Partnerships

Advanced Energy Storage (2017-2019)

Co-Sponsor
Alfred P. Sloan Foundation

Additional Support
Lyda Hill Philanthropies

Advancing BioImaging (2021-2023)

Co-Sponsors:
Chan Zuckerberg Initiative
Frederick Gardner Cottrell Foundation

Additional Support:
Walder Foundation

Automating Chemical Laboratories (2024-2026)

Co-Sponsors:
The Arnold and Mabel Beckman Foundation
Frederick Gardner Cottrell Foundation

Additional Support:
Walder Foundation

Chemical Machinery of the Cell (2018-2020)

Co-Sponsor:
Gordon and Betty Moore Foundation

Additional Support:
Paul G. Allen Frontiers Group
Flinn Foundation
National Institutes of Health Common Fund

Early Science with the LSST (2024-2026)

Co-Sponsor:
Heising-Simons Foundation

Additional Support:
The Brinson Foundation
Leinweber Foundation
Kevin Wells

Microbiome, Neurobiology and Disease (2021-2023)

Co-Sponsors:
The Paul G. Allen Frontiers Group
Frederick Gardner Cottrell Foundation

Additional Support:
Walder Foundation
WoodNext Foundation

Mitigating Zoonotic Threats (2021-2023)

Co-Sponsor:
U.S. Department of Agriculture – including the Animal and Plant Health Inspection Service (APHIS,) Agricultural Research Service (ARS) and National Bio and Agro-Defense Facility (NBAF)

Additional Support:
Walder Foundation

Molecular Basis of Cognition (2022-2024)

Co-Sponsors:
CIFAR
Frederick Gardner Cottrell Foundation

Additional Support:
Azrieli Foundation
The Kavli Foundation
PCLB Foundation
Walder Foundation

Molecules Come to Life (2015-2017)

Co-Sponsor:
Gordon and Betty Moore Foundation

Additional Support:
Simons Foundation
National Institutes of Health National Cancer Institute

Negative Emissions Science (2020-2023)

Co-Sponsor:
Alfred P. Sloan Foundation

Additional Support:
Climate Pathfinders Foundation
ClimateWorks Foundation
Thistledown Foundation

Neurobiology and Changing Ecosystems (2025-2027)

Co-Sponsors:
The Paul G. Allen Frontiers Group
Frederick Gardner Cottrell Foundation
The Kavli Foundation

Quantum Matter and Information (2025-2027)

Co-Sponsor:
TBA

Additional Support:
TBA

Signatures of Life in the Universe (2021-2023)

Co-Sponsor:
Heising-Simons Foundation

Additional Support:
The Kavli Foundation
NASA

Solar Energy Conversion (2010-2014)

Support:
National Science Foundation,
Colorado Renewable Energy Collaboratory

Sustainable Minerals, Metals, and Materials (2024-2026)

Co-Sponsor:
Alfred P. Sloan Foundation

Additional Support:
The Kavli Foundation

Time Domain Astrophysics (2015-2016 and 2018-2019)

Co-Sponsor:
Heising-Simons Foundation

Additional Support:
Kavli Foundation

Cottrell Scholar Selection – The German-American Fulbright Commission

As first announced in 2015, RCSA and the German-American Fulbright Commission (GAFC) are collaborating to support the Fulbright-Cottrell Scholars Program, modeled after the RCSA Cottrell Scholar Award Program. Under this partnership, the GAFC organizes and finances an annual competition for 2-3 Fulbright-Cottrell Scholars. The Scholars are selected through a rigorous peer review process that identifies applicants with innovative research and teaching plans that have a high potential for transformative impact. Fulbright-Cottrell Scholars attend the annual Cottrell Scholar Conference in Tucson, Arizona, and Cottrell Scholars organize a faculty workshop in Germany.

Begun in 1952 and headquartered in Berlin since 1998, GAFC is one of the most active and influential commissions of the binational educational exchange programs operating under the Fulbright umbrella. Annually, the Fulbright Program supports the research and educational activities of approximately 8,000 students and faculty from more than 155 countries. Every year, the German-American Fulbright Commission (one of 50 Fulbright commissions around the world) sponsors hundreds of student and faculty exchange activities in both Germany and the United States.

