Presentation by Dr. William E. Easterling, Directorate for Geosciences, National Science Foundation

The National Science Foundation, or NSF, together with the National Institutes of Health, or NIH, are the primary US federal agencies promoting fundamental, curiosity-driven research.  Encouragement by the research community, the public and its elected leaders has led to the expansion of the NSF mission to support research that not only contributes fundamental new knowledge but that also hastens scientific advances and/or delivers information that addresses critical societal needs such as food, energy and water security. Convergence science is introduced.  NSF’s Big Ideas, as convergence science, are discussed with emphasis on new initiatives in the Arctic and cyber-science and engineering.  New initiatives being developed in the Geosciences Directorate, such as Coastlines and People (CoPe) are presented. The talk concludes with examples of exciting new research findings that demonstrate that NSF must continue to maintain fundamental, curiosity-driven research but that that research is in balance with interdisciplinary, convergence research.