NSF Engines: Paso del Norte Defense and Aerospace Innovation Engine

NSF 引擎：Paso del Norte 国防和航空航天创新引擎

• 批准号: 2315782
• 负责人: Ahsan Choudhuri
• 金额: $ 1500万
• 依托单位: University of Texas at El Paso
• 依托单位国家: 美国
• 项目类别: Cooperative Agreement
• 财政年份: 2024
• 资助国家: 美国
• 起止时间: 2024-03-01 至 2026-02-28
• 项目状态: 未结题
• 来源: https://www.nsf.gov/awardsearch/showAward?AWD_ID=2315782&HistoricalAwards=false
• 关键词: NSF; Engines; Paso; del; Norte

The Paso del Norte Defense and Aerospace Innovation Engine is working to fuel the growth of a dynamic aerospace and defense (A&D) manufacturing sector in West Texas and Southern New Mexico. The NSF Engine will increase the competitiveness of Paso del Norte small and medium manufacturers (SMMs) in A&D markets by creating an innovation platform that combines an emerging digital engineering paradigm, skilled workforce development, and other resources to reduce costs for startups and SMMs while increasing access to cutting-edge design and testing tools needed to spur growth. The NSF Engine re-imagines the Paso del Norte region as an advanced manufacturing and knowledge-based economy that increases the share of jobs in advanced industries in the region from 3.2% to 25%. This can be accomplished by redeploying local manufacturing capabilities to support U.S. A&D industries and upskilling the local talent workforce and expanding access for K-12 students to next-generation STEM skills so that more people in the region have a path to the middle class.SMMs remain extraordinarily critical to maintaining a vibrant and secure U.S. A&D supply chain, but fewer and fewer SMMs are participating in the defense industrial base. Because they often have a smaller workforce, limited resources, and no budget or infrastructure for research and development, SMMs are increasingly excluded from the highly stratified U.S. innovation ecosystem. The NSF Engine is tackling the national challenge of reinvigorating the once vital manufacturing base of the U.S. economy and increasing economic mobility and workforce participation in the Paso del Norte region through the creation of innovation sector jobs. Five of 14 defense critical technologies identified by the U.S. Department of Defense are included in the ecosystem: advanced materials; trusted AI and autonomy; space technology; renewable energy generation and storage; and hypersonics.Paso del Norte is an eight-county region that sits on the U.S.-Mexico border in the American Southwest. It includes six counties in West Texas and two in Southern New Mexico. The cities of El Paso and Las Cruces are the largest metropolitan areas in the region of service. The U.S. Economic Development Administration (EDA) designates six of the eight counties (Culberson, Doña Ana, El Paso, Hudspeth, Presidio, and Sierra) as Persistent Poverty Counties, meaning that poverty rates have stayed above 20 percent for at least 30 years. The median income for families in this region is well below the national average and this gap has widened since 1997.One reason for low incomes is the lack of high-paying STEM jobs in the region, relative to other markets. To revitalize the US A&D industrial base and propel the Paso del Norte region toward more economic parity and increased competitiveness, the NSF Engine will help SMMs to develop more innovation in their approaches and gain affordable access to defense-critical research and development. Some of the key components of the NSF Engine are new open-access physical and technical support infrastructures based at universities and facilities in the region that SMMs can utilize to build their innovation capacity and workforce talent.The NSF Engine’s Public Innovation Architecture will be an ecosystem that fosters engineering and manufacturing innovation to speed the development of capabilities among regional SMMs to access use-inspired R&D. This Public Innovation Architecture is a way to disrupt the traditional R&D process by ensuring broad and affordable access to innovation processes. The Public Innovation Infrastructure will be a combination of resources to develop hard and soft infrastructure, which includes expanding the available local skilled workforce, physical infrastructure in El Paso for SMMs, digital infrastructure that can be accessed throughout the region, and capacity building for innovation in translation and commercialization. This public infrastructure will reduce costs for startups and SMMs to enter and compete in the A&D market.The Talent Infrastructure supports the region’s innovation industry through upskilling of local workforce talent and K-12 outreach to build interest in careers in the A&D industry. Project lead organizations, The Aerospace Center and the W.M. Keck Center for 3D Innovation at The University of Texas at El Paso have developed new approaches to solving the STEM talent crisis facing the nation with a unique student-centered research model. Skill development strategies have produced graduates who are in high demand because of their abilities to immediately provide value to employers. This research model excels at opening new pathways into the A&D sector for groups traditionally underrepresented in the workforce. The Centers’ students are 80% Latino, two-thirds come from families who make less than $37,000, and half are first-generation college students. The two centers are national leaders in training female engineers — 29% of their students are women, which is much higher than peer institutions in the same fields.The NSF Engine will expand this model with a technician training program called Aerospace and Defense Technologies and Manufacturing Training Centers (ADTech). A&D manufacturers often complain that new graduates of engineering and technician programs often lack the skills needed to be immediately productive and require expensive additional on-site training to be ready for the demands of their new job. The ADTech skills development platform, which expands on the success of programs at UTEP, will use proven skills-focused strategies to train a technician workforce that can meet the demands of A&D and advanced manufacturing employers. This agile training platform will integrate best practices in vocational training including supporting an open talent ecosystem, digital learning opportunities, and comprehensive partnership coordination that meets the needs of local SMMs.The NSF Engine builds from significant investments and partnerships that have been developed over the two decades to fuel growth in this sector. This growth will lift the region’s median income to the national average and increase the region’s corporate footprint. The capital influx will spill over into other regional industries, creating broad and inclusive wealth building in this historically poor region where a majority of residents identify as Latino.This award reflects NSF's statutory mission and has been deemed worthy of support through evaluation using the Foundation's intellectual merit and broader impacts review criteria.

