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DARPA AI Forge Program is sponsored by Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA) and National Science Foundation (NSF). A jointly developed program by DARPA and NSF to catalyze breakthroughs in AI for national security, focusing on aligning government, academia, and industry around foundational research to accelerate advances in AI interpretability, AI control, and adversarial robustness.
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NSF and DARPA release new report and RFI to align government, academia and industry around forward-looking AI research | NSF - U.S. National Science Foundation NSF and DARPA release new report and RFI to align government, academia and industry around forward-looking AI research The new AI Forge initiative aims to accelerate AI breakthroughs for national security The U.S. National Science Foundation (NSF) and the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA) announced AI Forge , a joint research and development program designed to catalyze breakthroughs in AI for national security, working in close collaboration with the Center for AI Standards and Innovation (CAISI) at the National Institute of Standards and Technology.
AI Forge aims to accelerate progress toward AI that is significantly more reliable and predictable in high-stakes settings, understandable to its operators, and secure in contested environments. It also envisions building a durable research ecosystem around priority AI challenges and enabling a more robust exchange of talent and ideas across universities, frontier AI companies, and government than is possible today.
AI Forge is strategically aligned with America’s AI Action Plan . Commercial AI development is progressing at a breathtaking pace. Yet many of the most consequential AI challenges for national security remain underexplored because they lack immediate commercial applications and are not the primary focus of private industry.
There is a critical need to bridge the gap between commercial AI innovation and the unique requirements of national security. The program convened representatives from frontier AI companies, chief AI officers from more than 15 Department of War (DOW) and Intelligence Community (IC) agencies, and government stakeholders to explore and reach consensus around core AI challenges for national security.
The resulting AI Forge Critical AI Challenges for National Security report will serve as a roadmap to focus research under the program. The report synthesizes insights from experts across industry and government into 15 research challenges spanning three thrust areas. University-led teams will develop aligned ideas and research proposals aligned with these priorities.
The thrust areas are: AI interpretability: Research challenges focused on making the behavior, decisions and impacts of AI systems understandable to humans, with an objective to move beyond explanations in routine settings toward operational interpretability.
AI control: Research challenges focused on pioneering tools that can provide strong, verifiable evidence of bounded, auditable and reliable model behavior today, while laying the essential groundwork for maintaining meaningful human control over future, more capable AI systems.
Adversarial robustness: Research challenges focused on building the scientific foundations for AI that is not just capable, but resilient by design so that it maintains its integrity and intended performance even when under deliberate attack from a thinking adversary. The program hypothesizes that pre-competitive AI research in these thrust areas can accelerate the adoption of AI innovations by industry and federal agencies.
To reflect the fast-changing landscape of technical AI research, the challenges will be revisited every six months during the program. AI Forge is calling upon the university research community to share their capabilities to conduct research on the challenges described in the program’s Critical AI Challenges for National Security report.
University researchers interested in submitting their capabilities are encouraged to do so through the AI Forge Request for Information . Responses to this RFI will be used by the program stakeholders to establish a repository of U.S. universities interested in accelerating next-generation AI research to solve national security challenges. Responses are due by June 22 .
A forum for unlocking national-security focused AI innovation Moving forward, the program will establish a forum comprised of universities, industry and U.S. government representatives to fund, guide and manage fast-paced, university-led research projects.
The forum aims to combine academic talent with frontier-scale compute, models and expertise to address mission-driven challenges informed by national security AI leaders from across the DOW and IC. “We’re taking a unified approach to create breakthroughs in AI for national security,” said Matthew Marge, DARPA program manager for AI Forge . “The frontier AI companies build and commercialize massive, high-capability models and compute.
Universities are engines of deep, foundational research and, importantly, they cultivate our nation's future talent. At the intersection is high-risk, high-reward research that requires both massive scale and deep, mission-driven work – something that is difficult to pursue in either environment alone. With AI Forge, we’re looking to build an ambitious new ecosystem that bridges this gap.
” “NSF is excited to partner with DARPA, working alongside CAISI, on this groundbreaking effort to catalyze AI innovation for national security,” said Erwin Gianchandani, NSF Assistant Director for Technology, Innovation and Partnerships.
“By linking the rapid advances of frontier AI companies, the research and talent at universities, and the use cases surfaced by the intelligence community, AI Forge will propel advancements in AI capabilities for the benefit of U.S. national security and, ultimately, all Americans. ” The forum will be administered by a nonprofit and will launch in summer 2026. More details will be available in the coming weeks.
