For research centers
Less administrative work for your research center
Software and AI for National Science Foundation and Department of Energy research centers and university research offices. You can pay from the grant, so the work does not wait on institutional procurement.
We have built National Science Foundation program websites since 2016, including mrsec.org, prem-dmr.org, dmref.org, mip.org, nsf-epiic.org and neuronex.org. We also publish annual reporting guides for seven programs.
Who this is for
- Center directors and Principal Investigators
- You run a center funded by the National Science Foundation or the Department of Energy, and someone does its reporting and broader-impacts work after hours.
- Center coordinators
- We take on the data entry, the copying between systems and the website updates. You keep the decisions.
- Research development offices
- You run limited-submission competitions and help researchers with broader-impacts sections, and you want AI to help with proposals and their review.
What we build
- Center records for the annual report
- Publications imported from CrossRef by Digital Object Identifier (DOI) and matched to your researchers. People recorded with roles and start and end dates, so you can list who took part in any reporting period. Events, projects and outreach kept in the same record. Research centers at nine universities have used it.
- Instrument finders for a whole program
- Search across every instrument page, publication and program record. Each answer links to its source and names the facility manager who runs the instrument. It uses what your sites already publish, so nobody takes on a new task to keep it current. We built one for the Materials Innovation Platforms.
- Public question-and-answer tools that cite your pages
- Answers drawn from your own pages and videos, with links back to the page, the paragraph or the moment in the video. A reader can check every answer in one click.
- Proposal advisors
- Help with proposals, based on the solicitation and the program guidance, with stored expert answers for common questions. We built the EPIIC Assistant for the National Science Foundation's Enabling Partnerships to Increase Innovation Capacity (EPIIC) program.
- Newsletters and science writing
- We also write for research centers: newsletters, interviews with researchers, and stories about the center's science for its website.
- SimplyScholar
- Our software for running a research center's records and public website. It grew out of the NeuroNex program website we built in 2018 for the University of Houston. Licensed by the year and paid from the award. simplyscholar.com
There were no problems. Communication was easy, and work was done on time.
Ways to work with us
- Pilot, 6 to 8 weeks, fixed price
- A working version for one real task, with a written brief that sets the scope and the price before we start.
- Full build, 3 to 6 months
- The complete system, installed in your environment, with your staff trained to run it before we finish.
- SimplyScholar subscription
- SimplyScholar as a line in the award budget, so it is funded for the life of the grant instead of requested again each year.
Examples of our work
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A proposal advisor for the EPIIC program
The EPIIC Assistant gives stored expert answers to common questions, and AI answers based on the program guidance for the rest.
National Science Foundation
In use
Annual reporting guides, by program
One guide for each program: what its annual report requires, and which sections take a coordinator the most time.
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National Science Foundation
MRSEC
Materials Research Science and Engineering Center
Multi-institutional materials centers. The report depends on the thrust structure and the shared facilities, and both need data collected all year.
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National Science Foundation
PREM
Partnership for Research and Education in Materials
Partnerships between a research university and a minority-serving institution. The report is read for education and workforce outcomes, especially the student pipeline.
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National Science Foundation
DMREF
Designing Materials to Revolutionize and Engineer our Future
Smaller, focused materials design awards. The reporting work is nearly a center's, without a center's coordinator.
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National Science Foundation
EPIIC
Enabling Partnerships to Increase Innovation Capacity
Capacity-building awards. The report must show new institutional capability, which leaves much less evidence than research output.
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National Science Foundation
MIP
Materials Innovation Platform
Mid-scale user facilities for materials synthesis, characterization and theory. Most reportable output comes from external users.
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National Science Foundation
NeuroNex
Next Generation Networks for Neuroscience
Neurotechnology hubs and networks. Activity is spread across institutions the award does not employ, which single-site reporting cannot handle.
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Department of Energy
EFRC
Energy Frontier Research Center
The Department of Energy counterpart to a MRSEC. A different reporting template and portal, with nearly the same underlying data.
Which report takes your team the longest?
In a 30-minute call, we will tell you if it is worth building for, what it would cost, and how long it would take.