record. Hi, everybody, we are going to wait for a minute to let everybody come in the room and get situated. So just hang tight, feeling good about the number we have. And if anyone comes in late, that's not a problem, because we will be recording this, we are recording this. So welcome, everyone to this very special January webinar. Today, we are delighted to have Dr. Chinonye, Nakwe Whitley, more commonly known as Dr. Chichi, with us today to share information on NSF EPSCORE, which is the Establish Program to Stimulate Competitive Research, the Track 4 Research Fellows Program. And Dr. Chichi is actually the NSF program lead for this track. So we are especially lucky that she graciously agreed to do this webinar, given that she is literally the expert, which is awesome. Alright, so a few housekeeping things before we begin. My name is Brittany VanDorff, and I'm the Communication and Outreach Specialist for New Mexico EPSCORE. EPSCORE is a nationwide program funded by the National Science Foundation. And I'll be your host for today's webinar, along with my partner and webinar hosting crime, Ms. Isis Serna, who will be working in the background behind the scenes to make sure everything runs smoothly. Another thing you need to know is that this webinar will be about an hour long. And if you have questions at any point, please type them into the Q&A box, and Dr. Chichi will take them at the end of the presentation. And then finally, a recording and transcript of this webinar will be made available to view on our website, www.nmepscore.org, under the webinars tab. Alright, now for the star. So a quick introduction. As an NSF program, EPSCORE program officer, Dr. Chichi currently manages a $107 million portfolio of 20 standard grants and cooperative agreements, and focuses on building basic science research infrastructure, promoting economic development, and broadening participation in STEM. However, she is also a molecular biologist and her research of DNA repair and DNA signaling pathways offers insights towards the molecular biology of neuroscience, immunology and cancer biology. She earned her PhD in pathology at the University of Chicago, and we are absolutely over the moon that she was able to do this webinar today. So welcome, Dr. Chichi. Thank you for being here and take it away. All right, I'm going to share my screen. Just get confirmation that you can see it. All right. Well, thank you so much, Brittany and New Mexico EPSCORE for inviting me to give a talk on a program that I hope will be exciting for early career investigators across the jurisdiction of New Mexico. My name was so pleasantly said earlier. Thank you, Brittany. And so you're welcome to just call me Dr. Chichi. I'm proud. I'm proud to serve as a program officer for the National Science Foundation. And I serve with the established program to stimulate competitive research. What I'd like to do is give a brief overview of EPSCORE for folks who may not be familiar with the program, as well as additional information about the EPSCORE research fellows opportunity. I'll provide a deeper dive into our newer track, which is the RII track for fast mechanism, as well as go over merit review criteria, which is very important as you're crafting proposals for this opportunity to keep in mind. And I'll end with some closing remarks. So the NSF EPSCORE program is a congressionally mandated program and it originated at NSF in 1978, but then went on to be mandated by Congress in the 1980s. And you'll find an EPSCORE-like program across multiple federal agencies. The intention of the program is to build research capacity and advance the capacity of eligible jurisdictions to conduct competitive research. EPSCORE's investment strategies seek to build capacity across three main areas. In terms of STEM outreach and research, our investments are to promote discovery and innovation. We also seek to advance the education of a diverse and capable STEM workforce. And as a result of these investments, we hope that they positively impact the economic development of EPSCORE jurisdictions more broadly. The term EPSCORE jurisdictions refers to United States commonwealths and United States territories that are eligible for funding from the NSF EPSCORE program. In fiscal year 22, states commonwealths and territories are all that are eligible for funding are referred to as EPSCORE jurisdictions and they're eligible if their most recent five year level of total NSF funding is equal to or less than 0.75% of the total NSF budget. So if you tally up all the funding over the last five years, and it's less than this percentage of the NSF budget, this given jurisdiction is eligible. Jurisdictions above 0.75% but less than 0.8% that are that were previously eligible for EPSCORE funding may remain eligible for up to five years. If you'd like more information, this eligibility is updated annually and is available via our website using the link in this slide and we'll provide the slides to you, Brittany, so that you can share with your audience. In this fiscal year, there are 28 EPSCORE eligible jurisdictions. And that means that if you're part of this jurisdiction, your institution is eligible for the EPSCORE research fellows mechanism. So the EPSCORE program makes its investments through research infrastructure improvement mechanisms. And many know the RII or research infrastructure improvement track one mechanism, which includes jurisdiction wide awards that amount to $20 million over five years. Another mechanism includes the RII track two mechanism, which supports research collaborations across multiple EPSCORE jurisdictions. And