NSF CAREER Awards in Materials Science, 2019 to 2024: 30 Verified Awards and Where a Self-Healing Offshore-Wind Coating Fits

Scope: NSF Faculty Early Career Development (CAREER) awards whose NSF program is a materials program (Polymers, Ceramics, Electronic/Photonic Materials, Solid State & Materials Chemistry, Metals) or Mechanics of Materials and Structures (no Metals-program award ended up in the 30; one near-miss row, 2339251, is outside materials programs), with award start dates from 1 January 2019 to 31 December 2024. NIH RePORTER and Wellcome Trust were requested but could not be searched (see Coverage note), so every row is NSF. I found 30 verified awards (33 NSF award records; three CAREER awards appear twice because the PI moved institutions and NSF issued a successor record, so I merged each pair). Awards are ranked by my similarity score to your project (inference from titles and abstracts only), then newest start date. Data were pulled from NSF's public Awards API, accessed 5 October 2026 (Polymers query, Ceramics query, Solid State & Materials Chemistry query, community-college keyword query, coating keyword query). Each query returns at most 100 records, so the set is a strong sample, not a census of all CAREER materials awards.

Headline finding: none of the 30 awards targets protective coatings, corrosion, or wind-turbine blades, and only two abstracts use the words "self-heal". The self-healing polymer angle has precedent; the coating and offshore-wind application does not. Four winners name community colleges in their outreach, so that component is a recognised pattern.

1. Awards table

Amounts follow the NSF record: "total (estimated)" is NSF's estimatedTotalAmt; "obligated to date" is fundsObligatedAmt. Link column is the canonical NSF award-record address for each ID. The nsf.gov page itself would not load for me (redirect loop), so field values come from the API records above, not from the web page.

