Stony Brook Submitted 89 AI Research Proposals in Six Weeks for Federal Initiative
Stony Brook University mobilized its research enterprise to respond to the U.S. Department of Energy's Genesis Mission, a national initiative to use artificial intelligence for breakthroughs in energy, discovery science and national security. The university submitted 89 proposals between March and May, with 40 led by Stony Brook researchers and 49 submitted as partnerships with other institutions.
The compressed timeline tested institutional capacity. The DOE released the funding opportunity on March 17. Stony Brook launched its internal competition three days later, closed it on March 30, and submitted final applications by May 1 - a six-week window to identify faculty expertise, build interdisciplinary teams, secure external partners and manage compliance.
President Andrea Goldsmith said the response reflected the university's ability to move quickly and compete for opportunities tied to national priorities. "Eighty-nine submissions. That's remarkable," she said at a May 15 recognition event hosted by the Office for Research and Innovation.
Breadth Across 16 Research Areas
The proposals spanned 16 Genesis Mission topic areas: advanced manufacturing, biotechnology, critical minerals, fusion energy, quantum algorithms, quantum systems, microelectronics, data centers, autonomous laboratories, materials discovery, particle accelerators, physics, grid optimization, high-performance computing, scientific reasoning and AI for fluid flow in energy technologies.
Many proposals built on new or expanded collaborations. Among the 40 Stony Brook-led applications, 28 included partnerships with Brookhaven National Laboratory, 16 involved other national laboratories, and 14 included industry partners. External collaborators ranged from Amazon Web Services and NVIDIA to Dominion Energy and GE Vernova.
Mónica Bugallo, interim vice president for research and innovation, highlighted one outcome: 15 of Stony Brook's lead proposals (38 percent) were submitted by first-time DOE principal investigators. Another 13 non-Stony Brook-led proposals involved first-time DOE PIs from the university. "You saw here the opportunity that may change how you are funding your research," Bugallo said.
The Administrative Infrastructure
The response required significant institutional coordination. The Office for Research and Innovation mapped research strengths across the university to the DOE's 26 Lighthouse Challenges and 99 focus areas. The team adapted when the DOE's final solicitation differed from expectations.
A campus-wide internal competition reviewed 52 pre-proposals with support from 10 reviewers and approved 45 Stony Brook-led submissions. Ultimately, 40 moved forward.
Central research staff provided webinars, templates, training videos, budget guidance and one-on-one support. Faculty and administrators navigated three DOE amendments, major changes to application structure and multiple system outages during the final 48 hours.
During the same six-week period, Stony Brook processed 236 total proposals - the 89 Genesis Mission submissions plus 147 others. Goldsmith called research staff "the unsung heroes in universities." She said: "Your names aren't on the proposals. The faculty members and the students are the ones that are in the articles, in the newsletters, in the posts about the great research that we do, but we could not do it without the staff."
What the Genesis Mission Reveals
The DOE describes the Genesis Mission as building "the world's most powerful scientific platform" by connecting national laboratories, industry, academia and other partners. Phase I projects are intended to design and demonstrate research workflows that incorporate AI and show potential for "AI advantage" - whether that means increasing predictive power, coupling data and experiments more tightly, building new models or speeding discovery.
Goldsmith said the timing matters because AI remains in an early stage. "AI today is very different from the AI of the past," she said. "But we really don't yet know how this tool is going to transform jobs, research, education and other aspects of how we live, work and play. It is still the early days."
For Stony Brook, that uncertainty creates an opportunity. The university aims to be recognized as a global leader in areas where its expertise, partnerships and public mission converge. The Genesis Mission response demonstrated that capacity, Goldsmith said: "We can come together. We can respond quickly. We are young. We are ambitious. We are nimble."
Sustaining Momentum Beyond Funding Decisions
Both Goldsmith and Bugallo emphasized that the value extends beyond which proposals receive DOE funding. The process created relationships, research ideas and institutional knowledge that should continue regardless of outcomes.
Goldsmith said the university will seek ways to sustain collaborations through seed funding or other support. "I want to make sure that every thread of collaboration that was supported through this process continues," she said. "You have my commitment to make sure that the momentum you created will not go away independent of what the Department of Energy decides to fund."
Bugallo noted that compressed timelines and large-scale interdisciplinary calls are likely to become standard federal practice. "We have to start getting ready," she said. "We have to start thinking about how we are going to respond to some of these calls on a regular basis."
For researchers looking to develop expertise in this area, AI for Science & Research covers research automation, data modeling and laboratory optimization aligned with these priorities.
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