these awards range from $4 to $6 million over four years. The RII track one mechanism supports topics that are driven by the state's science and technology plan. And the track two mechanism supports PI driven projects that are in alignment with the topic that NSF announces. The EPSCORE program also makes investments in individuals or small teams through its co funding and workshop mechanisms. We recently released a new opportunity to increase the retention and graduation rates of students disproportionately affected by the COVID-19 pandemic that are pursuing undergraduate and graduate degrees in STEM. Particularly those individuals from groups that are underrepresented in STEM, and those transitioning from or to minority serving institutions within EPSCORE jurisdictions. This is the research infrastructure improvement program bridging EPSCORE communities or RIBEC. And it's the intent of this program to strengthen the science and engineering enterprise by enabling institutions and EPSCORE jurisdictions to create bridge programs to facilitate the transitions of affected groups from one stage of STEM training to the next. You like more information, the solicitation just came out and the deadline is April 4 2022. So I would encourage you to consult the solicitation NSF 22-536. Now the RII Track 4 mechanism arose in discussion with the broader EPSCORE community. And during those discussions, the program recognized an opportunity to catalyze career trajectories of the next generation of research leaders. This opportunity amounted to providing time for these leaders to develop new or expand current research directions and a pathway for strengthening research connections with partners across the nation. And so we have the vision of the RII Track 4 EPSCORE research fellows mechanism where early career investigators that are non-tenured can further develop their individual research potential through extended collaborative visits to the nation's premier private, governmental or academic research centers. This includes national laboratories when we talk about governmental or any federal entity, and it includes private companies as an example. This mechanism will provide fellows the ability to learn new techniques, benefit from access to state-of-the-art equipment facilities or reagents to strengthen collaborative partnerships and shift or extend their research towards transformative directions. This mechanism provides experiences that will benefit and positively impact the recipient's career in years to come. And these benefits are also expected to enhance the research capacity of a fellow's home institution or jurisdiction. This is a really exciting time at NSF EPSCORE because the solicitation for RII Track 4 includes two tracks. The first is the RII NSF Track in which host sites may be any research institution within the United States or its territories and possessions in any topic that NSF funds is eligible. The second, which is the newest track, is the RII Track 4 FAST Track. And host sites are at specific NASA research centers where topics are limited to those described in the solicitation and there are specific institution types that are eligible. To go in a little bit more depth, the RII Track 4 FAST Opportunity includes acronym in which it stands for Fellows Advancing Science and Technology. And this is a collaboration between the federal agency NASA and NSF and the EPSCORE programs that are within. It provides an opportunity to strengthen relationships with research communities while also building on experience and know how. And it's the hope that the collaboration between these two agencies will engage the NASA and NSF EPSCORE Minorities Serving Institution community with NASA researchers and open new pathways for NASA EPSCORE jurisdictions to compete for larger projects. For this new opportunity, the idea is that we aim to fund up to 10 proposals. The opportunity will provide access to NASA facilities and can start as early as the first quarter of 2023 for this next cycle. Within the partnership, a NASA mentor will be aligned with the research as a subject matter expert by the NASA Center's point of contact. Awardees will have the opportunity to collaborate with NASA subject matter experts for the duration of the award. And this expert will serve as the research collaborator, the technical monitor that will have support from NASA to conduct extended collaborative visits with awardees. There's also logistical support to be provided, including assistance with identifying housing that can be made available as part of the onboarding process that supports access to NASA research centers. And PIs will be able to access NASA facilities for 24 months within the project duration, but they will be able to receive support for up to six months overall within that timeframe. For both tracks, there's a limit on the number of proposals that may be submitted by an institution. For the RAI track for NSF track, there's a limit of three proposals per institutions that may be submitted. For the RAI track for a fast opportunity, the limit is six proposals per institution. For institutions that are eligible for both tracks, the maximum number of some proposal submissions is nine proposals, which breaks down to three proposals for the RAI track for NSF track, and six proposals for the RAI track for a fast opportunity. Make sure that you are contacting your sponsored research office early in the process to determine what the what will be the internal process that is used to select the proposals that can be submitted by your institution. All right. So in terms of eligibility, there's