NSF Announces New “Open-Source Ecosystems” Program

The National Science Foundation (NSF) has established a new interdisciplinary program called “Pathways to Enable Open-Source Ecosystems” (POSE), which is intended to “harness the power of open-source development for the creation of new technology solutions to problems of national and societal importance.” The program will fund the establishment of entities to manage networks of open-source products and platforms with the goal of ensuring “more secure open-source products, increased coordination of developer contributions, and a more focused route to impactful technologies.” The program will accept two types of proposals: Phase I projects, focused on “scoping” the development of a potential Open-Source Ecosystem (OSE), and Phase II projects, which will develop a sustainable OSE based on an existing open-source product. Proposals for Phase I projects are due May 12, 2022, and Phase II products are due October 21, 2022. More details are available in the full program solicitation.