Four NDSU departments have been awarded a total of $315,000 over two years by the North Dakota Experimental Program to Stimulate Competitive Research, known as ND EPSCoR, for its Infrastructure Improvement Program New Faculty Start-Up supplemental funding. The funding will enable the hiring of four new faculty members in the Departments of Biological Sciences, Chemistry and Biochemistry, Coatings and Polymeric Materials and Industrial and Manufacturing Engineering.

The New Faculty Start-Up program’s major goal is to staff North Dakota’s research-intensive universities with new faculty who will be nationally-competitive for grants from federal agency research programs in science, engineering, and mathematics. According to Kelly A. Rusch, ND EPSCoR project director and NDSU vice president for research and creative activity, “The New Faculty Start-Up program is an invaluable instrument for department chairs in recruiting top faculty via providing a mechanism to offer highly competitive financial packages to establish strong research programs.”

ND EPSCoR is a federally- and state-funded program designed to help university researchers compete more effectively for federal, regional and private research grants in the sciences, engineering and mathematics. For more information, visit www.ndepscor.nodak.edu. Questions may be directed to 701-231-8400.