(FOA)-BAA:
Biological Technologies (HR001120S0044); through April 22,
2021
Agency
Department
of Defense, Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency; Biological Technologies
Office (BTO)
Description
The
Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA) often selects its research
efforts through the Broad Agency Announcement (BAA) process. This announcement
seeks revolutionary research ideas for topics not being addressed by ongoing BTO
programs or other published solicitations. The mission of BTO is to foster,
demonstrate, and transition breakthrough research, discoveries, and applications
that integrate biology, engineering, computer science, mathematics, and the
physical sciences. BTO's research investment portfolio includes combating
pandemic disease, innovative physiological interventions, human performance and
warfighter readiness, microbes as production platforms, and deep exploration of
changing ecologies and environments on U.S. capabilities and resilience.
BTO
is interested in submissions related to the following
areas:
·
Discovering
and leveraging novel findings from biotechnology, biochemistry, molecular
biology, neuroscience, psychology, cognitive science, and related disciplines to
advance treatment and resilience in neurological health, transformative neural
processing, and optimize human performance.
·
Understanding
and improving interfaces between the biological and physical world to enable
seamless hybrid systems and revolutionary new human-machine
interfaces.
·
Designing
novel materials, sensors, or processes that mimic or are inspired by biological
systems.
·
Leveraging
and translating a biological system’s underlying design rules, functional
processes, and/or means of interactivity to provide insight into or control over
complex biological systems from biofilms to organs.
·
Developing
new tools and capabilities for forward engineering of biological systems, such
as cells, tissues, organs, organisms, and complex communities, to both develop
new products and functional systems, as well as to gain new insights into
underlying mechanisms.
·
Developing
new platform technologies that integrate, automate, and miniaturize the
collection, processing, and analysis of biological and chemical
samples.
·
Developing
technologies that leverage ecological diversity and/or help support human
operations in extreme environments (ocean, desert, space, arctic,
etc.).
·
Developing
and validating new theories and computational models that identify factors and
principles underlying collective and interactive behaviors of biological
organisms at all scales from individual cells to global
ecosystems.
·
Understanding
the dynamics of population and ecosystem behavior to preserve equilibrium,
provide strategic opportunity, or avoid catastrophe.
·
Developing
and leveraging new technologies that can be applied to agricultural ecosystems
for production stabilization, by improving quality or reducing losses from
pathogens or pests.
·
Developing
and leveraging new insights into non-human biology across and between
populations of microbes, insects, plants, marine life, and other non-human
biologic entities.
·
Developing
technologies to leverage biological systems and enhance the ability to acquire
and maintain critical and strategic organic and inorganic
materials.
·
Developing
new technologies and approaches that ensure biosafety, biosecurity, digital
biosecurity of biological hardware, data and information, and protection of the
bioeconomy.
·
Understanding
emerging threats to global food and water supplies and developing
countermeasures that could be implemented on regional or global
scales.
·
Developing
new technologies to treat, prevent, and predict the emergence and spread of
infectious diseases that have the potential to cause significant health,
economic, and social burden.
·
Developing
and leveraging technologies to advance continuous or near-continuous monitoring
of an organism’s physiology to elucidate mechanisms of human
resilience.
·
Developing
new technologies for the rapid manufacturing, delivery and distribution of large
molecule drugs such as biologics.
·
Leveraging
biology to provide new tactical and strategic maritime operational
advantages.
·
Developing
an understanding of mechanisms that organisms use to assess and interact with
their environment.
·
Developing
new technologies for advanced eukaryotic cellular engineering to support next
generation cellular therapeutic applications.
·
Developing
new platform technologies for targeted, effective, spatiotemporally-controlled
delivery of large and small molecules and biologics.
·
Developing
tools to understand the underlying rules defining biomolecular and biomaterial structure/function properties
in order to predict desired outcomes for novel materials.
·
Leveraging
biological systems to produce solutions for antimicrobial
resistance.
·
Other
biological technology topic areas that fit the national security scope of BTO’s
mission.
Announcement
Number
HR001120S0044
Closing
Date
Abstracts
and proposals are accepted on a rolling basis until April 22,
2021
Link
to Full Announcement
https://www.grants.gov/web/grants/view-opportunity.html?oppId=326528
Contact
Information