NSERC Alliance-CSE Research Communities Grants

Program Description

The Natural Sciences and Engineering Research Council of Canada (NSERC) and the Communications Security Establishment (CSE) are partnering to fund Research Communities to conduct unclassified research on cutting-edge technologies in areas of strategic importance to CSE and the Government of Canada. A Research Community is defined as a group of researchers – and their research personnel (i.e., students, post-doctoral fellows, and research professionals) – from multiple Canadian universities working in related domains and sharing NSERC-CSE funds awarded to their project(s). The first Research Communities grants focus on robust, secure, and safe artificial intelligence (AI), and aims to:

• Generate new knowledge in robust, secure, and safe AI from either a model-centric or data-centric view.
• Enhance the capacities of Canadian universities to undertake research related to robust, secure, and safe AI.
• Help produce a new generation of data scientists and engineers sensitive to the issues around robust, secure, and safe AI.

Grant support ranges from $700,000 to $1,400,000 per year, for four years. Grant funding is provided in equal parts by NSERC and the Communications Security Establishment (CSE), and CSE is the sole partner organization; no additional partner organizations will be accepted. CSE encourages researchers from multiple universities working in related domains to apply as a group to form a Research Community.

Applicants will be allowed to participate in only one grant application for this call, either as the principal investigator or a co-applicant. When submitting the LOI, the applicant, or at least one of the co-applicants, must be a Canadian citizen, eligible for a TOP SECRET security clearance, and willing to work in Ottawa at CSE for at minimum two weeks per year. The identified researcher(s) must maintain their security clearance for the entire grant period.

Applicants will be asked to submit a letter of intent (LOI) that will be screened by NSERC and CSE. Based on the screening process, selected applicants will be invited to submit a full proposal to the Alliance grants program.

Full Program Terms

Proposal Development Support

For support in preparing a UBCO-led application, please get in touch with the contact below:

How to Apply

RPIFs must be received at least 5 business days ahead of the LOI deadline.

UBC Okanagan submission guidelines