AI Seed Grants 2026

Call for Proposals

Goals

The Office of the Provost AI Initiatives offers seed grants to foster discipline-spanning work on, with, and about AI technologies.  We seek to:

• Promote innovation and thought leadership in artificial intelligence;
• Nurture projects engaged with ethical uses of artificial intelligence to improve the world; and
• Foster interdisciplinary collaborations at Yale and beyond.

Eligibility

Interdisciplinary teams of faculty consisting of two or more faculty from different fields can propose projects.  All teams must be led by a full-time Yale faculty or staff member who is eligible to serve as a Principal Investigator (PI) for external grants.  There is a limit of one proposal per PI, but you can participate as a teammate in multiple proposals.  Teammates can include any university community member.  We encourage proposals from all disciplines: arts, humanities, science, social science, engineering, and the professional schools. We encourage proposals that explore collaborations with New Haven, and those that harness the power of Yale’s centers, institutes, libraries, and staff as research partners. Junior faculty members are especially encouraged to apply. 

Planetary Solutions Collaboration - AI Initiatives is co-sponsoring Planetary Solutions grants.  We are coordinating with Planetary Solutions to reduce duplication of effort for grant writers and the review committees.  Apply to one program only. 

• If your primary research goal is advance AI, apply here.
• If your primary research goal is aligned to using AI as a tool for Planetary Solutions, apply there.

Yale and the World Supplement – The Yale and the World Partnership Fund will co-sponsor two $15,000 supplemental awards to support international relationship building. To be considered, please select the check box in the application, include names of proposed partner institutions, and write a 500-word description.

• The international relationship building evaluation is a supplement to the main proposal and award.  Do not include this $15k in your main budget proposal.
• Both AI at Yale and Planetary Solutions are collaborating with Yale and the World Partnership Fund and the Office of International Relations.  

Grant Types

Selection Criteria

• Innovation – How does this project seek to discover something new about AI?
• Intellectual or Artistic Merit – What does this proposal add to fields and disciplines in which you are engaging?
• Impact – How might this project solve a problem or impact people, etc.?
• Credentials of the team to complete the project – How is your team qualified to do this work?
• Interdisciplinarity (minimum two different departments at Yale)—How will your team bring together different disciplinary methods to do this work?
• Viability – Can the project be completed in the amount of time with the proposed budget?

Reporting Expectations

• Participation in Midway Exchange Event and one-pager
• Final report
• Participation in AI at Yale Symposium 2027
• 1-year anniversary survey

Funding Guidelines

Funding requests must comply with Yale’s Appropriate Use of University Research Funds policy. AI at Yale Seed Grant funding may cover a range of activities including but not limited to:

• Personnel Costs*: 
  • *Not allowable - ladder-track faculty salary and fringe 
  • Salary and fringe for research scientists, M&P research staff, post-docs, and research assistants
  • Stipend and up to 50% tuition for graduate students (please note that this funding cannot be used toward the Graduate Student Tuition Matching Program);
  • Undergraduate compensation for hourly work.
• Project or Research Supplies or Services: Data collection and analysis; supplies; software; small instrumentation; syllabus development; dissemination of findings (e.g., symposia (internal), publication fees, policy briefs, curricular materials).
• Travel: Travel directly related to the proposed project or research.  External conference travel is not allowable on this grant.
• Other: Items required for the project or research that do not fit in the above categories. Example: consulting fees
• Not allowable: General office supplies, attendance at external conferences, and indirect costs will not be supported under these grants. *Yale ladder track faculty salaries are not supported under these grants. Unallowable expenses in a budget will be subtracted from any award amount.

Materials Required

Please read the full application prompts in InfoReady.  The system will allow you to browse the application.  Below is an outline of the pieces it will ask you to provide.

• Proposal abstract – 150-250 words direct entry
• Proposal narrative – file upload
  • Research proposals 5-page limit
  • Workshop proposals 3-page limit
• CV Principal Investigator – file upload
• Team member names, departments, titles, direct entry
• CVs team members – file upload (collate into one file please)
• Team narrative – 250-word direct entry
• Budget narrative and budget – file upload 1-3 page limit
• Project Timeline – file upload – 1-2 page limit
• Optional: Yale and the World Supplement Materials

Dates and Deadlines

• Submission Deadline:  Friday, February 6, 2026
• Notification Date: April 17, 2026
  • Yale and the World notifications may trail the main award due to an additional evaluation.
• Dates of Work: 
  • 12 Month projects – July 1, 2026 – June 30, 2027
    • Final report, July 31, 2028
  • 18 Month projects – July 1, 2026 – December 23, 2027
    • Final report, January 29, 2028
• PI Exchange Event: January or February 2027
• Expectation to participate in 2027 or 2028 AI at Yale Symposium

Frequently Asked Questions

InfoSessions via Zoom

• Wednesday, December 17, 3pm (PAST)
• Friday, January 16, 2026 2pm, Registration

Contact

Connie Steel, PhD, Program Manager AI Initiatives, Office of the Provost, connie.steel@yale.edu