Seeding To Accelerate Research Themes

All tenured or tenure-track assistant/associate/full professors, associate/full research professors, associate/full clinical professors, assistant/associate/full research scientists and research investigators with at least a 50% appointment in the U-M Ann Arbor College of Engineering will receive a virtual token that they can contribute to a project to request funding for one project per three-year funding cycle.

Eligible faculty need at least a 50% appointment in the College of Engineering (Ann Arbor campus) to be eligible to contribute a token.

Your project may be composed of an unlimited number of faculty from across the University of Michigan’s Ann Arbor campus. Each funding request must contain 2-5 token-holding tenured or tenure-track assistant/associate/full professors, associate/full research professors, associate/full clinical professors, assistant/associate/full research scientists and research investigators with at least a 50% appointment in the U-M Ann Arbor College of Engineering. If more than 5 token-holding faculty members are interested in working together, they can submit separate funding requests in parallel.

No. Tenured or tenure-track assistant/associate/full professors, associate/full research professors, associate/full clinical professors, assistant/associate/full research scientists and research investigators with at least a 50% appointment in the U-M Ann Arbor College of Engineering are only allotted ONE token per three-year funding cycle. You may use that token for only ONE project, even if you did not maximize your token value in your funding request.

A faculty member gets one chance or “token” each three-year funding cycle to request funding. We use the term “token” to indicate their eligibility.

All tenured or tenure-track assistant/associate/full professors, associate/full research professors, associate/full clinical professors, assistant/associate/full research scientists and research investigators with at least a 50% appointment in the U-M Ann Arbor College of Engineering will receive one token to contribute for every cycle of start. The first cycle of START includes projects funded in the Winter 2022 – Winter 2023 term.

No. A token is only used if funding is received.

Yes. You can participate on as many projects as you’d like, however, you may only contribute one funding token to one project per three-year funding cycle.

Yes. Each token is worth up to $15K in funding. 2/3 of each token is funded by the College of Engineering, and 1/3 is funded by faculty member cost-share.

As an example, let’s assume five faculty get together, each requesting $15K for their token, for a total funding request of $75K. For each $15K token, the faculty member would contribute $5K with the remaining $10K being supplied by Michigan Engineering. Thus, the total funding request would be $75K: $25K in cost-share from the faculty and $50K from the College.

No. Remaining funds will allow us to fund ~80 faculty members for the remainder of the current cycle. Note that each faculty member receives only one token during this cycle (Winter 2022 – Winter 2023).

The goal of the program is to fund all requests. If the requests for funding exceed the funds available, we will use a random distribution method: randomize the list of requested grants; start from the top of that list and choose grants until funds are exhausted.

There is no set minimum funding level.

The maximum amount per request is $75,000.

A group can request any amount of funding by submitting separate requests. Each request will be funded separately and is subject to the above described constraints. In other words, if your collaboration includes 10 token-holding faculty members, you can request two grants each of which would be $75,000 for a total of $150,000.

No. You can include as many faculty members in your group. A subset of that group can then submit one or more requests for START funding.

You can request $30,000 in a number of ways: two faculty members, each requesting $15,000 for their tokens (and cost-sharing $5,000), five faculty members, each requesting $6,000 for their tokens (and cost-sharing $2,000), ten faculty members, each requesting $3,000 for their tokens (and cost-sharing $1,000), etc.

To request funding, your team must contribute 2-5 tokens. Each token is worth up to $15K in funding (2/3 funded by the College of Engineering and 1/3 funded by faculty cost-share). If more than 5 token-holding faculty members are interested in working together, they can submit separate funding requests in parallel.

There is no set minimum funding requirement. The maximum possible funding request is $75K. In this scenario, a project team would need 5 token-holding faculty members to each request maximum funding ($15K) for each of their tokens ($10K each from Engineering and $5K each in faculty member cost-share.) If more than 5 token-holding faculty members are interested in working together, they can submit separate funding requests in parallel.

Click on the “REQUEST FUNDING” button on the START homepage. Then, review the application checklist, and if you have all of the required information, click on the green START button to begin an application. Complete and submit the application. You’ll receive a confirmation email once your application has been received. The application will be routed to the other token-contributing faculty investigators on the project for approval. When all token-contributing investigators have approved the application you will all receive an email confirming that your project has successfully been submitted. Award notices will be sent in early – mid April.

You will receive an award email in mid-April.

There is only one deliverable. START project teams are required to submit an external proposal within six months after the project’s one-year duration. The proposal should be based on the preliminary results of the START project.

START grants have an award period of one year.

Once your project is funded, you’ll receive a new P/G and general fund shortcode. All project expenses must be charged to this shortcode. Investigators may not request additional shortcodes. Expenses cannot be transferred to this shortcode, and funds cannot be withdrawn from this shortcode.

At least half of the award must be used to train undergraduate students, graduate students, or postdoctoral fellows by paying trainee salaries, tuition, and/or lab fees. Supply and equipment purchases are allowable. Funds cannot be used for token-eligible faculty member salaries or travel.

Funds cannot be used for token-eligible faculty member salaries or travel.

Investigators will be responsible for covering the unallowable expenses.

The Investigators’ Research Administrators or Research Administration teams are responsible for managing the START grant’s financials.

Investigators are responsible for providing a valid shortcode within one week of receiving an award notice. The 1/3 faculty cost-share funds will be withdrawn from that shortcode immediately and will be used to fund the START grant.

Investigators can supply shortcodes from discretionary, general funds, designated, unrestricted gifts, or auxiliary. Investigators cannot supply shortcodes from external or internal sponsored funding or restricted gifts.