The National Science Foundation (NSF) on Wednesday announced it launched a five-year $67 million investment establishing the Safeguarding the Entire Community of the U.S. Research Ecosystem (SECURE) Center.
The SECURE Center – mandated by the CHIPS and Science Act of 2022 – aims to serve as a central hub to help the research community identify and mitigate foreign threats to the U.S. research enterprise.
Of the $67 million in funding, $50 million will go to the University of Washington and $17 million to Texas A&M University. The University of Washington will lead the center with support from nine institutions of higher education.
“The SECURE Center is how we bring the research community together to identify risks, share information, and leverage national expertise on research security to develop solutions that protect essential research being done at institutions across the nation,” NSF Director Sethuraman Panchanathan said in a press release. “This is a community-focused platform, and the research community will be the drivers of how SECURE Center tools and services are designed, used, and improved upon.”
According to NSF, the SECURE Center will also serve as the “nexus” for five regional centers, each managed by a higher education institution:
- SECURE Northeast – Northeastern University;
- SECURE Southeast – Emory University;
- SECURE Midwest – University of Missouri;
- SECURE Southwest – The University of Texas at San Antonio and Texas A&M University; and
- SECURE West – University of Washington.
Mississippi State University, the University of Michigan, and Stanford University’s Hoover Institution will also provide expertise for the SECURE Center. Additionally, NSF said the College of Charleston and Mississippi State University will also be participating, ensuring “research and minority-serving institutions are included in SECURE Center activities.”
“Possessing a suite of solutions like shared tools, best practices, training, analyses, and other information, all delivered through a shared virtual environment, SECURE will assist the research community in making decisions regarding their research activities in the context of malign foreign threats,” the agency said.
The announcement comes after the White House Office of Science and Technology Policy (OSTP) issued new guidelines to Federal research agencies earlier this month to improve research security and better protect U.S. research and development (R&D) work from foreign adversaries.
The guidelines outline requirements for research security programs, including that higher education institutions implement a cybersecurity program consistent with the CHIPS and Science Act’s cybersecurity resource.