a number of guidelines for both opportunities. To be eligible for both tracks, an applicant must have their primary appointment at an EPSCOR eligible institution. So when I refer to the map earlier, your institution needs to be within an EPSCOR eligible jurisdiction to be eligible for this for both opportunities. If an applicant holds a transitional fixed term postdoctoral appointment or a short term appointment that will last for less than three years, they are not eligible for this program. And applications for this mechanism may only be submitted by a single PI. And there is not a submission with co-PIs or collaborative proposals that are permitted. For the RAI track for NSF track, institutions can either be one of higher education or a nonprofit non degree granting organization. And an example of these type of organizations are independent museums, science centers, observatories, research laboratories, etc. etc. Okay. At a non for profit, non degree granting organization, an applicant must have an early career career track appointment. And independent research much must be a major component of their work duties. At institutions of higher education, an applicant must hold a non tenured faculty appointment. And this includes pre tenured tenure track positions, or long term non tenure track positions. To be eligible for the opportunity must be in a non tenured status by the proposal deadline. So for example, if you're going up for tenure and you're notified that your tenure status is going to change, but it has not changed by the deadline, you are eligible for the opportunity. For the RAI track for fast track only institutions of higher education are eligible. There are five institution types that may apply. And these include minority serving institutions such as institutions within New Mexico, two year colleges, institutions primarily serving at students with disabilities, women's colleges and primarily undergraduate institutions. Similar to the RAI track for NSF track, faculty can have either long term non tenure track appointments or non tenured tenure track appointments. Please keep in mind that all of the types that are eligible for all of the institution types that are eligible for RAI track for fast are also eligible for RAI track for NSF. For both tracks, PIs may also request to support one trainee level researcher along for the fellowship visit. And for the RAI track for NSF track, there's no stipulations on the role of the trainee. So they may be an undergraduate or graduate trainee. They may be a postdoc. Some folks have brought on staff members. Okay. For the RAI track for fast opportunity, the trainee may be a student or postdoctoral researcher. They may or may not be working in the research group already. So they may be unnamed or they may be named. And PIs for both tracks may request up to six months of salary support that can include benefits and tuition for the trainee. It's important to note that funding from this mechanism is not easily transferable. So for example, if a PI takes a new position at an institution that's not within an abscort eligible jurisdiction, the fellowship award will be terminated because the opportunity is specific for the PI that's applying. To give you an example of some track for fast awardees, the in the first cycle, we awarded the University of Hawaii with a track for RAI track for a fast award to Dr. Justin Stopa. And his topic focused on an investigation of tropical cyclone intensity using synthetic aperture radars and complementary satellite ocean observation. That's a mouthful. And his collaboration is at the Jet Propulsion Laboratory. We also have another PI going to the Jet Propulsion Laboratory from Middlebury College. And that's Dr. Chris Herdman, who's studying numerical simulations of Bose-Einstein condensants in microgravity. As you can see, that's an example, but these are not the only types of topics that are eligible. And I encourage you to take a look at the solicitation for the topics. So what goes into a successful proposal? Okay. For this opportunity, successful proposals will present exciting and vibrant fellowship ideas that are innovative. They will positively impact and positively transform the PI's individual career trajectory. And more broadly, the fellowship is expected to impact the research field, the home institution, and or the home jurisdiction in which the PI resides. All proposals should include the motivation and research context for the research to be conducted, well-defined reason and organized research objectives that are driven by specific research questions or hypotheses. They should have specific plans for the fellowship period and a discussion on how the benefits gained from the fellowship can be sustained beyond the funding period. There should also be a clear description of fellowship goals, performance metrics for the project and a timetable of activities. Successful proposals also explain how or why the award will advance the research. For example, how will the fellowship provide opportunities to a PI that would otherwise be unavailable? Successful proposals also describe how activities can lead to long-lasting impacts for both the PI's career and the PI's home institution or jurisdiction. And that's something I'm emphasizing here. It's very important that the proposals describe both how the PI can benefit and how the home institution or jurisdiction can benefit. The opportunity has a 24 month or two year duration, but PI's may only request up to six months of support because the idea is that they're doing six months of work. This is not a two-year research