ActiveNASA · 2026

NASA SBIR 2026 Phase I

Quick Facts

Agency: NASA
Funding: $150,000
Deadline: March 20, 2026 (23 days remaining)
Status: Active
Eligibility: Small businesses (less than 500 employees) with a focus on high-risk technical innovation for aerospace and earth science.

About This Grant

NASA SBIR 2026 Phase I is sponsored by NASA. Supports early-stage R&D in areas like autonomous systems, remote sensing, and intelligent data management for water systems in extreme environments.

Official opportunity description and requirements excerpt:

Upcoming Launches & Landings NASA Brand & Usage Guidelines International Space Station NASA’s Hubble Captures Light Show Around Rapidly Dying Star Core Survey by NASA’s Roman Mission Will Unveil Universe’s Dark Side What’s Up: February 2026 Skywatching Tips from NASA Upcoming Launches and Landings Communicating with Missions James Webb Space Telescope International Space Station Earth Science Researchers Asteroids, Comets & Meteors The Search for Life in the Universe Astrophysics & Space Science Biological & Physical Sciences Human Space Travel Research Technology Transfer & Spinoffs Technology Living in Space Manufacturing and Materials For Colleges and Universities Requests for Exhibits, Artifacts, or Speakers Upcoming Launches & Landings NASA Brand & Usage Guidelines What You Need to Know About NASA’s SpaceX Crew-12 Mission NASA’s Hubble Captures Light Show Around Rapidly Dying Star Core Survey by NASA’s Roman Mission Will Unveil Universe’s Dark Side What You Need to Know About NASA’s SpaceX Crew-12 Mission Space Station Research Contributes to Artemis II NASA’s SpaceX Crew-12 to Study Adaptation to Altered Gravity Reaching Top Speed in the Dolomites Summer Heat Hits Southeastern Australia NASA’s Hubble Captures Light Show Around Rapidly Dying Star Core Survey by NASA’s Roman Mission Will Unveil Universe’s Dark Side Hubble Sees Galaxy with Dark Rings in New Light Reaching Top Speed in the Dolomites Amendment 47: Corrections to B.2 Heliophysics Foundational Research ARMD Research Solicitations (Updated Feb. 4) NASA Armstrong Contributions Propel Artemis, Deep Space Innovation NASA Aims to Advance Hypersonic Flight Testing with New Awards Amendment 46: D.6 APRA and D.7 SAT TBD Placeholders Created, Plan to Solicit in ROSES-25 A Winter Blanket Covers North Carolina Join the Artemis Mission to the Moon Cracking Antarctic Sea Ice NASA Back for Seconds with New Food System Design Challenge Space Station Research Contributes to Artemis II Últimos preparativos para la primera misión tripulada a la Luna con la campaña Artemis de la NASA TRAPPIST-1 e — Guided Tour-es Kepler-186 f — Guided Tour-es Small Business Innovation… Phase I is the jumping off point for most small businesses and research institutions working with the program. It is known as the “idea generation” phase, during which small businesses (and their research institution partners in STTR) establish the scientific, technical, commercial merit and feasibility of the proposed innovation. You can discover the types of technologies NASA is looking for by reading through the most recent Phase I solicitations. Learn the basics of Phase I on SBIR.gov about SBIR/STTR Phase I SBIR Period of Performance STTR Period of Performance Program Year 2026 Information Hub This year, the

Get alerted about grants like this

Save a search for “NASA” or related topics and get emailed when new opportunities appear.

Search similar grants →

Official Opportunity Details

Extracted from the official opportunity page/RFP to help you evaluate fit faster.

2 Heliophysics Foundational Research ARMD Research Solicitations (Updated Feb. 4) NASA Armstrong Contributions Propel Artemis, Deep Space Innovation NASA Aims to Advance Hypersonic Flight Testing with New Awards Amendment 46: D. 6 APRA and D.

7 SAT TBD Placeholders Created, Plan to Solicit in ROSES-25 A Winter Blanket Covers North Carolina Join the Artemis Mission to the Moon Cracking Antarctic Sea Ice NASA Back for Seconds with New Food System Design Challenge Space Station Research Contributes to Artemis II Últimos preparativos para la primera misión tripulada a la Luna con la campaña Artemis de la NASA TRAPPIST-1 e — Guided Tour-es Kepler-186 f — Guided Tour-es Small Business Innovation… Phase I is the jumping off point for most small businesses and research institutions working with the program.

