Randomized Algorithms for Combinatorial Scientific Computing | DE FOA 0002722

Opportunity Information: Apply for DE FOA 0002722

The Department of Energy (DOE) Office of Science, through its Advanced Scientific Computing Research (ASCR) program, announced a discretionary funding opportunity titled "Randomized Algorithms for Combinatorial Scientific Computing" (Funding Opportunity Number DE-FOA-0002722). The call focuses on basic research that advances the theory and practice of randomized algorithms aimed at difficult discrete and combinatorial problems that appear across DOE mission needs, including energy, environmental science, and national security. In practical terms, the opportunity targets fundamental algorithmic work rather than near-term product development, with an emphasis on methods that can handle large, complex problem instances where deterministic approaches may be too slow, too memory-intensive, or too brittle.

A central theme of the opportunity is the design and development of randomized techniques for combinatorial scientific computing, which broadly includes areas like graph and network computations, discrete optimization, sampling and counting, randomized rounding and sketching, and probabilistic approaches to searching or exploring very large discrete spaces. The FOA highlights not only creating new algorithms, but also analyzing them rigorously and ensuring they can scale. That means proposed research is expected to address mathematical guarantees such as accuracy, robustness, failure probability, convergence behavior, and complexity, while also grappling with implementation-relevant issues like parallelism, communication costs, and performance on large-scale computing platforms typically used in scientific workloads.

Scalability is explicitly called out as a core interest, indicating DOE wants approaches that remain effective as problem sizes and computing resources grow. For randomized methods, this can include work on parallel random number generation and reproducibility, load balancing when algorithm paths diverge stochastically, fault tolerance, and strategies that reduce synchronization and communication overhead. It can also include research into how randomness can be used to reduce computational cost (for example, via sampling, sparsification, or sketch-based surrogates) while still producing results reliable enough for scientific decision-making.

From a funding mechanics standpoint, the opportunity is listed under Science and Technology and other Research and Development, with CFDA number 81.049. The agency is the Department of Energy, Office of Science. The funding instruments include grants and may also include other assistance mechanisms and procurement contracts, signaling that DOE reserved flexibility in how it would make awards depending on the nature of the proposed work and the applicant. The eligibility is described as unrestricted, meaning it was broadly open to any type of entity, subject to any additional constraints that might have appeared in the full eligibility text of the solicitation.

The FOA set an expected number of awards of nine, with an award ceiling of $2,400,000. While the ceiling does not guarantee any single award size, it indicates the upper bound DOE anticipated for an individual award under this call. The opportunity was created on April 14, 2022, and the original closing date was June 30, 2022, defining the main application window for submitting proposals.

Overall, this grant opportunity was designed to strengthen the foundational algorithmic toolkit available for combinatorial and discrete challenges in scientific computing, with particular emphasis on randomized methods that come with solid theoretical understanding and that can be engineered to run efficiently at scale. It is aimed at researchers developing new ideas in randomized algorithm design, rigorous analysis, and large-scale applicability to the kinds of discrete problems that show up in DOE-relevant scientific and engineering domains.

• The Department of Energy - Office of Science, Office of Science in the science and technology and other research and development sector is offering a public funding opportunity titled "Randomized Algorithms for Combinatorial Scientific Computing" and is now available to receive applicants.
• Interested and eligible applicants and submit their applications by referencing the CFDA number(s): 81.049.
• This funding opportunity was created on Apr 14, 2022.
• Applicants must submit their applications by Jun 30, 2022. (Agency may still review applications by suitable applicants for the remaining/unused allocated funding in 2026.)
• Each selected applicant is eligible to receive up to $2,400,000.00 in funding.
• The number of recipients for this funding is limited to 9 candidate(s).
• Eligible applicants include: Unrestricted (i.e., open to any type of entity above), subject to any clarification in text field entitled Additional Information on Eligibility.

Apply for DE FOA 0002722

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