#	Award title	Award ID	Funder/program	PI and institution	Amount	Start–end	Abstract gist	Link
1	CAREER: Creating Tough, Sustainable Materials Using Fracture Size-Effects and Architecture	2339197	NSF CAREER; CAREER, Mech. of Materials & Structures	Lucas Meza, University of Washington	$735,670 total (estimated); $735,670 obligated to date	07/01/2024 to 06/30/2029	Tough, sustainable materials via fracture size effects and architecture; recruits community college students into university STEM.	2339197
2	CAREER: Autonomous, Rapid Self-Healing and Ultra-Stretchable Electronic Polymer Research & Education for Outreach and Student Success in STEM	2305282	NSF CAREER; ELECTRONIC/PHOTONIC MATERIALS	Evan Wujcik, University of Maine	$523,438 total (estimated); $399,314 obligated to date	06/01/2023 to 04/30/2027	Autonomous self-healing, ultra-stretchable electronic polymers for wearables; outreach via YouTube videos and educator engagement.	2305282
3	CAREER: Polymer dynamics near surfaces	2142097	NSF CAREER; POLYMERS, OMA	Svetlana Morozova, Case Western Reserve University	$610,000 total (estimated); $610,000 obligated to date	09/01/2022 to 08/31/2027	How surfaces alter polymer gel dynamics; educational demos co-developed with Cuyahoga Community College.	2142097
4	CAREER: Bottom-up construction of re-configurable entanglements toward polymer networks with switchable toughness	2144288	NSF CAREER; POLYMERS, OMA	Aleksandr Zhukhovitskiy, University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill	$674,825 total (estimated); $681,825 obligated to date	05/01/2022 to 04/30/2027	Reconfigurable entanglements giving polymer networks switchable fracture toughness; undergraduate research, school demos, teacher experiences.	2144288
5	CAREER: Gas-regulated Mechanochemical Activation for Bio-inspired Responses in Polymer Networks	2143146	NSF CAREER; POLYMERS	Melissa Gordon, Lafayette College	$600,000 total (estimated); $600,000 obligated to date	04/01/2022 to 03/31/2027	Gas-regulated mechanochemical remodeling in polymer networks, inspired by tissue healing; undergraduate research at a primarily undergraduate institution.	2143146
6	CAREER: Mechanochemical Activation in Ordered Polymer Networks	1846665	NSF CAREER; POLYMERS	Jennifer Laaser, University of Pittsburgh	$549,716 total (estimated); $549,716 obligated to date	03/01/2019 to 02/29/2024	Force-responsive polymer networks with controlled nanostructure; mechanochemistry for self-reporting and self-healing materials.	1846665
7	CAREER: Recycled Polymers of Enhanced Strength and Toughness: Predicting Failure and Unraveling Deformation to Enable Circular Transitions	2338508	NSF CAREER; Mech. of Materials & Structures	Christos Athanasiou, Georgia Tech Research Corporation	$682,463 total (estimated); $682,463 obligated to date	09/01/2024 to 08/31/2029	Failure and deformation of recycled polymers; engagement of justice-impacted youth and workforce re-entry.	2338508
8	CAREER: Multiscale Mechanics of Carbon Nanotube-Polymer Composites	2334166	NSF CAREER; Mech. of Materials & Structures	Hessam Yazdani, University of Missouri-Columbia	$562,555 total (estimated); $472,367 obligated to date	01/01/2023 to 08/31/2027	Fracture mechanisms and property prediction for carbon nanotube-polymer composites; course development.	2334166
9	CAREER: Vitrimer gels as a platform for homogenous and meso/nanostructured networks	2144007	NSF CAREER; OMA, POLYMERS	Ralm Ricarte, Florida State University	$677,644 total (estimated); $683,644 obligated to date	08/01/2022 to 07/31/2027	Vitrimer gels with dynamic crosslinks as platform for homogeneous, nanostructured recyclable networks; high-school research pipeline.	2144007
10	CAREER: Dynamics and structure of comb polymer elastomers	2338550	NSF CAREER; POLYMERS	Amanda Marciel, William Marsh Rice University	$670,406 total (estimated); $391,991 obligated to date	09/01/2024 to 08/31/2029	Comb-polymer elastomer topology, dynamics and structure; symposia aimed at community college teachers and students.	2338550
