The U.S. National Science Foundation is an independent federal agency that supports science and engineering in all 50 states and U.S. territories. NSF was established in 1950 by Congress to promote the progress of science, advance the national health, prosperity and welfare, and secure the national defense.
The Tectonics Program is designed to support a comprehensive range of research projects, including field studies, laboratory experiments, computational analyses, and theoretical work focused on understanding the ways in which the terrestrial continental lithosphere deforms. This includes exploring deformation processes and the tectonic forces that drive them at any depth within the continental lithosphere. The program encompasses a wide temporal scale, including both rapid processes observable on human timescales (decades/centuries, such as active tectonics) and processes that unfold over much longer periods. Research supported by this grant can range from microscale studies to those covering entire plate boundaries or orogenic belts.