project. It's a six month research project, but that six months can be spread out over a two year timeline to enable flexibilities with work responsibilities. For budget requests, PI's may request up to 300,000 for that 24 month period. And in addition to providing flexibility, budget requests may also include up to six months of salary in French for the trainee level participant. In addition, there may be a request for up to 75,000 to support travel to and from the host site for the PI and the trainee and up to 10,000 total for fees, supplies, reagents, equipment, shipping, publication costs. Anything other than the travel is up to 10,000. There's also an allowance of 5,000 for research related activities that might be used for travel to conferences or may be used for other sites that are not within a reasonable commuting distance of the host site. Please make sure that you are using the United States General Services Administration rate for estimating living expenses and traveling costs. Now, for the RII track for fast opportunity, in addition to these budget requests guidelines, an additional 60,000 in research infrastructure development funds from NASA are available. And I'm going to go into a quick deep dive on those. So PIs, if they have received an RII track for fast awards, may separately submit a request to NASA for a research infrastructure development grant that is up to 60,000 total for the duration of the fellowship and roughly 30,000 per year. Only those who have gone through the NSF peer review process and have received a track for fast award are eligible for this opportunity. In addition, it's very important that you not include this in your budget request to NSF because NASA will separately manage the process for applying for this RID award. The process for applying is through the NASA EPSCOR lead institution directors. And as you prepare your proposal, I would encourage you to contact your local NASA EPSCOR state director as part of ensuring that they know who you are. And if you receive an award, you'll be working with them to submit your RID grant requests. The RID awards are managed through an augmentation application, and it follows the same rules, regulations and processes as any other RID augmentation request. If you currently have an RID award from NASA EPSCOR, this award would be provided in addition to your current award. We mentioned that your host collaborator would be a research collaborator. And for the RAI track for fast opportunities, they will also serve as a technical monitor. And so NASA will cover the expenses for the technical monitor to travel to your institution for that visit. The visits will take place at least once during the research period, but it can increase given the collaborator's preference. For example, when these technical monitoring visits take place, it's often the researchers collaborating at the whole site, home institution, excuse me. In addition, technical monitors or host collaborators at NASA research centers are able to also attend professional conferences, and that's covered by NASA as a way to encourage participation. Is there is also encouragement to submit peer reviewed papers and co-present as any collaborators would do. So just to really recap, to recap really quickly on RAI track for fast. Similar, there's no more than six applicants per institution. You would receive up to two years at a NASA research center, our facility. Similar to the RAI track for NSF opportunity, the research period is for two years, but the activities are for only six months. And if there are challenges that are being experienced, for example, a viral epidemic, you can request a no cost extension, depending on the work that's being performed. Now for RAI track for NSF, there are no citizenship requirements. And for your proposal submission, we ask that there be no documentation of citizenship provided for both tracks when you submit to NSF. For RAI track for fast, both the PI and apprentice may have a requirement to be US citizens in some cases. So in the first cycle of this opportunity, we only included NASA research centers that required citizenship. But in the second cycle, the plan is to expand the number of research centers that are participating and thus legal permanent residents may be eligible if that's an eligibility criterion that's available at that given NASA research center. What we will do is work with you once you've received your award at the stage of onboarding. And that's where you might be requested to provide that level of documentation. But at the level of proposal submission, we ask that you provide no documentation of citizenship. For the opportunity, there are letters that should be submitted from a number of categories. And for both tracks, we ask that you provide letters of supplementary documents for your proposal submission. They fall into several categories. The first letter should come from an appropriate supervisory administrator from the PI's home institution. And it should confirm that the institution is in support of the PI's plans and verify that the PI can receive release time or from other academic duties to complete the project as proposed. The letter should also confirm the PI's employment status and the tenure status at their home institution as it pertains to eligibility for this mechanism. Next, a second letter should come from the primary research collaborator or collaborators at the host site. And the letter should confirm the collaborator's understanding of the goals of the fellowship project and provide evidence that demonstrates the PI will receive support necessary to