It is known as the “idea generation” phase, during which small businesses (and their research institution partners in STTR) establish the scientific, technical, commercial merit and feasibility of the proposed innovation. You can discover the types of technologies NASA is looking for by reading through the most recent Phase I solicitations. Learn the basics of Phase I on SBIR.

Eligibility Requirements

Small businesses (less than 500 employees) with a focus on high-risk technical innovation for aerospace and earth science.

Frequently Asked Questions

Who can apply for NASA SBIR 2026 Phase I?

Based on current listing details, eligibility includes: Small businesses (less than 500 employees) with a focus on high-risk technical innovation for aerospace and earth science. Applicants should confirm final requirements in the official notice before submission.

What is the typical funding level for NASA SBIR 2026 Phase I?

Current published award information indicates $150,000 Always verify allowable costs, matching requirements, and funding caps directly in the sponsor documentation.

When is the deadline for NASA SBIR 2026 Phase I?

The current target date is March 20, 2026. Build your timeline backwards from this date to cover registrations, approvals, attachments, and final submission checks.

Funder Profile

Ready to start your proposal?

Granted uses AI to draft, review, and polish your grant application — saving weeks of work.

Draft Your Proposal Browse More Grants

NewActive

NASA Fellowship Activity (OSTEM)

NASA Fellowship Activity (OSTEM) is sponsored by National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA). Supports graduate-level students in AI and other STEM fields to conduct research aligned with NASA's mission and gain hands-on technical competencies. Application snapshot: target deadline February 27, 2026; published funding information $20,000 - $35,000; eligibility guidance U.S. citizens enrolled in a graduate degree program (Master's or Ph.D.) at an accredited U.S. university. Use the official notice and source links for final requirements, attachment checklists, allowable costs, and submission instructions before applying.

$20,000 - $35,000Deadline: Feb 27, 2026

NASA Headquarters

Grants.govActive

ROSES25: D.3C XRISM General Observer - Type 2

NOTICE: Amended, December 12, 2025. Instructions in Section 9.1 about how to request high-end computing have been modified. New text is in bold and deleted text is struck through. NOTICE: Amended, December 10, 2025. This amendment releases final text and due dates for XRISM General Observer, which was previously TBD. Both the Type-1 Phase-1 due date and the Type-2 (NSPIRES) proposal due date for this program are February 27, 2026. Revised text includes opportunities for new joint observations with XMM-Newton and NuSTAR, allowing coordinated or simultaneous studies across observatories when scientifically justified. Additionally, time-constrained and Target-of-Opportunity (TOO) observations, up to a combined maximum of 20% of total observing time are also allowed. See Section 8. This synopsis is a generic summary that is posted for each of the many individual "program elements" in NASA’s Research Opportunities in Space and Earth Sciences (ROSES) – 2025 solicitation. For specific information on this particular program element download and read the PDF of the text of this program element by going to Tables 2 or 3 of ROSES at https://solicitation.nasaprs.com/ROSES2025table2 and https://solicitation.nasaprs.com/ROSES2025table3, respectively, click the title of the program element of interest, a hypertext link will take you to a page for that particular program element. On that page, on the right side under "Announcement Documents" the link on the bottom will be to the PDF of the text of the call for proposals. For example, if one were interested in the Solar System Science program (NNH25ZDA001N-SCUBED) one would follow the link to the NSPIRES page for that program element and then to read the text of the call one would click on “C.2 Solar System Science (.pdf)” to download the text of the call. If one wanted to set it into the context of the goals, objectives and know the default rules for all elements within Appendix C, the planetary science division, one might download and read “C.1 Planetary Science Research Program Overview (.pdf)” from that same page. While the letters and numbers are different for each element within ROSES (A.10, B.3, etc.) the basic configuration is always the same, e.g., the letter indicates the Science Division (A is Earth Science, B is Heliophysics etc.) and whatever the letter, #1 is always the division overview. In 2025, most program elements will be set up for application via Grants.gov only if requested at least 30 days in advance of the due date. For more on Grants.gov submissions see Section IV(b)v of the ROSES Summary of Solicitation, that may be found at https://solicitation.nasaprs.com/ROSES2025. The National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA) Science Mission Directorate (SMD) released its annual omnibus Research Announcement (NRA), Research Opportunities in Space and Earth Sciences (ROSES) – 2025 (OMB Approval Number 2700-0092, CFDA Number 43.001) on February 21, 2025. In this case "omnibus" means that this NRA has many individual program elements, each with its own due dates and topics. All together these cover the wide range of basic and applied supporting research and technology supported by SMD. Awards will be made as grants, cooperative agreements, or contracts depending on the nature of the work proposed. However, most extramural research awards deriving from ROSES will be grants, and many program elements of ROSES specifically exclude contracts, because contracts would not be appropriate for the nature of the work solicited. Funded Co-Is at government labs will receive inter- or intra-agency transfers. The typical period of performance for an award is three years, but some programs may allow up to five years and others specify shorter periods. In most cases, organizations of every type, Government and private, for profit and not-for-profit, domestic and foreign (with some caveats), may submit proposals without restriction on teaming arrangements. Tables listing the program elements and due dates (Tables 2 and 3), a table that provides a very top level summary of proposal contents (Table 1), and the full text of the ROSES-2025 "Summary of Solicitation", may all be found NSPIRES at https://solicitation.nasaprs.com/ROSES2025. Frequently asked questions for ROSES are posted at http://science.nasa.gov/researchers/sara/faqs. Questions concerning specific program elements should be directed to the point(s) of contact for that particular element, who may be found either at the end of the individual program element in the summary table of key information or on the web list of topics and points of contact at: http://science.nasa.gov/researchers/sara/program-officers-list. General questions concerning ROSES-2025 may be directed to the office of the SMD Deputy Associate Administrator for Research at sara@nasa.gov. Not all program elements are known at the time of the release of ROSES. To be informed of new program elements or amendments to this NRA, proposers may subscribe to: (1) The SMD mailing lists (by logging in at http://nspires.nasaprs.com and checking the appropriate boxes under "Account Management" and "Email Subscriptions"), (2) The ROSES-2025 blog feed for amendments, clarifications, and corrections to at https://science.nasa.gov/researchers/solicitations/roses-2025/, and (3) The ROSES-2025 due date Google calendars (one for each science division). Instructions are at https://science.nasa.gov/researchers/sara/library-and-useful-links (link from the words due date calendar). Funding Opportunity Number: NNH25ZDA001N-XGO. Assistance Listing: 43.001. Funding Instrument: CA,G. Category: ST.

