CFAs: Advance Research Collaboration Program – Bahrain

The Public Affairs Section (PAS) at U.S. Embassy Manama supports a variety of projects through its Small Grants Program, which is designed to support eligible universities and institutions to submit applications to carry out programs to increase research cooperation between the United States and Bahrain in support of the economic and/or advanced technology portions of the Comprehensive Security Integration and Prosperity Agreement (C-SIPA) signed September 13, 2023.

Topics

• This program should support topics directly related to Articles III and IV of the agreement, including:
  • advancing economic integration;
  • bilateral and multilateral economic and trade cooperation,
  • supply chain resilience and infrastructure
  • economic development
  • fostering exchange innovative ideas, information, and skills
  • scientific and technological capabilities
  • emerging technologies
  • artificial intelligence (AI)
  • means of promoting secure networks, communications systems, software, and hardware, and
  • development and promotion of a more secure, resilient, diverse, competitive, transparent, and sustainable digital and Information and Communication Technology (ICT) infrastructure supply chain, particularly in global communications.
• Any research topic should focus on these issues as it affects the two countries (or, in the case of economic integration, as it affects the two countries and the region).

Funding Information

• Total available funding: $60,000
• Award amounts: awards may range from a minimum of $10,000 to a maximum of $60,000
• Length of performance period: 12 months
• The budget should support staff time, virtual calls, and potential travel for U.S. university personnel to visit their counterparts in Bahrain, and/or for Bahraini university personnel to visit their counterparts in the United States. The program should result in a concrete outcome (including, but not limited to, a joint publication, a memorandum of understanding for sustained joint research, etc.).  The Embassy encourages proposals that will also set the stage for future collaborations, including but not limited to additional research and publications, joint teaching endeavors, staff exchanges, additional memoranda, and/or student linkages.  The budget should not support the purchase of equipment.

Participants and Audiences

• Participants should include U.S. and Bahraini research universities and relevant Bahraini educational institutes such as Bahrain Polytechnic.

Eligibility Criteria

• Eligible Applicants
  • The following organizations are eligible to apply:
    • Public and private research universities in the United States
    • Public and private research universities in Bahrain, and relevant educational/research institutes.
    • Note: For-profit entities are not eligible.
• Cost Sharing or Matching
  • Cost share is not required but is encouraged and will be evaluated positively during the merit review; it will be used to break ties among applications with equivalent scores after evaluation against all other factors.
• Applicants are only allowed to submit one proposal per organization. If more than one proposal is submitted from an organization, all proposals from that institution will be considered ineligible for funding.

For more information, visit U.S. Embassy in Bahrain.