The grants for clean and sustainable energy research are funded under the NSF’s five-year Integrative Graduate Education and Research Traineeship (IGERT) program, which supports scientists and engineers pursuing doctorates in fields that cross academic disciplines and have broad societal impact. IGERT programs also involve collaboration with other institutions and support training for under-represented minorities to enhance diversity in the science and engineering workforce.

The awards are the fifth and sixth IGERT grants NSF has awarded Rutgers over the past six years.

Renewable and sustainable fuels. Rutgers will focus on replacing environmentally harmful fossil fuels with renewable, economically sustainable fuels in collaboration with universities in the US, Brazil, China and South Africa. The grant is valued at up to $3.2 million over five years.

“The development of biofuels and synfuels will require strategies adaptable to locations worldwide with diverse climates and geopolitical structures,” said Eric Lam, the grant’s principal investigator and director of the Rutgers Biotechnology Center for Agriculture and the Environment. Lam, who is also a professor of plant biology and pathology, said the program will prepare experts to shape America’s future energy economy and policy by providing education in biotechnology, chemistry, ecology, engineering and energy policy along with real-world experience in government and industry.

Lam and his colleagues will collaborate with University of Puerto Rico and two historically black universities, Virginia Union University and Delaware State University. Extending ties established by the Rutgers Energy Institute, the project also will involve Peking University and Academia Sinica Guangxi in China; the University of Sao Paulo in Brazil; and, in South Africa, the University of the Witwatersrand.

Nanotechnology for clean energy generation and storage. Rutgers will collaborate with Princeton University to apply nanotechnology to clean energy generation and storage and conduct an educational exchange program between the US and Africa. The grant is valued at up to $3.2 million over five years.

Graduate students supported by IGERT fellowships will study policy and economic issues related to clean energy development through the Edward J. Bloustein School of Planning and Public Policy at Rutgers and the Woodrow Wilson School of Public and International Affairs at Princeton. Students will also participate in internships and exchanges with African universities and institutions through Princeton’s US-Africa Materials Institute.

Strengthening graduate study in science, technology, engineering, math. The third grant is funded under a new NSF initiative to strengthen science, technology, engineering and mathematics education. Rutgers will use the five-year NSF Innovation through Institutional Integration (I3) grant to extend its IGERT curricula and practices to other graduate programs and to undergraduate research supported by the Aresty Research Center for Undergraduates.