Prof. Brad Moran has been selected to spend the next two years at the National Science Foundation to serve in the Division of Ocean Sciences.  He will help guide the merit review process for grant proposals dealing with chemical oceanography.  He was selected after a national search for a program director.

While Moran will not make decisions about URI grant proposals, he said that the University can benefit from his position by “having someone working at the NSF who will become familiar with new funding initiatives, multi-institutional programs, and related research and education opportunities that one might not necessarily know about while working in your URI office and laboratory,” he said. “It’s extremely helpful to know the kind of future projects and initiatives that are being proposed and funded.”

Moran, who has received funding from NSF for his chemical oceanography research continuously since 1992, is enthusiastic about his new role in part because it “is an opportunity to return some of the investment made in my research and education activities.”

He gained his first experience in research administration in 2008 when he was appointed to a temporary position as assistant vice president for research administration in the URI Research Office.

“I’ve always believed that you create your own opportunities. I rather fortuitously found myself in the Research Office through my work with the Blue MBA [a graduate degree program combining business and oceanography], and in turn that has led to this new opportunity,” he added.

Moran has six active NSF research grants, and he will periodically return to URI for up to 50 days each year to continue that research and advise his graduate students.  He began his new assignment on January 30.

For more information, please see the full press release.