Skip to Main Content

Research Funding and Grant Writing

Comprehensive Funding Databases

Grants.gov
A unified portal for grant programs sponsored by U.S. federal agencies.  Supports discovery of available grant programs, submitting grant applications, and for successful grant applicants, tracking of grant funds.  The Learn Grants tab provides information about the grant lifecycle, eligibility to apply, various application systems, grant terminology, and much more.

Foundation Directory Online
Search funding opportunities provided by over 100,000 foundations, corporate giving programs, and grantmaking public charities in the U.S. as well as over 4,000 sponsoring companies.  Search over 2.4 million recently awarded grants; and a keyword-searchable database of over 700,000 recently filed IRS Forms 990 and 990-PF.

Grant Forward (formerly IRIS)
Continually updated, Grant Forward includes 19,000+ opportunities, including 8,000+ federal and foundation opportunities.  Can also be used to enter your research profile and network with others based on research interests.

Catalog of Federal Domestic Assistance (CFDA)
"Catalog of Federal Domestic Assistance (CFDA) provides a full listing of all Federal programs available to State and local governments (including the District of Columbia); federally-recognized Indian tribal governments; Territories (and possessions) of the United States; domestic public, quasi- public, and private profit and nonprofit organizations and institutions; specialized groups; and individuals."

NU Office of Sponsored Research
This office's website provides links to several newsletters announcing funding opportunities and training in addition to the following subscription search services.  Most of these services allow you to establish a personal profile and receive automatic updates:

  • Funding Institutional (Free to NU with NetID) 
    • contains 18,000+ active funding opportunities from more than 3,500 government and private funders around the world, including 2,000 U.S. funders
    • Links with Scopus to generate researcher-specific funding recommendations
  • ResearchResearch (Free to NU with NetID)
    Search for funding opportunities.