The United Kingdom’s Defence and Security Accelerator, on behalf of the Ministry of Defence and the U.S. Department of Defense, is seeking engineering biology technologies that can address defense and security-related challenges.
On Tuesday, the organization launched Themed Competition: Engineering Biology for Defence and Security Phase 2. It is now accepting proposals for innovations that apply engineering biology approaches.
DASA will award up to $609,600 to selected proposals. It expects to award funding to pursue research and development to around three to five submissions.
Proposals must address one of three challenge areas: power and energy, materials for defense, and sensing.
The first challenge, power and energy, aims to discover alternatives to existing power sources and energy storage for military applications.
Meanwhile, materials for defense refers to materials that can be used for a range of purposes, including protection against physical attacks and improved survival in extreme environments.
The final area involves bio-enabled sensing, which may include any related sensing modality for any operational environment.
The themed competition is the next iteration of the Engineering Biology Phase 1 event held in 2022. Interested parties may submit their proposals to DASA on Jan. 17, 2024.
