Defense Launches New Research Fellows Program

The Department of Defense has inaugurated a National Security Science & Engineering Faculty Fellows program with its first awards. The new fellowship provides up to $3 million in direct research support for a five-year period to conduct long-term, unclassified basic research of strategic importance to DOD. Among the first six awardees are chemists Chad A. Mirkin, chemistry and materials science professor at Northwestern University, for research on functional one-dimensional structures based on on-wire lithography, and Stephen L. Mayo, chemistry and biology professor at California Institute of Technology, for research on engineering proteins for antiviral applications. DOD says the program supports basic research that applies to crucial defense applications such as sensors, surveillance, information security, computer protection, and power projection.