complete the proposed activities. Okay. And so for your, if you're applying to the RAI track for a fast opportunity, this letter would come from the collaborator at the research center. A third letter of support should come from an appropriate administrative manager at the host institution. And the letter should confirm that all the necessary logistical arrangements will be provided to ensure that the project can proceed as proposed. These administrators may include side access. These administrators may confirm that side access office space, cyber connectivity or other provisions can be provided. And for the RAI track for a fast opportunity, we would encourage you to contact the NASA points of contact for this letter. In some cases, PIs might believe that the primary research collaborator at the host site is also the administrative manager that would provide two letters. If that's the case, the PI should contact a program officer at NSF within the EPSCOR office for guidance. So I should receive an email from you or my colleague, Dr. Cologne, should receive an email for you if you have a question regarding this case. If you'd like to submit other letters of support, you can do so, but they need to specify specific tangible commitments related to the activities described in the proposal. If they don't meet the standards, we will ask PIs to remove those letters. So an example of this may be that there's a collaboration with a nonprofit for outreach activities. I've seen PI submit letters from their collaborator with that nonprofit or other organization as evidence that the outreach will be conducted. For RAI track for a fast, if an institution is a primarily undergraduate institution, a fourth letter from an authorized organizational representatives needs to be provided that certifies that the home institution awards associate and bachelor's degrees and master's degrees in NSF supported fields and that the institution has awarded 20 or fewer PhD or doctor of science degrees in all NSF supported fields within the last two years. And that's basically a letter verifying that the institution is a primarily undergraduate institution. For RAI track for a fast, if a PI has already contacted a NASA EPSCORE state director, they can also provide a letter from that state director. And we provided the link here for you to identify the contact information of these based on your jurisdiction. These and it's really important again to connect with these folks because they can provide assistance with processing the paperwork for our ID grants. All right. So finally, I'd like to go through the merit review criteria for this opportunity. It's really important to keep in mind that as you're crafting your proposal, reviewers who are reading your proposal will be asked to evaluate them based on specific review criteria. And so all NSF proposals, including those submitted to this program are evaluated through the use of two National Science Board approved merit review criteria. These include intellectual merit and broader impacts. And both criterion. Intellectual merit and broader impacts are to be given full consideration during the review and decision making processes. Each criterion is necessary, but neither by themselves are sufficient. So when evaluating NSF proposals, reviewers will be asked to consider what proposals one proposers yourselves as PIs want to do. Why do you want to do it? How do you plan to do it? And how will you know if you're successful and what benefits could accrue if the project is successful? These statements apply to both the technical aspects of the proposal and the way in which the product may make broader contributions. To that end, reviewers will be asked to evaluate all proposals against the criteria of intellectual merit, which encompasses the potential to advance knowledge and the criterion of broader impacts, which encompasses the potential to benefit society and contribute to specific desired societal outcomes. For each of these criterion following elements should be considered as part of the merit review process. So what is the potential for the proposed activity to advance knowledge and understanding within its own field and across different fields and benefit society or advance its desired societal outcomes? This is for both intellectual merit and broader impacts. So for both, what to what extent did the proposed activity suggests and explore creative, original and potentially transformative concepts, right? So that's both for intellectual merit and broader impacts. Reviewers will be asked, is the plan for carrying out the activities will reason, organize and based on the sound rationale? And does the plan incorporate a mechanism to assess success? Reviewers will also be asked about how well the individual team or organization is qualified to to conduct the proposed activities and whether there's adequate resources available to the PI to carry out the proposed activities. And these type of descriptions can be provided in the proposal, but also within the letters of support, which are required as part of the submission of this proposal. For this mechanism, additional solicitation specific criteria will be included to highlight specific objectives. And these include the following questions. So reviewers will be asked these questions when they're reading your proposal. What evidence is presented to demonstrate the proposed research outcomes can be achieved within the constraints of the fellowship period with the work being performed primarily at the host site? How will the fellowship have a positive impact on the trajectory of the PI's research