Under the Agriculture Systems and Technology (AST) program area, NIFA calls for Food and Agriculture Cyberinformatics Tools (FACT) proposals. This program area priority focuses on data science to enable systems and communities to effectively utilize data, improve resource management, and integrate new technologies and approaches to further U.S. food and agriculture enterprises. The program encourages university-based research as well as public and private partnerships. NIFA also invites proposals for FACT coordination innovation networks to foster a cohesive, multi-disciplinary community that addresses bottlenecks in critical areas (e.g., high-throughput phenomics; systems modeling, access and integration of data from technologies like sensors and drones; smart cities).

The Agriculture Economics and Rural Communities (AERC) program area invites proposals on Economic Implications and Applications of Big Data in Food and Agriculture. This program area invites proposals that address issues surrounding how Big Data might influence markets, industry structure, and agricultural and food value chains. The program area priority is a joint effort between the USDA Economic Research Service (ERS) and NIFA to support the FACT initiative. Invited projects include research only on development and applications of big data and integrated projects designed to train agricultural economists in the use of data science.

AFOSR's focus is on research areas that offer significant and comprehensive benefits to our national warfighting and peacekeeping capabilities. These areas are organized and managed in two scientific Branches: Engineering and Information Sciences (RTA), and Physical and Biological Sciences (RTB). Of interest to the Big Data community, the Information and Networks Team within the Engineering and Information Science Branch is organized to support many U.S. Air Force priority areas including autonomy, space situational awareness, and cyber security. The research programs within this team lead the discovery and development of foundational issues in mathematical, information and network oriented sciences. They are organized along three themes: Information, Decision Making, and Networks. The information theme addresses the critical challenges faced by the U.S. Air Force which lie at the intersection of the ability to collect, mathematically analyze, and disseminate large quantities of information in a time critical fashion with assurances of operation and security. Closely aligned with the mathematical analysis of information is the need for autonomous decision making. Research in this theme focuses on the discovery of mathematical laws, foundational scientific principles, and new, reliable and robust algorithms, which underlie intelligent, mixed human-machine decision-making to achieve accurate real-time projection of expertise and knowledge into and out of the battle space. Information analysis and decision making rarely occur in the context of a single source. The networks theme addresses critical issues involving how the organization and interaction among large collections of information providers and consumers contributes to an understanding of the dynamics of complex information systems.

In addition, AFOSR invites proposals for other innovative research concepts in the following thrust areas: Fundamental Dynamics of Scientific Discovery; Artificial Intelligence (AI), Games, and Optimal Design; Constructive Mathematics; and Novel Approaches to Theoretical Quantum Information Science.

In addition to research grants, AFOSR also provides partial support for conferences and workshops in areas of science that bring experts together to discuss recent research or educational findings, or to expose other researchers or advanced graduate students to new research and educational techniques in its areas of research interest. Proposals must be submitted at least 6 months prior to the conference or workshop start date to be considered.