1,000+ Opportunities
Find the right grant
Search federal, foundation, and corporate grants with AI — or browse by agency, topic, and state.
Young Investigator Program (YIP) is sponsored by Office of Naval Research (ONR). The ONR Young Investigator Program (YIP) seeks to identify and support academic scientists and engineers who are in their first or second full-time tenure-track or tenure-track-equivalent academic appointment, who have received their doctorate or equivalent degree in the past seven years, and who show exceptional promise for doing creative research.
The program aims to attract outstanding faculty members to the Department of the Navy's Science and Technology (S&T) research program, support their research, and encourage their teaching and research careers. Awards are made to institutions, not individuals, but individuals must submit proposals through their university officials.
The program supports a broad range of naval-relevant research topics, including coastal forecasting, machine learning, additive manufacturing, autonomous operations, advanced sensors, dexterous robotics, hypersonics, decision superiority, ocean acoustics, ultrafast lasers, and advanced composites.
Get a weekly digest of new grants like this
A free weekly digest of new foundation and federal funding opportunities as they're added to Granted. Unsubscribe anytime.
Or search similar grants →Extracted from the funder's official program page to help you evaluate fit faster.
Young Investigator Program (YIP) Proposals addressing research areas described in the ONR science and technology (S&T) department section of ONR's website, which are of interest to ONR program officers and division directors will be considered. Contact information for each division (a subgroup of an S&T department) is also listed within that section.
Potential applicants may contact the appropriate division director or the program officer who is the point-of-contact for a specific technical area, to discuss their research ideas. Brief informal pre-proposals may be submitted to facilitate these discussions. Such discussions can clarify the content and breadth of the priority research areas and enhance the match between a subsequent proposal and DoN research needs.
An individual wishing to apply for a Young Investigator award must submit a research proposal and at least one letter of support through the appropriate university officials. Applications received without a letter of support will be considered incomplete and will not be considered for award. ONR makes awards to institutions, not individuals.
The research proposal should follow the format described in the ONR YIP funding opportunity announcement, listed among ONR's broad agency announcements , in Section II. D titled, "Application and Submission Information." Typical awards are $750,000 over a 36-month period of performance.
Applicants may request up to $250,000 for each 12-month interval. These funds may be budgeted against any reasonable costs related to conducting the proposed research, for example, salary for the investigator, graduate student support, supplies, travel and applicable indirect cost. Awards under this announcement will be made only to U.S. institutions of higher education which award degrees in science, engineering or mathematics.
U.S. non-profit organizations operating primarily for scientific and educational services may also submit proposals.
The principal investigator of a proposal must be a U.S. citizen, national or permanent resident (on the date proposals are due), holding a first or second full-time tenure-track or tenure-track-equivalent faculty position at that university, and has received his/her doctorate or equivalent degree within the past seven years. See solicitation for eligibility dates.
The term "national" of the United States includes a native resident of a possession of the United States, such as American Samoa. The term “tenure-track-equivalent” is explained on the ONR website: https://www. onr.
navy. mil/Education-Outreach/Sponsored-Research/YIP/tenure-track-equivalent . Reginald G.
Williams, Ph. D.
According to the current listing, eligibility includes: Awards are made only to U.S. institutions of higher education which award degrees in science, engineering, or mathematics. U.S. non-profit organizations operating primarily for scientific and educational services may also submit proposals. The principal investigator must be a U.S. citizen, national, or permanent resident, holding a first or second full-time tenure-track or tenure-track-equivalent faculty position at that university, and have received their PhD or equivalent degree on or after January 1, 2019. Confirm the full requirements in the official notice before applying.
The current listing shows $750,000 over 36 months. Verify award ceilings, matching requirements, and allowable costs in the official notice.
The published deadline was October 30, 2026, which has passed. Check the official notice for any future application windows before investing time in a proposal.
Young Investigator Program (YIP) is funded by Office of Naval Research (ONR). Verify program details on the funder's official page before applying.
Yes — this listing is flagged as national in scope, so applicants across the U.S. may apply, subject to the sponsor's other eligibility criteria.
Applications go through the funder's official portal — the Apply Now link on this page goes there directly.
Past winners and funding trends for this program
NOFO N0001426SF004 offers roughly 25 awards at $750,000 over 36 months to first- and second-appointment faculty. No cost share, no white paper stage — and an eligibility clock that admits PhDs earned on or after January 1, 2019 and nobody earlier. The program officer conversation, not the proposal, is the part most applicants get wrong.
Read articleThe Department of the Navy pre-released FY26 Release 3 SBIR/STTR on June 3, 2026 — 12 BAA topics and one Commercial Solutions Opening for Counter-Unmanned Air Systems. Topics span adaptive sensor management, anomalous behavior detection, satellite imagery optimization, real-time zero-trust data for combat systems, and gun weapon systems modernization. Technical questions cut off June 23. Proposals open June 24 and close July 22. NAVAIR and NAVSEA co-host a Counter-UAS webinar June 16. Phase I funding tops out at $315,000. The CSO open topic for AI-powered drone defense is the structural news: it's the first time NAVAIR has used a CSO vehicle to fund counter-drone work outside the conventional Phase I/II structure, and it changes how small businesses can engage with the Navy's most urgent capability gap.
Read articleThe FY2027 Defense University Research Instrumentation Program closes November 6, 2026 at 5:00 PM ET with roughly $28 million, awards from $50,000 to $3 million, and no cost-share requirement. It is down about $6 million from FY2026, it funds equipment and nothing else, and it lands ten days before the NSF MRI deadline. Here is how to split an equipment wishlist across two overlapping windows.
Read article