11	CAREER: Unraveling Oxygen Electrode Delamination Mechanisms in Reversible Solid Oxide Cells for Robust Hydrogen Production	2336465, 2451552	NSF CAREER; CAREER, Mech. of Materials & Structures	Xinfang Jin, University of Massachusetts Lowell / University of Texas at Dallas	$648,431 total (estimated); $648,431 (2336465); $656,831 (2451552) obligated to date	04/01/2024 to 05/31/2029	Oxygen-electrode delamination in reversible solid oxide cells; engages underrepresented groups (PI and awardee moved).	2336465 2451552
12	CAREER: Solid-state molecular motion, reversible covalent-bond formation, and self-assembly for controlling thermal expansion behavior	2411677	NSF CAREER; Solid State & Materials Chem.	Kristin Hutchins, University of Missouri-Columbia	$651,350 total (estimated); $520,038 obligated to date	01/01/2024 to 03/31/2027	Reversible covalent bonds and molecular motion to control thermal expansion; middle-school-to-graduate outreach.	2411677
13	CAREER: Mechano-Adaptive Polymers with Reversible Strain Stiffening and Softening via Active Control of Metal-Ligand Interactions	2238935	NSF CAREER; POLYMERS	Ying Yang, Board of Regents, NSHE, obo University of Nevada, Reno	$601,294 total (estimated); $601,294 obligated to date	08/01/2023 to 07/31/2028	Metal-ligand dynamic polymers that reversibly stiffen and soften under strain; virtual-reality outreach.	2238935
14	CAREER: Tailoring the Selectivity of Electrocatalytic Reactions in Seawater and Brine	2344820	NSF CAREER; Special Initiatives, Solid State & Materials Chem., Catalysis	Kelsey Stoerzinger, University of Minnesota-Twin Cities	$549,670 total (estimated); $439,366 obligated to date	07/15/2023 to 12/31/2026	Selective electrocatalysis in seawater and brine; K-12 electrochemistry outreach.	2344820
15	CAREER: Thermomechanical Property Control of Confined Conjugated Polymeric Thin Films	2047689	NSF CAREER; POLYMERS, EPSCoR Co-Funding	Xiaodan Gu, University of Southern Mississippi	$593,505 total (estimated); $593,505 obligated to date	05/01/2021 to 04/30/2027	Thermomechanical control of confined conjugated polymer thin films; K-12 platform and scattering workshop.	2047689
16	CAREER: Understanding the Multi-Scale Dynamics of Heterogeneous Polymeric Systems	2046606	NSF CAREER; POLYMERS	Reika Katsumata, University of Massachusetts Amherst	$595,000 total (estimated); $595,000 obligated to date	04/01/2021 to 03/31/2026	Multi-scale dynamics of heterogeneous polymers for 3D printing and lithography; K-12 internships for low-income communities.	2046606
17	CAREER: Impact-Adaptive Conducting Polymers	1945664	NSF CAREER; POLYMERS	Yue Wang, University of California - Merced	$610,000 total (estimated); $610,000 obligated to date	07/01/2020 to 06/30/2025	Impact-adaptive stretchable conducting polymers; low-cost 3D-printing kits for K-12 in a historically underserved region.	1945664
18	CAREER: Development of Force-Activated Materials for the Release of Small Organic Molecules	2040458	NSF CAREER; POLYMERS	Andrew Boydston, University of Wisconsin-Madison	$110,229 total (estimated); $110,229 obligated to date	01/01/2020 to 06/30/2021	Force-activated polymers releasing small molecules; local high school partnership. Short-term record ($110k, ended 2021).	2040458
19	CAREER: Robust, Reversible, and Stimuli-responsive Thermodynamic Adhesion in Hydrogels	2337592	NSF CAREER; Mech. of Materials & Structures	Qihan Liu, University of Pittsburgh	$546,127 total (estimated); $546,127 obligated to date	05/01/2024 to 04/30/2029	Switchable, stimuli-responsive hydrogel adhesion; training students to make short research videos.	2337592
20	CAREER: Bridging Research & Education in Delineating Fatigue Performance & Damage Mechanisms in Metal Fused Filament Fabricated Inconel 718	2338178	NSF CAREER; Mech. of Materials & Structures	Sanna Siddiqui, Florida Polytechnic University	$536,110 total (estimated); $536,110 obligated to date	03/01/2024 to 02/28/2029	Fatigue and damage in metal fused-filament Inconel 718; middle/high-school outreach and accelerated B.S.-to-graduate pathway.	2338178