Deadline: Feb 27, 2026

Similar Grants from Other Funders

Advanced Research Projects Agency Energy

Grants.govActive

CATALYTIC APPLICATION TESTING FOR ACCELERATED LEARNING CHEMISTRIES VIA HIGH-THROUGHPUT EXPERIMENTATION AND MODELING EFFICIENTLY (CATALCHEM-E)

This is modification 03 to the NOFO: • Removed indirect cost cap at 15% of Total Project Costs (Section I.G.15). NOFO Number: DE-FOA-0003505 - CATALYTIC APPLICATION TESTING FOR ACCELERATED LEARNING CHEMISTRIES VIA HIGH-THROUGHPUT EXPERIMENTATION AND MODELING EFFICIENTLY (CATALCHEM-E) To obtain a copy of the Notice of Funding Opportunity (NOFO) please go to ARPA-E eXCHANGE at https://arpa-e-foa.energy.gov. To apply to this NOFO, Applicants must register with and submit application materials through ARPA-E eXCHANGE (https://arpa-e-foa.energy.gov/Registration.aspx). For detailed guidance on using ARPA-E eXCHANGE, please refer to the ARPA-E eXCHANGE User Guide (https://arpa-e-foa.energy.gov/Manuals.aspx). ARPA-E will not review or consider application materials submitted through other means. For problems with ARPA-E eXCHANGE, email ExchangeHelp@hq.doe.gov (with NOFO name and number in the subject line). Questions about this NOFO? Check the Frequently Asked Questions available at http://arpa-e.energy.gov/faq. For questions that have not already been answered, email ARPA-E-CO@hq.doe.gov. Agency Overview: The Advanced Research Projects Agency – Energy (ARPA-E), an organization within the Department of Energy (DOE), is chartered by Congress in the America COMPETES Act of 2007 (P.L. 110-69), as amended by the America COMPETES Reauthorization Act of 2010 (P.L. 111-358), as further amended by the Energy Act of 2020 (P.L. 116-260): “(A) to enhance the economic and energy security of the United States through the development of energy technologies that— (i) reduce imports of energy from foreign sources; (ii) reduce energy-related emissions, including greenhouse gases; (iii) improve the energy efficiency of all economic sectors; (iv) provide transformative solutions to improve the management, clean-up, and disposal of radioactive waste and spent nuclear fuel; and (v) improve the resilience, reliability, and security of infrastructure to produce, deliver, and store energy; and (B) to ensure that the United States maintains a technological lead in developing and deploying advanced energy technologies.” ARPA-E issues this Notice of Funding Opportunity (NOFO) under its authorizing statute codified at 42 U.S.C. § 16538. The NOFO and any cooperative agreements or grants made under this NOFO are subject to 2 C.F.R. Part 200 as supplemented by 2 C.F.R. Part 910. ARPA-E funds research on, and the development of, transformative science and technology solutions to address the energy and environmental missions of the Department. The agency focuses on technologies that can be meaningfully advanced with a modest investment over a defined period of time in order to catalyze the translation from scientific discovery to early-stage technology. For the latest news and information about ARPA-E, its programs and the research projects currently supported, see: http://arpa-e.energy.gov/. ARPA-E funds transformational research. Existing energy technologies generally progress on established “learning curves” where refinements to a technology and the economies of scale that accrue as manufacturing and distribution develop drive improvements to the cost/performance metric in a gradual fashion. This continual improvement of a technology is important to its increased commercial deployment and is appropriately the focus of the private sector or the applied technology offices within DOE. In contrast, ARPA-E supports transformative research that has the potential to create fundamentally new learning curves. ARPA-E technology projects typically start with cost/performance estimates well above the level of an incumbent technology. Given the high risk inherent in these projects, many will fail to progress, but some may succeed in generating a new learning curve with a projected cost/performance metric that is significantly better than that of the incumbent technology. ARPA-E will provide support at the highest funding level only for submissions with significant technology risk, aggressive timetables, and careful management and mitigation of the associated risks. ARPA-E funds technology with the potential to be disruptive in the