NSF Ideas Lab: Measuring "Big G" Challenge - Preliminary Proposal Deadline

NSF Ideas Lab: Measuring "Big G" Challenge
NSF Preliminary Proposal Deadline (required): September 21, 2015
NSF Full Proposal Deadline (by invitation): January 14, 2016

This solicitation describes an Ideas Lab on "Measuring Big G." Ideas Labs are intensive meetings focused on finding innovative solutions to grand challenge problems. The ultimate aim of this Ideas Lab is to facilitate the development of new experiments designed to measure Newton’s gravitational constant G with relative uncertainties approaching or surpassing one part in 100,000. The aspiration is that mixing researchers from diverse scientific backgrounds will engender fresh thinking and innovative approaches that will provide a fertile ground for new ideas on how to measure G that can be used to validate and extend current calculations. A small number of qualified persons external to NSF will be selected to serve as the Director(s) and Mentors for the Ideas Lab.  These individuals will be subject matter experts from diverse disciplines pertinent to the topic of the Ideas Lab. They will assist participants in their efforts to meet the goal of the Ideas Lab, which is to develop multidisciplinary ideas that eventually will be submitted as full proposals. Researchers will be expected to form new “teams” at the Ideas Lab, and those teams may then be invited to submit a full proposal after the end of the workshop.