Researchers working in indoor microbial ecology have no easy way to share data.  Though the community is adopting state-of-the-art gene sequencing techniques, use of these new methods makes it difficult to compare newly collected data with older data collected using alternative methods.  What’s needed is an easy-to-use data platform that will facilitate data sharing by integrating sample handling, sequencing, analysis, and data release.  Funds from this grant support a project by Rob Knight of the University of Colorado and Mitch Sogin of the Marine Biological Laboratory to develop just such an integrated data platform. Over the next two years, Knight and Sogin will attempt to merge two data platforms used by microbial ecologists: QIIME (Quantitative Insights into Molecular Ecology) and VAMPS (Visualization and Analysis of Microbial Population Structures).  VAMPS is very user-friendly and nimble; QIIME is more powerful but harder to use.  The aim is to develop a new system that combines the best of both platforms, tying the user-friendly tools in VAMPS to the powerful analytical capacity of QIIME.  They will also develop a series of protocols and standards for the collection and analysis of microbial data using the new system.  The project will result in new standard operating procedures, better software tools, and improved methods for depositing and sharing data in indoor microbial ecology. The team expects the new tools and procedures to be adopted by at least 75 to 100 researchers, with at least 100 students and postdocs will be trained through annual workshops.

This grant provides continuing support to Columbia University, one of the Foundation's six film school partners, for twenty-eight months of activities designed to encourage top film students to develop screenplays and produce short films about science and technology. Activities supported through this grant include the provision of faculty mentors and science advisors for students working on science-themed film projects, two annual awards for production of short films on science and technology, one annual award to develop promising feature film scripts with science content, an annual science information seminar for film students,  and networking events with select film industry producers, agents, and managers.

This grant provides continued support for the second year of the Age Smart Employer Awards, which honor local New York City employers who have demonstrated an extraordinary commitment to leveraging older workers’ talent while meeting the goals of both the business and its employees.   Grant funds will support the administration of the awards, the selection process, and outreach activities.  Particular emphasis will be placed on expanding the circle of businesses that know about and apply for the awards as well as increasing the visibility for winning employers and the innovative practices for which they are being honored.  Outreach strategy will particularly target small businesses (those employing fewer than 100 workers) and employers in New York City’s growing health care sector.

This grant provides renewed support to the Berkeley Indoor Microbial Ecology Consortium (BIMERC), a multidisciplinary group of mycologists, microbiologists, chemists, architects, and engineers who are working together to better understand the sources, factors, and processes involved in the assembly of microbial communities indoors. Grant funds support a number of planned scientific studies by the BIMERC team, including an investigation into which microbial volatile organic compounds are indicators of microbial population growth;, a study of how environment, building characteristics, and human behavior affect airborn microbes; a project to measure and model living particles using a laser-based ultraviolet spectrometer; and an analysis of microbial reproduction using gene transcripts. Additional funds support the purchase of a state-of-the-art mass spectrometer, a Proton Transfer Reaction-Time of Flight-Mass Spectrometer (PTR-ToF-MS), which will permit the team to conduct real-time chemical analysis.  The team will share their findings through peer-reviewed scientific publications, presentations at meetings and workshops, and through web-based blogs.

Funds from this grant support efforts by David A. Mills, Peter J. Shields Endowed Chair in the Department of Food Science, to examine the seasonal nature of the built environment microbiota in two types of food and beverage fermentation settings: dairies and wineries. The study aims to determine what microbial communities reside in these facilities during normal operation during all four seasons of the year; examine how these microbial communities migrate throughout the facilities; and make a series of building science measurements to evaluate how the built environment impacts these microbial communities. In the wine study, Mills and his team will examine how regional microbiota on Chardonnay grapes from four different regions--Napa, Sonoma, Central Coast, and Northern San Joaquin Valley--influences winery-associated microbiota and how room traffic, occupancy, air flows, and room surfaces affect microbial composition. In the dairy study, the team will examine how three different types of milk--goat, cheese, and cow--drive the dairy-associated microbiota at three artisanal cheese-making facilities. In both studies, the team will examine seasonal changes to indoor microbiota and their correlations with environmental parameters. The project will train at least one postdoctoral fellow and two undergraduates.  Findings will be shared with the scientific community through peer-reviewed publications and talks at scientific meetings and disseminated to the wine and dairy industry through trade publications.

This grant supports three, two-day, annual conferences exploring the latest economic research related to changing labor market institutions and regulatory policy in ways that accommodate the increasing lifespans of the American worker.   Hosted by economist John Shoven, director of the Stanford Institute for Economic Policy Research (SIEPR), the conferences will serve as an annual event where the growing community of new and established economists working on these issues can gather to network, share ideas, and learn about the latest research.  Topics to be discussed at the conferences will cover a wide range of issues, including retirement security, how existing regulatory regimes affect worker incentives, retirement strategies, pensions, the likely effects of proposed alternative regulatory regimes, and systematic differences between labor markets for older workers and those for younger cohorts.  Additional funds will support a small postdoc/first sabbatical fellowship program that will support the work of two researchers interested in conducting original, high-quality economic research in this area.

As the health of the U.S. population improves and the sources of retirement income become potentially more unstable, older Americans are expected to continue their current trend of both needing and wanting to work longer.  The health impacts of longer working lives, however, are inadequately understood, particularly when work is induced by policy changes such as increasing the age of full retirement for Social Security benefits. This grant supports research by Maria Fitzpatrick of Cornell University and Timothy Moore of George Washington University that examines this issue by studying the changes made in 1983 to the statutory retirement ages for Social Security benefits.  Combining administrative with data and detailed data on health behaviors and expenditures, Fitzpatrick and Moore will examine how and whether differences in the length of working lives change health outcomes such as mortality and morbidity.

For those interested in the “science of learning,” the book called How People Learn has been a bible.  This report is one of the most successful ever produced by the National Academies Press, selling nearly 150,000 hard copies on top of many free downloads.  A distinguished National Research Council committee of cognitive neuroscientists, developmental psychologists, and educational experts succeeded in distilling and documenting key research findings, a series of practical applications of these findings, and an agenda for further research.  Funds from this grant support a project by the National Academy of Science to publish an updated second edition of How People Learn, fifteen years after its original publication.  The new edition will cover the latest research in fields such as cognitive neuroscience, behavioral economics, developmental psychology, and learning technologies. Though the updated report will address the full spectrum of learning from “K to gray,” Sloan funding will specifically support work on topics related to postsecondary education in science, technology, engineering, and mathematics.

Funds from this grant provide three years of support to the National Bureau of Economic Research for expenses associated with the continued operation of the Economics of Digitization Working Group.  Led by Shane Greenstein of Northwestern, Josh Lerner of Harvard, and Scott Stern of MIT, the Economics of Digitization working group brings together a diverse group of economists to examine issues related to the digital revolution, including the structure and features of markets that deal in digital goods and services, copyright and intellectual property issues, privacy in the digital age, the role of prices in digital markets, and capturing digital work and productivity in economic statistics like GDP.   Grant funds will support working group conferences at the NBER Summer Institute and at Stanford.  They will also support one postdoctoral fellow and four research sub-awards per year.