marketplace. The mere creation of a new learning curve does not ensure market penetration. Rather, the ultimate value of a technology is determined by the marketplace, and impactful technologies ultimately become disruptive – that is, they are widely adopted and displace existing technologies from the marketplace or create entirely new markets. ARPA-E understands that definitive proof of market disruption takes time, particularly for energy technologies. Therefore, ARPA-E funds the development of technologies that, if technically successful, have clear disruptive potential, e.g., by demonstrating capability for manufacturing at competitive cost and deployment at scale. ARPA-E funds applied research and development (R&D). The Office of Management and Budget defines “applied research” as an “original investigation undertaken in order to acquire new knowledge…directed primarily towards a specific practical aim or objective” and defines “experimental development” as “creative and systematic work, drawing on knowledge gained from research and practical experience, which is directed at producing new products or processes or improving existing products or processes.” Applicants interested in receiving financial assistance for basic research (defined by the Office of Management and Budget as “experimental or theoretical work undertaken primarily to acquire new knowledge of the underlying foundations of phenomena and observable facts”) should contact the DOE’s Office of Science (http://science.energy.gov/). Office of Science national scientific user facilities (http://science.energy.gov/user-facilities/) are open to all researchers, including ARPA-E Applicants and awardees. These facilities provide advanced tools of modern science including accelerators, colliders, supercomputers, light sources and neutron sources, as well as facilities for studying the nanoworld, the environment, and the atmosphere. Projects focused on early-stage R&D for the improvement of technology along defined roadmaps may be more appropriate for support through the DOE applied energy offices including: the Office of Energy Efficiency and Renewable Energy (http://www.eere.energy.gov/), the Office of Fossil Energy and Carbon Management (https://www.energy.gov/fecm/office-fossil-energy-and-carbon-management), the Office of Nuclear Energy (http://www.energy.gov/ne/office-nuclear-energy), and the Office of Electricity (https://www.energy.gov/oe/office-electricity). ARPA-E encourages submissions stemming from ideas that still require proof-of-concept R&D efforts as well as those for which some proof-of-concept demonstration already exists. Submissions can propose a project with the end deliverable being an extremely creative, but partial solution. Program Overview: 1. SUMMARY The Catalytic Application Testing for Accelerated Learning Chemistries via High-throughput Experimentation and Modeling Efficiently (CATALCHEM-E) program aims to disrupt and accelerate the design and development cycle for heterogeneous catalyst R&D workflows. The program will span from rational material discovery to synthesis and final reactor testing. These novel workflows will be developed by coupling the latest advancements in artificial intelligence (AI) and machine learning (ML) with high-throughput experimentation (HTE) to verifiably complete 10–15 years of traditional catalysis R&D work within 12–18 months, thus achieving more than a ten-time acceleration in the catalyst development cycle. The program will then use these new tools to discover and optimize catalytic chemistries relevant to ARPA-E’s goals. These new chemistries will ultimately help advance the objective of net-zero carbon emissions by 2050. Innovations developed under the CATALCHEM-E program will involve: • Future refinery relevant or other next-generation feedstocks such as hydrogen (H2), nitrogen (N2), oxygen (O2), water (H2O), carbon dioxide (CO2), methane (CH4), ammonia (NH3), methanol (MeOH), ethanol (EtOH), bio-intermediates (CxHyOz), waste plastics, and triglycerides (TAGs); and • Products like ethylene (C2=) and propylene (C3=) as low carbon monomers, and sustainable aviation fuel (SAF), diesel, and syngas as distillate range hydrocarbons. Key program elements include, but are not limited to: • Novel workflow topologies: A workflow topology is a diagram designating key task nodes involved in the development of a technical catalyst from