21	CAREER: Electro-Chemo-Mechanics of Multiscale Active Materials for Next-Generation Energy Storage	2237990	NSF CAREER; Mech. of Materials & Structures	Dibakar Datta, New Jersey Institute of Technology	$500,000 total (estimated); $500,000 obligated to date	09/01/2023 to 08/31/2028	Electro-chemo-mechanics of multiscale battery materials; research opportunities for community college students via LSAMP partnership.	2237990
22	CAREER: Using Physics-Based Machine Learning to Reconcile the Crack Tip with the Plastic Zone during Fracture of Metals	2237039	NSF CAREER; CAREER, Mech. of Materials & Structures	Ryan Sills, Rutgers University New Brunswick	$622,248 total (estimated); $622,248 obligated to date	07/01/2023 to 06/30/2028	Physics-based machine learning for crack-tip and plastic-zone behavior in metals; high-school fracture lesson plan.	2237039
23	CAREER: Hierarchical Structures and Tunable Mechanics of Polyelectrolyte Complex-Interpenetrating Network (PEC-IPN) Hydrogels	2048285	NSF CAREER; POLYMERS	Samanvaya Srivastava, University of California-Los Angeles	$606,492 total (estimated); $613,492 obligated to date	03/01/2021 to 02/28/2027	Self-assembled polyelectrolyte-complex hydrogels with tunable mechanics; high-school-to-graduate training and software tutorials.	2048285
24	CAREER: Building Hierarchical Polymers with Light to Unify Softness, Resilience, and Conductivity	2045336	NSF CAREER; POLYMERS	Zachariah Page, University of Texas at Austin	$620,000 total (estimated); $620,000 obligated to date	02/01/2021 to 01/31/2026	Light-driven synthesis of hierarchical polymers combining softness, resilience, conductivity; first-year research course and school activity.	2045336
25	CAREER: Bottlebrush polymers as gateways to multiresponsive structures	1945092, 2424452	NSF CAREER; POLYMERS	Yoan Simon, University of Southern Mississippi / Arizona State University	$581,187 total (estimated); $581,187 (1945092); $318,694 (2424452) obligated to date	06/01/2020 to 05/31/2027	Bottlebrush polymers as multiresponsive, membrane-inspired structures; community STEM events (PI and awardee moved).	1945092 2424452
26	CAREER: Inverse Mechanics in Self-Sensing Materials: Basic Knowledge, Education, and Service	2239039	NSF CAREER; Mech. of Materials & Structures	Tyler Tallman, Purdue University	$509,958 total (estimated); $509,958 obligated to date	08/15/2023 to 07/31/2028	Inverse mechanics for self-sensing materials; Society of Women Engineers outreach and undergraduate mentoring.	2239039
27	CAREER: Dissipation Mechanisms and Damping in Smart Elastomers with Intermolecular Organization	2238035	NSF CAREER; Mech. of Materials & Structures, GOALI-Grnt Opp Acad Lia wIndus, EPSCoR Co-Funding	Aurelie Azoug, Oklahoma State University	$580,651 total (estimated); $633,366 obligated to date	08/01/2023 to 07/31/2028	Dissipation and damping in smart elastomers; pipeline program for girls and women in mechanical engineering.	2238035
28	CAREER: Fundamentals and New Materials for Hydrogen Electrode of Intermediate Temperature Proton Conducting Solid Oxide Fuel Cells	1848305, 2503035	NSF CAREER; CERAMICS	Zhe Cheng, Florida International University / Colorado State University	$571,834 total (estimated); $571,834 (1848305); $193,505 (2503035) obligated to date	04/01/2019 to 07/31/2026	Hydrogen electrode fundamentals for proton-conducting ceramic fuel cells; ceramics education for minority students (PI and awardee moved).	1848305 2503035
29	CAREER: Highly Tunable Dry Adhesion through Constrained Buckling	2239507	NSF CAREER; Mech. of Materials & Structures	Wanliang Shan, Syracuse University	$547,315 total (estimated); $547,315 obligated to date	06/01/2023 to 05/31/2028	Tunable dry adhesion of buckling hollow pillars; soft-robotics summer camps at a local STEM museum.	2239507
30	CAREER: Bayesian Machine-Infused Physics-Based Data Assimilation for Digital Twinning and Uncertainty Quantification of Dynamical Systems	2339251	NSF CAREER; EPSCoR Co-Funding, Dynamics, Control and System D	Hamed Ebrahimian, Board of Regents, NSHE, obo University of Nevada, Reno	$599,725 total (estimated); $599,725 obligated to date	09/01/2024 to 08/31/2029	Digital twinning and uncertainty quantification of dynamical systems; K-12 and undergraduate outreach. Near miss: not a materials-program award.	2339251

