The University of Colorado at Boulder received nearly $340 million in sponsored research awards in fiscal year 2009, surpassing last year's record-breaking total by a whopping $60 million and making it the largest jump in university history.
"To shatter the $300 million mark is a remarkable achievement for a major research university like CU-Boulder," said CU-Boulder Chancellor Phil DiStefano. "It is a testament to the quality and ingenuity of our faculty and the hard work of our staff."
According to CU-Boulder Vice Chancellor for Research Russell Moore, NASA again was the top federal agency providing funding to CU-Boulder, awarding the campus about $75 million for the 2009 fiscal year, up from $56 million in 2008. The record- breaking NASA funding demonstrates CU-Boulder's ongoing excellence in the space sciences -- the campus has been the No. 1 NASA-funded public university in the world in recent years.
The other top funding agencies for CU-Boulder in fiscal 2009 were the National Science Foundation, at approximately $58 million, the Department of Health and Human Services at about $50 million, the Department of Commerce at $39.6 million and the Department of Defense at about $12.7 million. The 2008 awards are in the process of being broken down according to campus research institutes, the Graduate School and campus departments, said Moore.
"Our ongoing successes in attracting sponsored research dollars creates an exceptional environment for attracting high-caliber faculty, which in turn brings some of the very best graduate students in the country to our campus," said CU Interim Provost Stein Sture. "When you consider the role that undergraduates play in CU-Boulder research through our Undergraduate Research Opportunity Program, it is accurate to say that the benefits of CU-Boulder research are spread throughout our entire campus and indeed, throughout Colorado."
Other top funding agencies contributing to sponsored research at CU-Boulder in 2009 include the Department of Energy at nearly $8 million and the Department of Education at about $6 million. CU-Boulder also received about $3.3 million from the Department of Agriculture, roughly $2.5 million from the Department of the Interior and about $1.4 million from the Department of Justice.
CU-Boulder also received about $39 million in federal funds through partnerships with private companies that receive federal dollars for research, said Moore. In addition, CU-Boulder received about $23.6 million in sponsored research from private funding sources, and an additional $1.6 million from associations and foundations.
Moore said that as of the end of the fiscal year, CU-Boulder had received about $10.4 million in 2009 stimulus money from the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act, which makes up less than 4 percent of the almost $340 million the campus received in sponsored research.
Moore noted that funding from the National Science Foundation was up by more than $10 million in 2009 and funding from the Department of Health and Human Services was up by nearly $8 million over last year. "CU-Boulder's research portfolio is quite diverse," said Moore. "The funding diversity is reflective of the outstanding faculty that we have in many academic areas across campus, which in turn contributes to our excellence in research and education across the board."
The total sponsored research awards in 2009 to the University of Colorado system was about $711.5 million in fiscal 2009, breaking all previous records. The University of Colorado Denver and the Anschutz Medical Campus in Aurora together received a total of roughly $363.1 million. The University of Colorado at Colorado Springs received about $8.7 million in fiscal 2009.听
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