conception through reactor-scale testing. An example of a traditional, non-automated closed-loop workflow spanning from hypothesis to technical catalyst performance testing is illustrated in Figure 1. The CATALCHEM-E program envisions creating novel closed-loop workflow topologies that strategically remove bottlenecks and time-consuming tasks ultimately resulting in significant acceleration when compared to the traditional workflow. • Enhanced data integrity and benchmarking through reference chemistries: The program will use reference chemistries for workflow validation. These reference chemistries have been proven at the commercial scale and are relevant to both ARPA-E’s goals and the U.S. goal of net-zero carbon emissions by 2050. Specifically, the reference chemistries recommended in this program have been selected to provide applicants with feedstock phase flexibility across thermochemical and electrochemical reaction classes. Here, commercially available catalysts operating in real-world industrial-scale reactor units will serve as controls to ensure data integrity within each task node in the workflow, and as benchmarks when assessing the performance of AI/ML models. • High-quality data generation via HTE: Autonomous or automated HTE methods are necessary to generate high-quality experimental data in large quantities to train and validate AI/ML models. HTE techniques operating over complex, wide parameter spaces can increase the efficiency of experimentation across all stages of the catalyst development cycle, from research catalyst (synthesis, characterization, and validation) to technical catalyst (formulation, characterization, and validation). In addition, the quality of data and ability to identify the most optimal experimental conditions is expected to be enhanced dramatically with these approaches. • AI/ML-ready catalysis databases and informatics: As a result of creating effective CATALCHEM-E workflows, projects must create a set of robust databases in tandem populated with high-quality, multi-scale, multi-modal data as generated and gathered from synthesis, characterization, and performance testing tasks at the ab initio and research and technical catalyst levels. Further, these novel workflows will take advantage of the tools for automation and database management to streamline the storage, access, and processing of collected data that is findable, accessible, interoperable, and reusable (FAIR) to accomplish AI/ML tasks. • Transformational multi-scale, multi-modal modeling using AI/ML: As shown in Figure 2 in Section I.C, there are several ways to leverage the AI/ML tools and techniques to understand heterogenous catalyst surfaces starting from known theoretical predictions or prior knowledge in literature coupled with CATALCHEM-E workflow data (including language) from synthesis, advanced characterization, and reactor-scale testing activities. • Surrogate AI/ML assisted computational modeling and simulations: ML-based surrogate models can be used in two ways in the program. First, these models can accelerate the parametric testing space for the reactor-scale performance. Projects may accelerate the simulation of technical catalyst performance at engineering-scale by training surrogate models on data generated using various computational fluid dynamics and multi-physics approaches (e.g., COMSOL, Ansys, and OpenFOAM). , , These simulations can be used to expand the training set of the CATALCHEM-E learning model. Second, these models can accelerate the elucidation of fundamental reaction mechanisms and networks by including atomic scale, ab initio approximations along with microkinetic modeling for more rigorous calculations involving surface transition states and adsorption energetics. To view the NOFO in its entirety, please visit https://arpa-e-foa.energy.gov. Funding Opportunity Number: DE-FOA-0003505. Assistance Listing: 81.135. Funding Instrument: CA,O. Category: OZ,ST. Award Amount: $2.5M – $3.5M per award.

$2.5M – $3.5M per awardDeadline: Feb 25, 2026

NASA Grant Writing Tips

NASA Just Got a Unanimous Reauthorization Vote — What It Means for Research Grants

The House Science Committee passed the NASA Reauthorization Act of 2026 with a 37-0 vote. Here is what researchers, early-career scientists, and Space Grant institutions should know about the funding signals.

Read article

Find the right grant for your organization