
NSF I-Corps Program

Chart your path from research to innovation
The NSF-I-Corps Hub Northeast Hub provides specialized training and mini grants of up to $3,000 to teams interested in exploring the commercial viability of their ideas for products and businesses that are based on their own inventions, University intellectual property, or any STEM-related technology.
Our 4-session training programs help researchers explore how their scientific or technological discovery can meet the needs of people and industries. Our Hub is open to all academic researchers in the Northeast and is dedicated to inclusive innovation. Teams can include faculty, postdoctoral researchers, graduate students and undergraduates.
NSF I-Corps gave a different dimension to the research I do. Being able to identify the commercial opportunity is so rewarding! It has been the best experience in grad school. Thanks a lot for the support and guidance you have provided me.
The I-Corps program helps researchers explore the potential for their discoveries to become products and services that can benefit society.
The National Science Foundation-funded program gives researchers valuable insight into how their discovery or technology meets customers needs or addresses key challenges.
The I-Corps Northeast Hub is committed to diversity, equity and inclusion, and is working to attract and support participants of backgrounds historically underrepresented in research, innovation and entrepreneurship.
Researchers form teams and attend a 4-session program focused on identifying how their innovation meets customer needs.
Teams can include faculty, postdoctoral researchers, graduate students and/or undergraduates who are developing a scientific or technical discovery at any institution in the Northeast.
After finishing the course, promising teams may apply to attend NSF's national I-Corps Teams program and win a $50,000 small business grant.
Researchers in the program build relationships and gain skills in an inclusive, welcoming environment.
Program alumni become part of the I-Corps entrepreneurship ecosystem and have access to resources across the Hub-member institutions.
Participants make valuable connections with mentors and industry leaders with experience in transitioning technologies into new ventures.
About the National Science Foundation I-Corps Hub: Northeast Region
The I-Corps Northeast Hub is a regional coalition of universities in the Northeast that work together to provide I-Corps programs and support a growing generation of technology entrepreneurs. The Hub includes ten (10) universities with the opportunity to add more partners over time: Princeton University (Principal Institution) and nine Partner Institutions - Rutgers University, University of Delaware, Delaware State University, Lehigh University, New Jersey Institute of Technology, Rowan University, Temple University, Drexel University, and Yale University.
The Hub launched in January 2022 with a 5-year grant from the National Science Foundation.
-
UD A PARTNER IN REGIONAL INNOVATION HUB
August 25, 2021 | Written by Tracey Bryant and Catherine Zandonella, PrincetonThe University of Delaware is a partner in a new regional innovation network, established with a $15 million grant from the National Science Foundation (NSF), to accelerate the transformation of scientific discoveries into technologies that improve our daily lives. -
Making Broader Impacts: Announcing the New Innovation Delaware Fellowship Program
July 14, 2023 | Written by Daniel J. FreemanDelaware’s research scientists, graduate students and innovators now have an exceptional opportunity to learn about, and gain first-hand experience with the process of translating their ideas, discoveries and inventions from the laboratory to the marketplace – the Innovation Delaware (InDE) Fellowship program. -
Announcing the 12th Annual Deshpande Symposium Award Winners
June 30, 2023 | VentureWellUniversity of Delaware Horn Entrepreneurship's Social Entrepreneurship Initiative was recognized at the Deshpande Symposium on Innovation & Entrepreneurship as its 2023 awardee for Excellence in Curriculum Innovation in Entrepreneurship.