2. Size and duration stats

Measure	n	Median	Range	Note
Total (estimated), USD	30 merged awards	$597,363	$110,229 to $735,670	29 of 30 are $500,000 or more; the low outlier is 2040458 ($110,229, ended June 2021)
Obligated to date, USD	27 single-record awards	$595,000	$110,229 to $735,670	Excludes the three merged pairs, where successor records each report their own obligated amount
Duration, years (start to end date)	30	5.0	1.5 to 7.3	22 of 30 run 4.5 to 5.6 years
Total (estimated), broader pool of all 133 CAREER-titled records in the materials programs	133	$607,792	$54,024 to $822,963	Includes duplicates from successor records; shows my 30 are typical

Obligated amounts to date understate the full award for recent starts: for example, 2338613 lists $640,000 estimated total but $370,139 obligated. This is consistent with incremental funding of continuing grants (my inference). All figures are USD. Medians were computed in data/build.py.

3. Who wins

Institution type: The set is dominated by research universities. Exceptions I can confirm from the records: Lafayette College calls itself a primarily undergraduate institution (2143146); UC Merced is described as a Hispanic Serving Institution (1945664); UMass Lowell is described as a Minority Serving Institution (2336465). No company, nonprofit or community-college awardee appears, as expected for CAREER. Classifying the other 24 by Carnegie type would be my inference, so I do not.
Geography: 21 states. Pennsylvania, Florida and Texas have three awards each; Missouri, Massachusetts, Nevada, Mississippi, California and New Jersey have two each. A merged pair counts toward each state where the PI held the award. There is no single dominant region.
Repeat awardees: No PI holds two different CAREER awards. The only repeats are successor records: Yoan Simon (1945092, 2424452), Xinfang Jin (2336465, 2451552) and Zhe Cheng (1848305, 2503035).
Smaller-state awardees: Maine (2305282), Mississippi (2047689, which the record says is co-funded by EPSCoR) and Nevada (2238935) appear, so a non-coastal-elite home institution is not a barrier. This is a count from the table, not a statistical test.

4. Winning patterns

These patterns rest only on public titles and abstracts of the 30 awards, not on unseen proposals or reviews. Counts come from keyword matches in the abstract text (data/build.py, data/extra.py), so they are approximate (loose terms such as 'surface' or 'industr' can over-count).

Pattern	Awards showing it (of 30)
Statement of NSF's statutory merit-review criteria ("intellectual merit"/"statutory mission")	29
Mentions undergraduates	19
Mentions underrepresented, underserved, women, girls or low-income groups	22
Course, curriculum, lesson or module development	16
Workshops, symposia, camps, videos or demonstrations	16
K-12, middle-school or high-school activity	15
Dynamic, reversible or healing chemistry language	14
Fracture, failure, toughness, fatigue or delamination	13
Mentions industry	11
Separate non-technical and technical summaries	16
Adhesion, coating or surface wording	9
Names community colleges	4 (2339197, 2142097, 2338550, 2237990)
States a number of research aims	1 (2338550: "three research aims and one educational aim")

Aims structure: Abstracts rarely state aim counts, so I cannot report sequencing. Only 2338550 does; two others (2237990, 2238035) mention three objectives, the latter for its education plan.
Framing: My qualitative reading (no count): many abstracts open with a societal use (wearables, recycling, batteries, hydrogen) and then state a materials-science gap. Four borrow from nature: 2339197, 2143146, 2238935 and 1945092/2424452. This is the most common novelty move I can see in the abstracts, in 4 of 30.
Recurring language, short quotes: "reaching thousands of potential STEM students and teachers" (2305282); "partner with Cuyahoga Community College" (2142097); "community college teachers and students" (2338550); "recruit underrepresented community college students into university STEM programs" (2339197); "underrepresented community college students" (2237990); "primarily undergraduate institution (PUI)" (2143146); "increase the scientific literacy in Central California" (1945664).
Impact elements: Education is tied to the research object: a 3D-printing kit for K-12 (1945664), VR demonstrations (2238935), a fracture lesson plan (2237039), YouTube videos (2305282). Several plans name a concrete local partner, for example a Tallahassee high school (2144007) and a Society of Women Engineers programme (2239039). Source for all quotes: NSF API records and the Polymers query above.

5. Implications for your project (self-healing polymer coatings for offshore wind blades, community college outreach)

Closest winners (my similarity scores, 0 to 3 on each dimension; inference from abstracts):

Award ID	Problem	Method	Application	Broader impact	Total (of 12)
2339197	2	2	2	3	9
2305282	3	3	1	2	9
2142097	2	2	2	3	9
2144288	2	3	2	2	9
2143146	3	3	1	2	9
1846665	3	3	1	2	9
2338508	3	2	1	2	8
2334166	3	2	2	1	8

