Texas A & M Research Foundation

Texas A&M Research Foundation is a non-profit, tax-exempt corporate entity based in College Station, Texas, that has been registered to receive federal awards since January 2002. The organization specializes in managing complex research projects across multiple scientific domains, ranging from wildlife management to educational innovation and advanced scientific research. As a research foundation affiliated with Texas A&M University, the entity serves as a vehicle for conducting federally-funded research and development activities that advance knowledge and address critical challenges in agriculture, education, environmental sciences, and other fields.

Through federal contract awards, Texas A&M Research Foundation has demonstrated expertise in specialized scientific analysis and testing. Most notably, the organization received a $124,629 definitive contract from the Bureau of Land Management on December 10, 2025, to perform genetic analysis of wild horse and burro hair follicle samples. This contract, which extends through December 14, 2028, requires the foundation to conduct microsatellite genotyping at a minimum of 12 loci, develop a comprehensive genetic database, and perform detailed analyses including observed heterozygosity calculations and inbreeding coefficients. The work involves International Society for Animal Genetics (ISAG) certification standards and will be executed in College Station, Texas, under a firm fixed price structure with no small business set-aside applied. Additionally, Texas A&M Research Foundation has served as a sub-contractor on research and development projects for schools, receiving sub-contract awards from Massachusetts Institute of Technology on multiple occasions, indicating its capacity to contribute technical expertise to larger collaborative research initiatives.

The organization's federal grant portfolio reflects substantial activity in education innovation and earth sciences research. The foundation has received multiple significant grants from the U.S. Department of Education's Office of Elementary and Secondary Education under the Education Innovation and Research (EIR) program, including the RURAL OPPORTUNITIES THROUGH LITERACY, OBSERVATION, TUTORING, AND STEM (ROOTS) initiative ($16,499,993, awarded January 1, 2026, through December 31, 2030), the ENABLE MIDDLE-GRADERS WITH POWERFUL READING COMPREHENSION (EMPOWER) program ($15,256,841, awarded January 1, 2026, through December 31, 2030), and the KNOWLEDGE ACQUISITION AND TRANSFORMATION EXPANSION (KATE) initiative ($16,283,484, awarded December 15, 2021, through December 15, 2026). These grants support the creation and scaling of evidence-based educational innovations for high-need student populations in rural and underserved areas. Beyond education, the National Science Foundation's Division of Ocean Sciences has awarded the foundation substantial cooperative agreements: a $17,635,793 award (February 1, 2025, through January 31, 2030) to establish a Scientific Ocean Drilling Coordinating Office in collaboration with Columbia University's Lamont-Doherty Earth Observatory, and a cooperative agreement (October 1, 2024, through September 30, 2029) to close out International Ocean Discovery Program obligations and operate the Gulf Coast Repository. The foundation also received a cooperative agreement from the U.S. Department of Agriculture to study the effect of heat stress on glycoalkaloid amounts in potato tubers (September 1, 2022, through August 30, 2024), and has participated as a sub-grantee on gene-environment interaction research funded by The Johns Hopkins University. This diverse grant portfolio demonstrates the foundation's capacity to manage multi-million dollar research initiatives across scientific domains and to collaborate effectively with leading academic institutions.