Inaugural $10M DoW Grant to Enhance University, Defense Research Capacity

EAST GREENSBORO, N.C. (Sept. 10, 2026) – The U.S. Department of War has named North Carolina Agricultural and Technical State University an inaugural recipient of a five-year, $10 million grant to establish Accelerate-DAQ, a project focused on expanding N.C. A&T’s defense research capacity in artificial intelligence, autonomy, cyber resilience and quantum systems.

The project is funded through the Department of War Historically Black Colleges and Universities and Minority-Serving Institutions (HBCU/MI) Program within the Office of the Under Secretary of War for Research and Engineering, which established the pilot program to increase research capacity at HBCUs and other MIs.

The DoW established the program to provide support for cutting-edge research and training at HBCUs and MIs in many STEM fields aligned with national security. The scale of investment will serve to accelerate progress of the research enterprise itself while supporting specific research projects. For A&T, that includes reaching and sustaining Research 1 status in the Carnegie Classification of Institutions of Higher Education.

“We’re honored to have been chosen for the Accelerate-DAQ program. Our selection is strong validation of the research A&T is already focused on and our capacity to do much more in the future,” said Chancellor James R. Martin II. “Some of the most important research of the past 50 years has been funded by DoW/Department of Defense funding, including major advances in drug development, materials science, human augmentation technology and more. Accelerate-DAQ will enable A&T to make larger contributions toward advancing science and solving new and emerging scientific challenges.”

Accelerate-DAQ will focus on several of the six DoW’s Critical Technology Areas (CTAs), with a particular emphasis on Applied Artificial Intelligence (AAI) and Quantum and Battlefield Information Dominance, with three interconnected research clusters: Trustworthy AI & Cyber Defense, AI-enabled Autonomy, and Quantum Computing.

“Future AI systems must do more than produce accurate answers. They must be trustworthy, resilient and capable of operating under uncertainty,” said Kaushik Roy, Ph.D., one of the project’s faculty leads and Computer Science department chair in A&T’s College of Engineering. “Our research explores how intelligent systems can collaborate effectively with people, resist cyber threats and continue making reliable decisions in challenging environments. These advances have the potential to reshape how humans and AI work together in applications that demand both performance and trust.”

The Accelerate-DAQ project also seeks to enhance the research culture across campus. It will empower “research champions” within the faculty, postdoctoral scholars, graduate and undergraduate students, and research staff. It will also increase A&T capacity to do research in sensitive or classified areas.

“This project is a gamechanger in developing and providing support for our research champions at every level in multiple disciplines, while strengthening A&T’s ability to meet national security demands,” said Lisa Clough, Ph.D., vice chancellor for Research at A&T and Accelerate-DAQ lead principal investigator. “We must continue investing in emerging STEM scholars, helping them thrive as scientists and embrace excellence in research. N.C. A&T’s productivity speaks for itself.”

The Accelerate-DAQ team consists of experts from six A&T colleges representing the three research clusters:

• Geleana Alston, Ph.D., associate dean for research and community engagement, College of Education
• Shyam Aravamudhan, Ph.D., nanoengineering professor, Joint School of Nanoscience and Nanoengineering (JSNN)
• Bishnu Bastakoti, Ph.D., associate professor of chemistry, College of Science and Technology (CoST)
• Pankaj Chaudhary, Ph.D., associate professor and chair of business information systems and analytics, Willie A. Deese College of Business and Economics
• Salil Desai, Ph.D., associate dean of research and innovation and distinguished professor, College of Engineering (COE)
• Abdollah Homaifar, Ph.D., distinguished professor, COE
• Ali Karimoddini, Ph.D., professor of electrical and computer engineering, COE
• John Kelly, Ph.D., professor of electrical and computer engineering, COE
• Daniel Limbrick, Ph.D., associate professor of electrical and computer engineering, COE
• Evelyn Sowells-Boone, Ph.D., associate professor and chair of computer systems technology, CoST
• Stephanie Teixeira-Poit, Ph.D., associate professor of social work and sociology, John R. and Kathy R. Hairston College of Health and Human Sciences
• Emanuel Waddell, Ph.D., nanoengineering professor and chair, JSNN
• Jinsheng Xu, Ph.D., associate professor of computer science, COE

Over the past five years, A&T principal investigators have secured more than $550 million in external funding support, the strong majority from federal scientific institutes and agencies. Last year alone, A&T research brought in more than $113 million in external awards. In the university’s recently launched new fiscal year, this is already the second major eight-figure grant to be awarded to A&T.

Last month, the university announced a $16.9 million award from the National Institutes of Health to create a research center focused on alleviating health disparities through two large R01 scale projects. R01 projects represent substantial, independent research, rather than a pilot or exploratory study, with scientific depth sufficient to support a dedicated research team, equipment, data collection, analysis and dissemination of results.