Funding Opportunities
As a state taxpayer-funded initiative, the TRIF-WEES program benefits the state of Arizona while also achieving a high return on investment for the University of Arizona. The WEES initiative works in tandem with the office of Research, Innovation, and Impact and the office of Research Development Services (RDS) at the University of Arizona to administer grant competitions and awards. The WEES Director oversees the WEES grant review process, which draws on expertise across campus to evaluate proposals in a fair and transparent manner. Although WEES funds and reports on these grants, the application process is administered by RDS through Arizona Cultivate. For a list of recipients of previous WEES awards, please see the Funding History tab on this website.
WEES Programmatic Investment Areas
For FY22–FY24, WEES support will focus on the following six areas (described in detail below).
- Adaptable Desert Communities, Cultures, and Ecosystems
- Building Resilience from Environmental to Human Health
- Fostering Leaders in Resilience
- Future-Proofing Arizona Water
- Observation Systems for Resilience Monitoring and Modeling
- Resilient Systems Integration
WEES funding will be used to support new faculty salary and startup; new and not yet sustainable initiatives, centers, and institutes; targeted grants and awards; and competitive grants. In addition to the AIR-administered competitive AIR Resilience Grants and the AIR Annual Resilience Theme Grant, WEES plans to fund select relevant and highly-ranked proposals submitted through RII’s Internal Funding program, including Accelerate for Success, Challenge Grants, Community Engaged Partnerships, Equipment Enhancement Fund, Faculty Seed Grants, and Production Grants.
In addition to supporting AIR’s mission of supporting interdisciplinary groups, including off-campus partners, to develop practical, applied solutions that further resilience in our natural and human communities, all WEES investments will be evaluated with respect to the following ABOR performance measures:
- Postdocs supported
- Graduate students supported
- Undergraduate students supported
- New Sponsored Project funding
- Publications in academic peer-reviewed journals
- Licenses and options
- Startup companies, investments, and FTEs
- A final point of evaluation will be whether the funding would be a responsible use of Arizona taxpayers’ money.
Problem
For humans to continue to live in arid lands, we must understand how we can be resilient to impacts associated with climate change and other stresses affecting the linked human and natural systems of the desert. Many changes that will eventually affect the rest of the world are starting here in the arid Sonoran Desert; our experiences can inform communities across the globe. Integrated research, education, and outreach grounded in community needs is necessary to guide actions, policies, and decisions that preserve and enhance these linked cultural and ecological systems.
Program Goals
Research in this program focuses on:
- understanding the Sonoran Desert as a case study for resilience solutions that can be applied to challenges in other arid regions around the world;
- integration of science, education, and outreach grounded in community needs (i.e., at the community’s request or direct benefit);
- supporting cultural resilience for communities facing loss of traditional lifeways due to climate change challenges (e.g., cultural practices, language, ecological knowledge);
- research that combines science and/or art to support resilience solutions for arid lands;
- creation of transdisciplinary University/stakeholder working groups to generate solutions to enhance community resilience;
- and connecting researchers to policymakers to ensure that policy preserves both cultural practice/diversity and ecological systems.
Problem
Arizona’s changing climate, population, demographics, and land use patterns, as well as sudden shocks to the system from pandemics, heat waves, wildfires, and other natural phenomena, bring a continuous stream of health challenges to our communities. As people are moving closer to the urban/wild interface, changing climate brings new or more intense natural hazards and new vectors for disease transmission into our region. Communities need reliable information about the nature and extent of threats, the economic costs of threats and possible counter actions, where the greatest vulnerabilities lie, and scenarios for building resiliency to their effects. Furthermore, resource use and extraction industries are critical to the Arizona economy, but have impacts on environmental and human health that need to be addressed.
Program Goals
Research in this program focuses on:
- advancing our understanding of the impacts of heat, drought, and other climate-change-driven impacts and ways to address them, including demographic challenges as people continue to move to more comfortable climates;
- identifying and addressing air and food contamination to develop early warning systems to preempt crises;
- Water contamination may be included here as a secondary/tertiary focus. For research that focuses primarily on water, please see Future-Proofing Arizona Water.
- community collaboration to develop mitigation strategies, scenario evaluation tools, and community education programs;
- and new approaches to mining and reclamation to enable these industries to prosper while preserving our environment and the health of nearby communities.
Problem
Arizona is home to a diverse population with varying strengths, interests, and vulnerabilities. Preparing for a resilient future requires our next generation of leaders and decision makers to reflect that diversity and be able to communicate across sectors and disciplines. STEM training is necessary, but with fluency that goes beyond just STEM. New cross-disciplinary fields are emerging that mix science with technology or policy, for example, and we need to draw students into them. Students, in turn, seek opportunities to make a difference in their communities even before they graduate.