Paso del Norte国防和航空航天创新引擎致力于推动德克萨斯州西部和新墨西哥州南部航空航天和国防（A&amp；D）制造业的发展。NSF引擎将通过创建一个创新平台来提高Paso del Norte中小型制造商（smm）在a&d市场的竞争力，该平台结合了新兴的数字工程范式、熟练的劳动力发展和其他资源，以降低初创企业和中小企业的成本，同时增加刺激增长所需的尖端设计和测试工具的访问。NSF引擎将北帕索地区重新设想为一个先进的制造业和知识经济，将该地区先进工业的就业份额从3.2%增加到25%。这可以通过重新部署当地制造能力来支持美国的a&&d产业，提高当地人才队伍的技能，并扩大K-12学生获得下一代STEM技能的机会，从而使该地区更多的人有机会进入中产阶级。中小企业对于维持一个充满活力和安全的美国军工供应链仍然非常重要，但是越来越少的中小企业参与国防工业基础。由于中小企业的劳动力规模较小，资源有限，没有研发预算或基础设施，因此越来越多的中小企业被排除在高度分层的美国创新生态系统之外。NSF引擎正在解决重振曾经是美国经济重要制造业基地的国家挑战，并通过创造创新部门的就业机会，提高Paso del Norte地区的经济流动性和劳动力参与度。美国国防部确定的14项国防关键技术中有5项被纳入该生态系统：先进材料；可信的人工智能和自主性；空间技术;可再生能源发电和储存；和特超音速。北帕索是一个由八个县组成的地区，位于美国西南部的美墨边境。它包括德克萨斯州西部的六个县和新墨西哥州南部的两个县。埃尔帕索和拉斯克鲁塞斯是该地区最大的大都市地区。美国经济发展局（EDA）将8个县中的6个（Culberson, Doña Ana, El Paso, Hudspeth， Presidio和Sierra）指定为持续贫困县，这意味着贫困率至少30年保持在20%以上。该地区家庭的收入中位数远低于全国平均水平，而且这一差距自1997年以来一直在扩大。低收入的一个原因是，相对于其他市场，该地区缺乏高薪的STEM工作。为了振兴美国国防工业基础，推动Paso del Norte地区走向更加经济平等和提高竞争力，NSF引擎将帮助中小企业在其方法上开发更多创新，并获得负担得起的国防关键研究和开发。NSF引擎的一些关键组成部分是基于该地区大学和设施的新的开放获取的物理和技术支持基础设施，中小企业可以利用这些基础设施来建立他们的创新能力和劳动力人才。NSF引擎的公共创新架构将成为一个促进工程和制造创新的生态系统，以加速区域中小企业的能力发展，以获得使用启发的研发。这种公共创新架构是一种通过确保创新过程的广泛和负担得起的访问来破坏传统研发过程的方法。公共创新基础设施将是开发硬基础设施和软基础设施的资源组合，其中包括扩大可用的当地熟练劳动力，埃尔帕索中小企业的物理基础设施，可在整个地区访问的数字基础设施，以及翻译和商业化创新的能力建设。这种公共基础设施将降低初创企业和中小企业进入研发市场并参与竞争的成本。人才基础设施支持该地区的创新产业，通过提高当地劳动力人才的技能和K-12外展，以建立对研发行业职业的兴趣。项目领导组织，航空航天中心和德克萨斯大学埃尔帕索分校的W.M.凯克3D创新中心已经开发出新的方法，通过独特的以学生为中心的研究模式来解决国家面临的STEM人才危机。技能发展战略造就了高需求的毕业生，因为他们有能力立即为雇主提供价值。这种研究模式擅长于为传统上在劳动力中代表性不足的群体开辟进入A&amp；D部门的新途径。这些中心的学生80%是拉丁裔，三分之二来自年收入低于3.7万美元的家庭，一半是第一代大学生。这两个中心在培养女工程师方面处于全国领先地位——29%的学生是女性，远远高于同领域的同行机构。NSF发动机将通过一个名为航空航天和国防技术与制造培训中心（ADTech）的技术人员培训计划来扩展这一模式。零部件制造商经常抱怨工程和技术专业的新毕业生往往缺乏立即投入生产所需的技能，而且需要额外的昂贵的现场培训来为新工作的要求做好准备。ADTech技能开发平台扩展了UTEP项目的成功，将使用成熟的技能重点战略来培训技术人员，以满足a&&d和先进制造业雇主的需求。这个敏捷培训平台将整合职业培训的最佳实践，包括支持开放的人才生态系统、数字化学习机会和满足当地中小企业需求的全面合作伙伴关系协调。NSF引擎建立在20年来发展起来的大量投资和合作伙伴关系的基础上，以推动该领域的增长。这种增长将把该地区的收入中位数提高到全国平均水平，并增加该地区的企业足迹。资本流入将溢出到其他地区产业，在这个历史上贫穷的地区创造广泛和包容性的财富，这里的大多数居民都认为自己是拉丁裔。该奖项反映了美国国家科学基金会的法定使命，并通过使用基金会的知识价值和更广泛的影响审查标准进行评估，被认为值得支持。