Closest on science: 2305282 (Maine) is the only winner with "self-healing" in its title, but for stretchable electronics. 1846665 (Pittsburgh) frames force-responsive networks that can "self-heal after damage". 2143146 (Lafayette) uses healing of skin as the bio-inspired model. 2144007 (Florida State) and 2144288 (UNC) offer dynamic-bond and toughness language that maps to coating durability.
Closest on outreach: 2142097 (Case Western) is the nearest template; it names a specific community college and a demo series. 2339197 (Washington) targets community college students for university transfer. 2338550 (Rice) runs symposia for community college teachers. 2237990 (NJIT) pairs community college research placements with a minority-participation alliance.
What winners had that the idea lacks: a named fundamental question in polymer physics or chemistry (network topology, entanglement, force activation), not only an application; an outreach activity tied to the material itself; and a named local partner.
Angles no winner has taken (within this set): protective coatings; corrosion or UV/erosion damage of blade surfaces; offshore or marine service conditions (2344820 touches seawater but for electrocatalysis); wind energy as the motivating application (2339251 mentions offshore wind but is a data-assimilation award, a near miss); and healing under cold, wet, rain-erosion conditions. A keyword search for "corrosion" over the retrieved CAREER-titled records returned 0 hits; "wind turbine" returned 2 (2503599, 2339251), neither a coating or polymer award. Note that 2503599 sits outside my 30 and its abstract mentions wind-turbine blade vibration, so the claim is that no CAREER award among the 30 targets blades, not that none exists.
Concrete changes to consider (recommendations, not predictions of success):
1. Lead with a fundamental question about healing mechanism in networks (dynamic bonds, chain mobility near surfaces), with the blade coating as the application. Winners lead with mechanism, not product.
2. Make the offshore environment the novelty: healing efficiency under salt-water and temperature cycling is an untaken angle.
3. Copy the 2142097 pattern: name one community college, one activity (demos or a teacher workshop), and one deliverable. 2339197 and 2237990 add a transfer or research-placement pathway; pick one.
4. Tie the education artifact to the material, as winners did with kits and VR (1945664, 2238935): for example a hands-on healing demonstration for community college courses.
5. Check fit before writing: NSF's materials programs funded the polymer-physics and chemistry versions of this topic; a coatings-and-wind pitch may belong in an engineering or mechanics program, which I did not test.

Do next

Read the full public abstracts of 2142097, 2339197, 2338550 and 2237990 for how each describes its community college partner.
Read 2305282 and 1846665 for how healing is framed in a CAREER-fundable way.
Open the NSF CAREER programme solicitation and the Division of Materials Research programme pages and talk to the relevant programme officer about fit for a coatings and wind-energy topic (I did not open these).
Run the same NSF API query in the Mechanics of Materials and engineering programmes with "coating", "erosion" and "marine" to test whether the coating gap is real beyond my 100-record cap.
Repeat the search in NIH RePORTER and the Wellcome grants database if cross-funder precedent matters; I could not.

Near misses and open items

2339251 (Nevada, Reno, $599,725 total estimated): offshore-wind-related digital twinning, not a materials award; included in the table and statistics for completeness but ranked last by similarity.
2040458 ($110,229, 1 January 2020 to 30 June 2021): CAREER record with a short, small footprint; kept, and it is the minimum in the size range.
Successor records: 1945092/2424452, 2336465/2451552, 1848305/2503035 merged as one project each. The merged totals use the first record's estimated total.
Programme confirmation: I identified CAREER from NSF's "CAREER:" titles and "Faculty Early Career Development" text in records, not from the NSF programme page, which I did not open.
Not tested: The Electronic/Photonic Materials program-filter query returned an empty result and the Biomaterials query failed with a fetch-tool concurrency (429) error, so those programs were reached only through other queries; the Metals query yielded few rows.
Amount type caveat: the API gives estimated total and obligated to date; NSF award pages may label amounts differently.

Coverage note

NIH RePORTER (its API call from the browser failed; the search page returned an empty body) and the Wellcome Trust grants database (search page returned 404) could not be searched, and nsf.gov award pages did not load, so all 30 rows come from the NSF Awards API only. NIH and Wellcome are also unlikely to hold close analogues of NSF CAREER materials awards, but I did not verify that.

Sources

Access date for every source: 5 October 2026.