Media with inquiries should contact DARPA Public Affairs . NSF TIP seeks to engage all Americans in accelerating critical and emerging technologies to advance U.S. competitiveness. The directorate partners across sectors to advance three strategies – accelerating critical and emerging technology, expanding the geography of American innovation and building a competition-ready workforce.
For more information about NSF TIP, visit nsf. gov/tip/latest .
According to the current listing, eligibility includes: U. S. universities. Confirm the full requirements in the official notice before applying.
The current listing shows $750,000 - $3,000,000 for project ventures. Verify award ceilings, matching requirements, and allowable costs in the official notice.
DARPA AI Forge Program is funded by Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA) and National Science Foundation (NSF). Verify program details on the funder's official page before applying.
Start from the official opportunity page linked in this listing — it carries the sponsor's submission instructions.
AI Forge Program: University Research Capabilities for Artificial Intelligence (AI) Strategic Thrusts Request for Information (RFI) is sponsored by Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA) and National Science Foundation (NSF). The AI Forge Program is a joint DARPA and NSF initiative designed to fund university-led research on critical AI problems for national security.
AI Forge Program is sponsored by Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA) and National Science Foundation (NSF). AI Forge is a joint DARPA and NSF program designed to accelerate breakthroughs in AI for national security. It seeks to identify AI capabilities and research interests of U.S. universities to conduct high-impact, university-led fundamental AI research focused on critical AI challenges for national security, including AI interpretability, control, and adversarial robustness.
DARPA Young Faculty Award is sponsored by Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA). The DARPA Young Faculty Award program identifies and engages rising academics in early-career research positions, particularly those with minimal prior DARPA funding, to expose them to Department of Defense (DOD) needs. The Defense Sciences Office (DSO) within DARPA has open topic areas in Physical Sciences, including open quantum systems, quantum-enhanced sensing, novel qubit platforms, complex chemical systems, nuclear systems and beams, nuclear particle/photon interactions, and nonequilibrium thermodynamics.
Operation Stonegarden (OPSG) is a federal grant program administered by FEMA through the Office of the Governor's Public Safety Office that funds enhanced border security cooperation among Customs and Border Protection (CBP), U.S. Border Patrol, and state, local, tribal, and territorial law enforcement agencies. The program supports joint operations to secure land and water border routes, improve intelligence sharing, and expand 287(g) screening operations within correctional facilities. In 2025, the national priority is Supporting Border Crisis Response and Enforcement, covering training, operational coordination, and risk management. Eligible expenses include operational overtime costs, staffing support for screening activities, and training programs in immigration law, civil rights protections, and 287(g) procedures.
DoD Multidisciplinary Research Program of the University Research Initiative (MURI) is sponsored by Department of Defense (DoD) - Office of Naval Research (ONR). The Multidisciplinary Research Program of the University Research Initiative (MURI), administered by the Department of Defense Office of Naval Research, supports basic research in science and engineering at U. S.
On June 1, DARPA and NSF announced AI Forge — a jointly governed forum that will fund university-led research on three thrusts: AI interpretability, AI control, and adversarial robustness. The RFI on sam.gov closes June 22, 2026, at 5:00 PM ET. Project Ventures awards run roughly \$750K to \$3M with one-year durations and multiple awards expected annually. Administration runs through a nonprofit, intellectual property will be shared via open-source licensing, and CAISI at NIST is the third partner. Here is what the 15 priority research challenges look like and how U.S. universities should respond.
Read articleDARPA and NSF launched a joint program on June 1 to fund university work on AI interpretability, control, and adversarial robustness. Awards run $750K to $3M+ per project, the forum launches this summer, and the universities listed in the AI Forge repository will sit closest to the money. The Request for Information closes June 22.
Read articleOn June 1, 2026, DARPA and the National Science Foundation announced AI Forge — a jointly governed forum that will fund, guide, and manage university-led research on AI interpretability, AI control, and adversarial robustness. The RFI on sam.gov closes June 22. The forum itself will be administered by a new nonprofit launching in summer 2026. The structure is what matters: this is not a one-off solicitation, it is a multi-year venue for university-government-industry research that operates outside the normal merit-review timelines of either agency. What university research teams should be doing in the seventeen-day window between the announcement and the RFI deadline — and what the forum model means for federal AI funding through FY 2028.
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