Research plays an important role in the discovery of ways our nation can advance and strengthen its priorities in education, health, science and engineering. Through collaboration with those from multi-disciplinary perspectives, amazing solutions can emerge. ORAU offers opportunities to connect with the research excellence offered by its internationally known subject matter experts and our 160+ member institutions.
ORAU is now accepting applications for its annual Education Grants program for 2026, offering grant funding for teachers in Anderson, Campbell, Morgan, Roane and Scott counties. Selected projects will be implemented during the 2026-2027 school year. Educators interested in applying for ORAU funding can complete and submit an online proposal. All proposals are due Friday, April 24, 2026.
Greg Nichols is operations manager in the ORAU health studies program, but he wears a lot of hats. He has become an expert in artificial intelligence and received an ORAU Thought Leadership Research Award to write a chapter on the convergence of AI and biotechnology. Nichols’s chapter, “Assessing Governance and Regulatory Frameworks for Converging Technologies: The Case of Artificial Intelligence in Biological Engineering and Design Technologies,” appears in Biotechnology and AI: Technological Convergence and Information Hazards. He says that While biotechnologies are somewhat better regulated and monitored compared to other technologies, artificial intelligence is not, and the combination of these two is certainly not explicitly or fully covered by most existing regulations or risk governance framework. This was an insightful and thought-provoking conversation.
For more than 80 years, ORAU has served as a trusted partner to our government customers, our university consortium members, and our local community. In this video, you can meet some of the people behind the ORAU name.
