Award Type

There is one category of awards for Spring 2025: POC: USII Affiliate Funding Program.

POC: USII Affiliate Funding Program

The POC: USII Affiliate Funding Program provides funding support aimed at enhancing its research capabilities, fostering academic-industry collaboration, and promoting interdisciplinary education within the field of sport science. The program will support initiatives that advance scientific understanding and contribute to the development of practical and innovative applications in sport and economic development.

The POC: USII Affiliate Funding program prioritizes funding for initiatives that align with its mission to enhance sport science research, education, and practice. Key funding priorities include:

SPEED Lab Use/Enhancement

Projects aimed at using, developing, and/or enhancing the Sport Performance, Education, and Evaluation Development (SPEED) Mobile Lab.

Priority for funding will be given to projects that align with the main functions of the SPEED Lab:

Sport Science Demonstration

The SPEED Lab will provide on-the-spot Sport Science.

Education – Hands-on experiential learning

Work with K-12 schools and community organizations that are in a variety of geographical and social economic areas to provide knowledge of sport science as well as pathways to a wide range of sport-related careers.

Sport Science Research

Functional mobile sport science laboratory to collect data in the field specific to real-world sport science.

Sport Economic Development

Projects aimed at fostering current academic-industry collaborations, building new collaborations, and/or entrepreneurial efforts by faculty (e.g., patentable products/ideas). Evidence of shared support with an industry collaborator should be provided.

Workforce Development

Projects aimed at developing and training the next generation of sport scientists and other sport-related careers.

Women in Sport Science

• Professional Development: Support for programs that empower and train women in sport science, including research, leadership training, mentoring, and conference attendance.
• Research: Projects that focus on understanding sport related health of women including physiology, psychology, and athletic performance in sports.
• Gender Equity in Research: Encouragement of research teams with diverse representation and studies addressing gender disparities in sport science.

Athletic-Academic Collaborations

• Promoting partnerships between athletic teams (e.g., UNLV and regional Professional teams) and academic departments to facilitate real-world application of sport science.
• Joint projects between students, faculty, and athletic staff to enhance coaching strategy, athlete performance, injury prevention, and recovery strategies.
• Collaborative initiatives that integrate athlete data collection with academic research goals.

Eligibility Criteria

Catalyst Grants are open to all fields of research in which the proposed project fulfills the goals and funding priorities of the program outlined above. If a project is addressing commercially relevant sports innovations, applicants are encouraged to consult with the UNLV OED about the project’s appropriateness and eligibility for this opportunity.

The following are not eligible for funding under this program:

• Proposals to fund basic research or theoretical development, or to generate models, new data, or solely for academic curiosity.
• Projects requiring more than one year to accomplish.

Applicant Eligibility

• Any Principal Investigator who meets University eligibility.
• Recipients of past Proof of Concept Grants are eligible for this solicitation.
• Priority will be given to USII UNLV Affiliate Faculty. USII non-UNLV Affiliate Faculty must collaborate with a UNLV Affiliate Faculty member.

Review Criteria

Qualification Criteria

Qualifying proposals must meet the following criteria:

• UNLV researcher – UNLV PI Eligible;
• USII Affiliate - https://sportsinnovation.unlv.edu/programs-data/affiliate-program/
• Funding period – funding period shall be for up to one year; and
• Amount of funding – project funding up to $25,000.

If the project proposal has a commercial component:

Programmatic/Commercial Criteria

Qualifying proposals will be reviewed by the OED based on programmatic and commercial criteria. In keeping with the program’s goal of fostering economic development, review of the full proposal will be made based on the following criteria:

• Intellectual Property – proposals advancing currently disclosed inventions to OED will be given preference;
• Market Assessment – total market size, addressable market, other market dynamics including a well-defined path to market;
• Licensing Potential – potential licensees, assessment of license revenue potential;
• Corporate Collaboration – the potential for corporate collaborations and/or startups, tie-in with regional industrial clusters; and
• Commercial Return – Ability of the project to advance a technology toward commercialization – through a key proof of concept, prototype development, cooperative research effort with a company or other means. Commercialization may be measured by the completion of a license agreement, the launch of a startup company or ability to secure outside investment.

Scientific Evaluation Criteria for Grant Applications

Complete proposals will undergo scientific evaluation by both internal and external reviewers using criteria established for the UNLV Faculty Opportunity Awards program. Scientific reviewers will be asked to prioritize all reviewed proposals and rank proposals against national standards (top 10%, next 40%, bottom 50%).

• Quality – Excellence and novelty of the concept, approach, and methodology; clarity and appropriateness of project plans; desirability and impact of potential results on the national and international scholarly community;
• Return – Return on investment (ROI) through one or more of the following:
  • follow-on extramural funding
  • Sport economic development (e.g., commercialization)
  • other sources of revenue that enhance USII initiatives.
• Risk – Availability of necessary skills and experience, the likelihood of achieving the intended outcomes; probability of securing extramural funding or engaging in commercialization; and potential for self-sustainability after the seed investment phase

Nevada Benefit

Applications will be reviewed for intended sport and economic development impacts within Nevada as demonstrated by:

• Accelerating innovation and creating a path to commercialization of new technologies and products
• Increasing competitiveness of Nevada companies, by attracting greater investments and retaining jobs in Nevada
• Establishing the basis for founding new Nevada companies
• Identifying new solutions to problems critical to Nevada
• Creation of new jobs