and facilitate technology transfer. There are currently more than 65 IUCRCs consisting of more than 180 university sites and more than 1,200 industry members.
A new faculty award developed by the Research Advisory Board will celebrate faculty members who have received national and international recognition at the highest level.
The Advisory Board, consisting of representatives from each college and the University Libraries, has been working with Tanju Karanfil, vice president for research, to develop a mechanism to induct the university’s highest-achieving faculty into a university honors society that will be recognized and celebrated annually. Recipients of this new University Research, Scholarship, and Artistic Achievement Award (URSAAA) will be lifetime URSAAA members and will be invited to participate in an annual celebration with their peers.
The URSAAA webpage includes detailed information on criteria for the award, along with information on recommending yourself or another faculty member for the inaugural class. Recommendations are due April 16. Recipients will be announced and celebrated at the 2018 Research Symposium in May.
As CURF executive director, Chris Gesswein is charged with commercializing innovative Clemson technology and intellectual property and nurturing private-sector partnerships that will advance scientific discovery at Clemson and support economic growth. Gesswein, who joined CURF in 2014 as director of licensing for technology transfer, has served as interim director since 2017.
“CURF serves as the intersection of university research and the economy. Chris’s business savvy and understanding of research-and-development will benefit Clemson faculty, industry and the South Carolina economy,” said Tanju Karanfil, vice president for research.
Prior to joining CURF, Gesswein served as vice president of business development at Ultradian Diagnostics, a start-up he helped nurture to a clinical stage medical device company while overseeing fundraising, regulatory compliance and research grants management. He has more than 20 years of experience bringing various technologies from concept to market working as a new product development and technology transfer specialist for early-stage startups as well as large multi-national companies. Gesswein also operated a consulting business to assist mid-market life-sciences companies and has been a co-author on approximately 21 federal SBIR/STTR and state technology-development grants.
Gesswein received his master’s degree in biotechnology and molecular biology from Johns Hopkins University and his bachelor’s degree from West Virginia University. He has an MBA from Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute in New York and is a member of the American Association of Clinical Chemistry, the American Society of Clinical Pathologists, the Association of University Technology Managers and the Licensing Executive Society.
“With a deep understanding of business, product development and research, Chris is well positioned to lead a great team at CURF and was an easy, unanimous choice by the board to move the organization forward,” said CURF board Chairman George Acker.
The Clemson University Research Foundation is a 501(c)(3) corporation organized exclusively for charitable, educational or scientific purposes to promote the research enterprise at Clemson University.
Through an agency agreement with the university, the foundation is commercializing intellectual property through technology transfer; licensing agreements and new venture formations; and assisting with research development through a Foundation-sponsored technology maturation program and participation in early-stage research grants and sponsored research activities.
We have steadily grown our research enterprise the past few years despite a plateau in federal investments in higher education R&D. Collaborations with industry or private foundations may offer alternative opportunities for you to advance your work. The Division of Research can help.
This semester, our Office of Industry Contracts – with support from the Clemson University Research Foundation and the Watt Family Innovation Center – has made a webinar series available to the campus community to help you initiate and navigate industry collaborations. The webinars bring valuable insights from top academic institutions and private industry. I encourage you to take a look at the schedule online and see how the Office of Industry Contracts can facilitate an industry collaboration for you.
We are investing in your research, too. The Division of Research is accepting applications for internal funding from the university’s SEED program until March 7. Last year, the SEED program provided grants to faculty in every college, helping them to initiate new research or complete a scholarly project. More information is available online here.
We have been successful securing federal funding in what has been a very competitive environment. I want to remind you that some federal funding agencies require you to complete Responsible Conduct of Research training. Our Office of Research Compliance will provide opportunities in March and April for you to obtain credit hours toward this training by attending one of its Brown Bag seminars. More details are available here.
The Division of Research offers numerous events and programs throughout the year to help you advance your work. We want our events and programs to be meaningful to you and would like to hear your feedback. Please send comments, suggestions and ideas to vpr@clemson.edu. In the meantime, I hope to see you at one of our events.
I was proud to report numerous achievements to the Board of Trustees this month:
Our performance in all Carnegie R1 metrics have improved over the past two years, with the university’s overall average ranking for R1 metrics moving up nine spots from 101 in 2014 to 92 in 2016.
Through Jan. 1, federal grant awards were the highest of the past five years at $65 million.
The past several years, our research expenditures have grown steadily even as federal R&D investments flattened under discretionary-spending limits put in place by the Budget Control Act of 2011.
You are doing great work. Assistant art professor Todd Anderson recently joined Pablo Picasso, Francisco Goya and David Hockney with work on display at The Metropolitan Museum of Art. History professor Edwin Moïse, meanwhile, had a lengthy article in the New York Times to discuss a key event of the Vietnam War.
This great work, and more like it, will continue to put Clemson on a world stage. Thank you for your dedication to scientific discovery and scholarship.
The Division of Research will award grants through the Clemson Research Fellows program to assist faculty, academic departments, centers and institutes in the hiring and training of qualified research faculty and post-doctoral researchers.
Through Clemson Research Fellows, researchers may be hired to promote collaborative and creative interdisciplinary activities, research and demonstration projects with the goal of pursuing a large funding opportunity or building a major research program or a research center. These grants ($30,000 to $50,000 per year for each position) may run for a maximum of two years. At the end of the two-year period, the researcher position is expected to be fully supported by externally funded grants or the department.
Clemson Research Fellows is one of four R-Initiative funding opportunities available this semester. The R-Initiative funds are part of the ClemsonForward strategic plan, representing the “R” of the REAL priorities – Research, Engagement, the Academic core and the Living environment.
For details, guidelines and instructions for applying, visit the R-Initiatives webpage. Questions should be directed to Diana Thrasher in the Division of Research at dianas@clemson.edu or 864-656-6444.
A new faculty award developed by the 