Program Goals
Research in this program focuses on:
- increasing diversity in existing scholarship and internship programs;
- design and implementation of experiential learning curricula;
- expanding internship programs to include more opportunities, especially for underserved populations and less-advantaged students;
- leadership training and mentoring for junior faculty via TRIF-funded programs;
- growing programs to reach K-12 students in STEM and attract them to the University;
- and creation of new environment-focused courses that allow high school students to gain UArizona credit.
Problem
We seek reliable supplies of clean water for our municipalities, industries, and ecosystems, including new technologies to treat contaminated water, new means to use water more efficiently, and better methods to distribute it equitably. The science and technology of clean and reliable water is extremely important, as is having people understand the options and trade-offs associated with alternative pathways forward and encouraging the exploration of creative new ways to manage water in the state.
Program Goals
Research in this program focuses on:
- ensuring a reliable and safe water supply for all Arizonans: water supply, availability, quality, distribution, equity;
- new partnerships between scientists, engineers, and policymakers;
- connecting water sciences to policy to address and resolve water management challenges, including water use;
- commercialization of new water treatment technologies;
- and promotion of a greater diversity of voices influencing water resources management; and engage in innovative partnerships with the private sector.
Problem
We can better prepare for change if we are able to monitor it in real time. Data related to weather, water resources, soil and vegetation conditions, air quality, greenhouse gasses, wind and solar energy, and other conditions allows us to predict what we might expect in the future and plan accordingly. Scientists are now developing methods to provide data and forecasts at shorter-term and more local scales useful to farmers, utilities, and resource managers. A critical step is collaboration between data collectors, data modelers, and data users to ensure that the quality, format, and parameters of the data products are optimized to users’ needs.
Program Goals
Research in this program focuses on:
- creation of a regional-scale climate forecasting center;
- development of more refined local and regional climate, weather, greenhouse gas emissions and other forecasting models;
- combining science, policy, economic, and technology solutions to help monitor and manage greenhouse gas emissions;
- production of energy forecasting products codeveloped with utilities;
- and partnerships with communities to codevelop data and information products that allow them to make decisions based on greater understanding of probable conditions.
Problem
As energy demands, food scarcity, and climate variability increase, the means to create and maintain reliable and resilient energy delivery systems, and food production systems sufficient to sustain and enhance our society, economy, and ecosystems are of paramount importance, especially in regions like Arizona and the Southwest. An integrated and aggressive approach that incorporates economic considerations is required to solve these problems, especially as this region is home to many communities that are particularly vulnerable to such changes.
Program Goals
Please note that water research must be integrated with energy or food production to be included here. Otherwise, please see Future-Proofing Arizona Water.
Research in this program focuses on:
- development of new materials, technologies, and operations targeted to enhance efficient water reuse and purification in energy or food production;
- development of smarter data and decision-making platforms for energy use with robust links to policy and decision-making processes;
- improvement of food production systems, including soil quality;
- integration of new science and technology with policy development, decision making, support, and education;
- production of news designs for more resilient and efficient urban and rural environments;
- and creation of regional test beds and new public-private partnerships.
Grants Supported by TRIF-WEES
AIR Annual Resilience Theme
This award supports an interdisciplinary team to develop and execute a creative and inspiring yearlong agenda of events and activities focused on a single, resilience-related theme-of-the-year for each academic year. This theme will be investigated, explored, and examined through a series of activities using a wide variety of venues.
AIR Resilience Grants
Resilience Grants provide 12 months of funding for activities that advance the mission of the Arizona Institute for Resilience to support interdisciplinary and collaborative research, including with off-campus partners, to develop practical, applied solutions that further resilience in our natural and human communities.
Accelerate for Success
Federal agencies are increasingly funding larger scale, cross-cutting efforts that address specific transdisciplinary challenges. These grants are designed to catalyze medium to large, strategic transdisciplinary research programs—by creating teams, broadening partnerships, and supporting the proposed plan to result in proposal submission and successful funding.
Equipment Enhancement Fund
These grants are designed to add or augment research capacity through the acquisition of equipment for use by multiple investigators in shared facilities or approved university core facilities, with priority for equipment located in the RII Core Facilities. Equipment must add new capacity or refresh existing capacity to enable competitiveness for new, clearly identified extramural funding opportunities. This competition is usually hosted in the fall of each year.
Faculty Seed Grants
The Faculty Seed Grants are designed to jump-start worthwhile projects by providing short-term, one-time support. FSG grants are single investigator awards, provide up to $15,000 on a competitive basis. While there are two tracks available, funding for mid-career faculty is priority to help them take the next step in their research and careers.
Production Grants
Production grants focus on work that spans multiple fields and mediums across the University. These grants may be used to produce original works, performances, or installations. The expenses covered in this grant include: time in a recording studio, film and videography expenses, and travel among many others.