career goals? Or should I say not positive transformative, excuse me, impact on the PI's research career goals during and after the funding period? And how will the fellowship yield tangible benefits to the home institution and or jurisdiction beyond the individual benefits to the PI? Okay, so we'll be asking reviewers to give their assessment of that. Finally, what evidence is there that the home institution and host site are each committing the necessary resources, both scientific and administrative to lend confidence that the fellowship project will be successful in achieving its intended outcomes. So again, your letters of support will also be able to address this criterion. Okay, so that's it for the content portion of this presentation. I just want to want you to know that we are welcoming interested applicants to engage well before the proposal submission process. We're having a series of webinars. We have one coming up again on Wednesday. And my colleagues from NASA will be leading that webinar. So it's a great opportunity to ask them questions directly. We're also organizing some matching events to enable PI's to connect with the NASA points of contacts at each research center that's participating in the solicitation. So this is an opportunity for you to talk to the folks that will help you find a researcher at one of these NASA research centers. Okay, so those tentative dates are for February 9th and February 16th. So we strongly encourage you to attend. We will also be hosting office hours at NSF in the months of February, March and April. And we usually do that to enable PI's to come and talk to NSF program officers if they have any questions on their submissions. And those are not recorded.  You're welcome to submit questions in advance of these opportunities and outreach events to me directly. And if you are in need of real time closed captioning, please contact me 14 days in advance. Okay, here are the contact information for here's the contact information for the program officers at National Science Foundation and our contacts at NASA. If you have further questions, you'll receive this slide, you can call us, you can email us, you can contact us with any questions you have. And we will be posting the date for the office hours in the next couple of weeks. Alright, I think to summarize everything. I'll just encourage you to get your application ready. Identify your collaborator if you haven't done so already. And for track for our eye track for fast, identify your collaborator at NASA Research Center will provide that in the solicitation. You should also consult with your sponsored research office regarding internal competitions because there's a limit on the number of proposals that can be submitted. So make sure that your proposal is one of those selected to be submitted within that proposal limitation. We encourage you to obtain your letters of support early in the process, very early, at least a month in advance early. I can't stress strongly enough. And also contact us at NSF or my colleagues at NASA if you have any questions. And this year, proposal submissions will be through research.gov. So I provided a link to give you more insight on how to guide video tutorials and frequently asked questions on submitting through research.gov. We won't be receiving proposals through Fastlane at this time. All right. And now, thank you. Thank you so much for taking the time to listen to all this information. I really encourage you to reach out to us over the next couple of months. And again, thank you again to Brittany and New Mexico F Score for inviting me to speak into my colleagues that are attending this call. All right. Any questions? And I'm going to stop sharing at this point. Yes, we do have questions. So the first is for track board fast, I am wondering if we need a pre contact to pre contact NASA for detailed research topic or need to get an approval for the facility access, et cetera. Yes. And so we're in the process of providing a solicitation that will have the updated research centers that are involved. And the points of contact will be listed there so you can reach out to them and they'll help you identify the detailed research topics that are eligible for the opportunity. And that's kind of why we're doing the matching events as well because we want you to reach out to folks in advance to incorporate that into the proposal that you're writing for facility access. I think I have to ask my NASA colleagues about that because I think with the letters of either support, that's part of the process. So I think. Either way, the support for access to the facilities will be provided. And that's part of this partnership that we have with NASA. Great. And if you want more clarification on any questions that I ask on your behalf, audience, just type it into the chat or the Q&A and I'll speak up on your behalf again. The next question is, are there any opportunities for cellular, molecular and neuroscience? I would say yes. I think that there are some research centers that do astrobiology. And so that can be doing cellular and molecular research on a spaceship. So this is where I would love my NASA colleagues to come in. So I would ask them directly, but I have seen research opportunities for cellular and molecular biologists as part of this opportunity, either through doing research on a vessel, either through doing research that might impact astronauts. And so there's there's different ways to be able to incorporate your biological science background into a NASA research opportunity. Great. Thank you. I think you might have answered this, but