Cottrell Fellowships

In 2020 and 2021, RCSA awarded funds to Cottrell Scholars to support the work of postdoctoral fellows whose plans to start independent academic or research careers were delayed or derailed due to institutional hiring freezes resulting from the pandemic. Some of these awards were funded through a grant from the National Science Foundation.

Cottrell Scholar Support – Lyda Hill Philanthropies

Each Cottrell Scholar receives a discretionary fund for research and education initiatives. Lyda Hill Philanthropies provided funds to support one 2019 Scholar.

Cottrell Scholar Collaboration – American Chemical Societ

The New Faculty Workshop, a project that originated as an RCSA-funded collaboration from the Cottrell Scholar Conference, has become an ongoing program through the American Chemical Society.

In addition, ACS published two volumes edited by Cottrell Scholars Rory Waterman and Andrew Feig that brought together a number of Cottrell Scholar collaborations on education and career development:

• Educational and Outreach Projects from the Cottrell Scholars Collaborative: Undergraduate and Graduate Education – Volume 1. 2017. ACS Symposium Series 1248. Published by the ACS and Oxford University Press.
• Educational and Outreach Projects from the Cottrell Scholars Collaborative: Professional Development and Outreach – Volume 2. 2017. ACS Symposium Series 1259. Published by the ACS and Oxford University Press.

Cottrell Scholar Collaboration – American Physical Society

The American Physical Society (APS) sponsors a series of Conferences for Undergraduate Women in Physics (CUWiP) across the country, and RCSA provides support for those conferences hosted by Cottrell Scholars.

Cottrell Scholar Collaboration – Association of American Universities

RCSA, through a collaborative project among Cottrell Scholars, has worked closely with the Association of American Universities (AAU) on developing and disseminating effective teaching innovations in undergraduate science courses. RCSA and AAU have jointly organized workshops that resulted in several publications:

• Searching for Better Approaches: Effective Evaluation of Teaching and Learning in STEM
• Aligning Practice to Policies: Changing the Culture to Recognize and Reward Teaching at Research Universities
• Meeting in the Middle to Achieve Sustained Change in the Quality of Undergraduate STEM Education by Stephen E. Bradforth,William R. Dichtel, Adam K. Leibovich, Andrew L. Feig, James D. Martin, Karen S. Bjorkman, Zachary Schultz, Emily R. Miller, and Tobin L. Smith. (2015) Nature 523: 282-284.

American Chemical Society

RCSA supports an annual, national award administered by the ACS to recognize the importance of research at undergraduate institutions. The award honors a chemistry faculty member whose research in an undergraduate setting has achieved wide recognition and contributed significantly to chemistry and to the professional development of undergraduate students.

American Physical Society

RCSA funds an annual, national award administered by the APS to honor a physicist whose research in an undergraduate setting has achieved wide recognition and contributed significantly to physics, and who has contributed substantially to the professional development of undergraduate physics students.

Council on Undergraduate Research

Through a gift from RCSA, CUR established the annual Silvia Ronco Innovative Mentor Award to recognize faculty members who demonstrate success in the chemical sciences and whose mentoring practices have supported undergraduate research. The award is in honor of CUR past-president and current RCSA Senior Program Director Silvia Ronco.

National Academy of Sciences

The Award for Scientific Discovery was endowed in 2014 in honor of former RCSA President John P. Schaefer through a gift from RCSA and the Frederick Gardner Cottrell Foundation. The award is bestowed biennially to recognize an accomplishment or discovery in basic research within the past five years. It consists of a $50,000 cash prize and $50,000 to support research. 

LBT

Located on Mount Graham in Arizona, LBT has a unique design of two 8.4 meter telescopes mounted side-by-side. First light on the first mirror occurred in 2005, and first binocular light in 2008. Partner institutions are five universities in the United States (the University of Arizona, the University of Minnesota, the University of Notre Dame, The Ohio State University, and the University of Virginia) and two international research institutes (Istituto Nazionale di Astrofisica in Italy and LBT Beteiligungsgesellschaft in Germany).

NSF VERA C. RUBIN OBSERVATORY

Located on the Cerro Pachón ridge in Chile, the Rubin Observatory (formerly named LSST) will survey the southern sky with unprecedented data collection capabilities. The LSST Corporation includes a large number of United States institutions and international partners.