AC Social Science & Humanities Research Grants

Timeline
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Launch: Jan. 14, 2026

NOI Intake: Jan. 23, 2026-Feb. 20, 2026

Full application intake: March 3, 2026-April 10, 2026

Award Notifications: May 5, 2026

Purpose of Funding

Funded by the Canada First Research Excellence Fund (CFREF), the Acceleration Consortium social sciences and humanities grants will focus on basic and applied research across all social science and humanities disciplines. The goals of this program include:

1. increasing the number of social science and humanities researchers working on questions related to AI-driven discovery using self-driving labs (Accelerated Discovery),

2. promoting the ethical research, production and use of materials and molecules, and

3. using Indigenous, social justice, and other methodologies to consider the benefits and harms of technology deployment.

To be in scope, the research project should touch on aspects of the AC’s core mission of ethical and sustainable accelerated discovery and the development of new materials and molecules (substances). Applications could address topics such as:

• Understanding what makes a material or substance ethical.
• Indigenous and justice-oriented investigations of AI or materials that can support community repair and healing.
• Community-based research design for SDLs and/or ethical substance concerns.
• Arts-based approaches to understanding SDLs and ethical substance.
• The implications of AI and automation for accelerated discovery and the community-based use of these technologies.
• The economic, environmental, cultural, and social implications of accelerated materials discovery.
• The development of protocols to ground scientific work in Indigenous and environmental values.
• Building ethical frameworks concerning the benefits and harms of accelerated discovery.
• Understanding how SDLs alter how scientists contemplate, construct, and think about their research.
• The impact of acceleration on science and product development.
• Policy recommendations to support commercialization and knowledge mobilization.
• The opportunities and threats of low-cost (democratized) SDL technology.

Grant Requirements & Eligibility

• Lead principal investigators must meet the University of Toronto’s eligibility guidelines and be eligible to hold tri-agency funding and identify as social science or humanities researchers.
• Principal investigators from physical or life science disciplines can be co-applicants
• Principal investigators from Canadian universities can be co-investigators and can receive funding via an inter-institutional agreement.
• PIs can only submit one application as a lead applicant.
• PIs leading a current (2025) AC grant will not be eligible to apply for a 2026 grant as a lead.
• AC Staff Scientists are eligible co-applicants (procedurally, funding would flow to their lab).

We welcome and encourage investigators from all career stages to apply, including early career researchers. Successful applicants will become full members of the Acceleration Consortium and may be asked to support adjudication of future award competitions. We encourage applicants to consider working with the AC Staff Scientists. A list can be seen here.  

To help answer questions about the grants, all potential applicants are invited to attend the launch event at 700 University Ave, Toronto, on Wednesday Jan. 14, 2026, at 10:30 a.m. Register here to join in person or online.

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Funding

• ‍Amount: Maximum $100,000 total, direct research costs‍
• Length: 1-year or 2 -years‍
• All funds are to be spent at the participating academic institution(s) except as noted in the submitted budget
• Eligible expenses must align with U of T's Guide to Financial Management  and CFREF eligibility guidelines. Please see the CFREF Financial Administration Guide

Note that social science and humanities researchers can also apply to the annual Accelerate Seed, Moonshot, and Translation grants if they need additional ‍resources.

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Selection Process

NOI: Eligible applicants are invited to submit a ~2000-character notice of intents (NOI) that will be used to evaluate project eligibility and identify applications that could be merged. Projects that are deemed not to be in scope will not be rejected, but a discussion with the project lead will be held to determine if the grant should go to the full application stage.

At the NOI stage, the quality of the research or team is not evaluated; the NOI is only used to determine if the project is within scope.

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Full Application: Successful NOIs will be asked to submit short applications outlining a deliverable-based research project with a timeline and budget, along with CVs for each of the grant’s principal investigators and co-investigators. Applications will be reviewed by the AC’s Scientific Leadership Team’s Awards Sub-Committee and additional experts as identified by the Scientific Awards Sub-Committee.

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Ethical Discovery

AC research should ultimately support the goals of economic, environmental, and social sustainability and/or advance human health. Technologies developed with AC funding should be evaluated for the potential to cause indirect harm, create positive community impact, and be sustainable throughout its complete lifecycle. These aspects can be part of or a focus of an AC research project.

Intellectual Property

The AC supports open science approaches for early-stage research and encourages applicants to publish all data sets, software, and blueprints, particularly for the development of platform technologies such as SDL. However, open approaches are not required for all grants.

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Recipient Requirements
The following requirements align with our responsibilities to the CFREF funding bodies:

• At the end of the funding period, sign off on the report of budget expenditures report provided by departmental administrative staff.
• Completion of a short report describing the progress against the objectives and milestones and the research and training impact achieved with the funding, including trainees hired, publications, leveraged funding, etc.
• Report on the research impact achieved from the grant until the end of the CFREF funding period (2026) via a short online survey. Metrics include, but are not limited to publications, patents, startups, leveraged funding, and progress to EDI goals.
• Support the University of Toronto’s and AC’s EDI principles, programs, objectives and reporting obligations.
• Adhere to the Acceleration Consortium’s goal that all materials developed should support the public good. This means that research projects funded by the AC should consider, to the extent that it is possible, the ultimate social, economic, and sustainability of the materials or molecule being researched and any potential indirect harms these materials or molecules could have.
• Acknowledgment of the Acceleration Consortium and CFREF in all presentations and publications. This assists us in measuring the impact of our programs and supports future funding.

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This research was undertaken thanks in part to funding provided to the University of Toronto's Acceleration Consortium from the Canada First Research Excellence Fund

• Grant number - CFREF-2022-00042
• All applicants (both lead and co-PIs) are required to answer a self-identification survey if they have not already submitted as part of another AC program. In completing this survey, applicants may voluntarily self-identify in all applicable groups, or they may select “prefer not to answer” in response to any of the questions. Self-identification data is important to the University’s ability to accurately identify barriers to inclusion and to develop strategies to eliminate these barriers. Any information directly related to you is confidential and cannot be accessed by the reviewers or the AC team.

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Learn more:

About the Acceleration Consortium

What is an SDL?

Who can be a Principal Investigator? | Before Engaging in Research

Guide to Financial Services

About the Canada First Research Excellence Fund