{"response":{"award":[{"abstractText":"Most Alaskans live within or near the wildland-urban interface, particularly in rural areas, making adaptation to the growing wildfire risk a priority statewide. Prescribed burning, which is intentionally setting and carefully managing fires under controlled conditions, is a proven strategy for reducing this risk and managing the landscape. Yet prescribed burning remains underused in Alaska because the state lacks weather forecasting tools and community partnerships suited to its unique environment. This project will develop and share the scientific knowledge and practical tools that Alaska's fire managers, municipalities, and local communities need to plan and carry out prescribed burns safely and effectively. In many of these communities, governance and land management involve a mix of municipal, federal, Tribal, and non-profit entities, and the project's engagement approach aims to build a community of practice that helps distribute relevant knowledge across all of these stakeholders. By reducing the frequency and severity of destructive wildfires, this work will help protect lives, property, and critical infrastructure while preserving resources tied to the land. The project will also train the next generation of fire and emergency management professionals through a new university curriculum, and its findings will offer a model for other remote, fire-prone, high-latitude regions facing similar challenges and changing fire regimes.\r\n\r\nThis project adapts the Prescribed Fire and Smoke Planner, a decision-support tool already used across the contiguous United States, for use in Alaska by incorporating the Canadian Forest Fire Weather Index system on which Alaska's fire management relies. Using historical weather reanalysis data and statistical and machine-learning techniques, the research team will characterize the geographic and seasonal patterns of hazardous fire weather and identify windows of conditions favorable for safe prescribed burning across Alaska and the broader Northern Pacific Boreal-Arctic region. A central activity is sustained relationship-building with local communities, both remote and ex-urban, to understand their resilience needs and operational constraints. This will be followed by co-development of customized planning products, such as maps, GIS datasets, and risk assessments, with several committed community partners. The project will also survey fire managers and members of the public to quantify differences in preferences and values regarding prescribed burning, informing more effective outreach and decision-making processes. Educational activities include developing a curriculum for a new four-year wildland fire management program to build capacity among current and future fire professionals.\r\n\r\nThis 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.","activeAwd":"true","agency":"NSF","awardAgencyCode":"4900","awardee":"UNIVERSITY OF ALASKA FAIRBANKS","awardeeAddress":"2145 N TANANA LOOP","awardeeCity":"FAIRBANKS","awardeeCountryCode":"US","awardeeDistrict":"00","awardeeDistrictCode":"AK00","awardeeName":"University of Alaska Fairbanks Campus","awardeePhone":"9074747301","awardeeStateCode":"AK","awardeeZipCode":"99775","cfdaNumber":"47.050, 47.076","coPDPI":["Peter A Bieniek pbieniek@alaska.edu","Alec Bennett apbennett@alaska.edu","Richard Lader UAF-OGCA@alaska.edu","Jesse Kaczmarski jikaczmarski@alaska.edu"],"date":"07/31/2026","dirAbbr":"GEO","divAbbr":"RISE","estimatedTotalAmt":"1588147","expDate":"08/31/2030","fundAgencyCode":"4900","fundProgramName":"IUSE, Fire Science Innovations","fundsObligated":["FY 2026 = $1,588,147.00"],"fundsObligatedAmt":"1588147","histAwd":"false","id":"2536745","initAmendmentDate":"07/31/2026","latestAmendmentDate":"07/31/2026","managingPec":"345Y00","orgCodeDir":"06000000","orgCodeDiv":"06010000","orgLongName":"Directorate for Geosciences","orgLongName2":"Integrative and Collaborative Education and Research (ICER)","orgUrl":"https://www.nsf.gov/div/index.jsp?div=RISE","parentUeiNumber":"KNP1HA2B9BF8","pdPIName":"Christine F Waigl","perfAddress":"2145 N TANANA LOOP","perfCity":"FAIRBANKS","perfCountryCode":"US","perfDistrict":"00","perfDistrictCode":"AK00","perfLocation":"University of Alaska Fairbanks Campus","perfStateCode":"AK","perfZipCode":"997750100","pi":["Christine F Waigl cwaigl@alaska.edu"],"piEmail":"cwaigl@alaska.edu","piFirstName":"Christine","piId":"270072659","piLastName":"Waigl","piMiddeInitial":"F","poEmail":"yyanes@nsf.gov","poName":"Yurena Yanes","poPhone":"7032920000","primaryProgram":["04002627DB NSF STEM Education","01002627DB NSF RESEARCH & RELATED ACTIVIT"],"progEleCode":"199800, 345Y00","program":"Artificial Intelligence (AI), FIRE-Wildland Fire, INTERDISCIPLINARY PROPOSALS, Improv Undergrad STEM Ed(IUSE), EXP PROG TO STIM COMP RES, UNDERGRADUATE EDUCATION","progRefCode":"075Z, 132Z, 4444, 8209, 9150, 9178","publicAccessMandate":"1","startDate":"09/01/2026","title":"Collaborative Research: FIRE-WUI: A research-informed fire weather toolkit to advance controlled burning in Alaska","transType":"Standard Grant","ueiNumber":"FDLEQSJ8FF63"}],"metadata":{"offset":0,"rpp":25,"totalCount":1}}}