I'm going to ask it on there. We have anyway regarding the track for fast, are the proposals reviewed, selected by NASA centers together with NSF panel or by NSF? Who are the reviewers? So maybe not. So NSF manages the merit review process. We have a hybrid review process where we have ad hoc reviewers that have the technical expertise that is that's an alignment with your proposal. So that might include folks that have reviewed for NASA or might have reviewed for NSF. We also have a panel that includes experts in a given field, but broader with senior leadership experience. So that's kind of how the review process goes, but we don't send it to NASA. I'm assuming that was the question. I have yet to get a clarification. So I think that was the question. I'm occasion. Feel free to ask. So we've got another one from being from New Mexico. Can the PI write the proposal in collaboration with the National Labs located in New Mexico? Yeah. And so if you, well, OK, now remember that the solicitation states that the collaboration and the fellowship is meant to support collaborations that cannot happen otherwise, right? So if the federal lab is like 30 minutes from your home institution and you can already go over there, you would probably need to provide some additional justification, right? Because then it's not clear as to why you need this fellowship funding, OK, to do something where you can just go across the street. But there may be that the release time may not be provided otherwise. That's an example I've seen. But if you're in New Mexico and you want to go somewhere that's beyond a reasonable commuting distance, there's no reason to avoid that host site. It's all about the collaboration and what it's going to do to benefit and transform your career. That's very relevant for a lot of people to know, given how far apart things are here. That I get that question a lot because, you know, we have several jurisdictions which are really large. I would say Alaska has five people per square mile. I don't know what the population per square mile here in New Mexico is. I should know this, but maybe you could tell me later. I don't either. Thank you for answering that. Awesome. And do we have any other questions now is your moment? Yeah. And just to follow up on that question, the idea would be then you would want to get a letter from the senior administrative manager at that National Lab to show that there is support of your project. And you coming, right? So I think someone also posted that Dr. Paulo Omig is the NASA New Mexico Epscore director and provided their emails. So that was great.  Yeah. OK, thank you. Yeah. Yeah. And he's he's very nice to work with. And here at New Mexico at NSF, New Mexico Epscore would be happy to introduce you should that should you want to go that route. Just contact the state office me or Selena or anyone here really, we can put you in touch with those people and help you. And so some people might say so when is the new solicitation coming out? And we're we're trying to say soon. We can't give you a date yet. But as soon as it's available, we will send out a blast and keep in mind that proposals have to have 90 days. Advanced notice to. I'm sorry, solicitations have to give 90 days advanced notice. So regardless of when it comes out soon, you will have at least 90 days to work on your proposal. But that doesn't mean you can't start trying to identify and get letters of support and talk to your SORO and all these other things just to make sure that you are able to apply. On that note, actually, it's do you anticipate the full proposal deadline to still be April 12th? I believe it was. It depends at this point. It does still depend. Sorry, sorry. Because it's not nine is within 90 days. So OK, maybe push a little bit. OK, cool. All right, I am not seeing any other questions. So I'm going to start closing us out. But if I see a question, I will stop immediately and ask it. Please do. And I think my colleague, Jose is here. Just wanted to acknowledge him and say hi, Jose. He's also another program officer at National Science Foundation that you can reach out to regarding both tracks. I mean, regarding the fast track. Hi, Jose. Oh, hello. Yeah, I asked a question and he was answered. OK. Thank you. And thank you for being here, too, Jose. OK, y'all. I'm going to take us out in a second.  All right, and and also just for everybody to know, you Mexico Epscore, we do a summary article on this solicitation, actually, just with the differences between NASA and NSF components that should be coming out in February.  We it'll break it all down into really simple terms. And then also we'll have a recording of this this webinar, which will be great. So there's no reason you shouldn't apply for this, basically. We want to help you be successful. So please, please do apply. OK, so thank you, Dr. Chichi, once more for being so generous with your time and your expertise. And on behalf of everybody in New Mexico, yes, I speak for the entire state. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you for being here and sharing this information with us. My pleasure. And then I also want to thank the quick shout out to my partner and webinar hosting crime, Miss Isis Surna and everybody support at New Mexico Epscore. And then just a reminder, everybody, this this webinar and a recording of this webinar and a transcript will be available to view on our website and the full proposal line proposal deadline is maybe not April 12th, but it's coming up. So make sure to start working on it now. Thanks for being here and have a wonderful afternoon, everybody.