National Institute of Standards and Technology 2009 – Federal Register Recent Federal Regulation Documents

The Annual Meeting of the 94th National Conference on Weights and Measures, Incorporated (NCWM) will be held July 12 to 16, 2009, in San Antonio, Texas. Publication of this notice on the NCWM's behalf is undertaken as a public service; NIST does not endorse, approve, or recommend any of the proposals contained in this notice or in the publications of the NCWM mentioned below. The meetings are open to the public but registration is required. Registration information is stated in the FOR FURTHER INFORMATION CONTACT section below.

This notice announces the Secretary of Commerce's approval of Federal Information Processing Standard (FIPS) Publication 186-3, Digital Signature Standard (DSS). FIPS 186-3 is a revision of FIPS 186- 2. The FIPS specifies three techniques for the generation and verification of digital signatures that can be used for the protection of data: the Digital Signature Algorithm (DSA), the Elliptic Curve Digital Signature Algorithm (ECDSA) and the Rivest-Shamir-Adelman (RSA) algorithm. Although all three of these algorithms were approved in FIPS 186-2, FIPS 186-3 increases the key sizes allowed for DSA, provides additional requirements for the use of RSA and ECDSA, and includes requirements for obtaining the assurances necessary for valid digital signatures. FIPS 186-2 contained specifications for random number generators (RNGs); this revision does not include such specifications, but refers to NIST Special Publication (SP) 800-90 for obtaining random numbers. FIPS 186-3 is available at https://csrc.nist.gov/publications/ PubsFIPS.html; SP 800-90 is available at https://csrc.nist.gov/ publications/PubsSPs.html.

The National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST) is establishing a financial assistance program for awardees to develop and implement with NIST a measurement science and engineering fellowship program as part of NIST's activities implementing the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act of 2009 (ARRA, or Recovery Act), Pub. L. 111-5, 123 Stat. 115. The fellowship program is intended to promote training and practical experience in science and engineering, and to advance NIST's mission to promote U.S. innovation and industrial competitiveness by advancing measurement science, standards, and technology in ways that enhance economic security and improve our quality of life.

Pursuant to the Federal Advisory Committee Act, 5 U.S.C. app. 2, notice is hereby given that the Judges Panel of the Malcolm Baldrige National Quality Award will meet Tuesday, June 16, 2009. The Judges Panel is composed of twelve members prominent in the fields of quality, innovation, and performance excellence and appointed by the Secretary of Commerce. The purpose of this meeting is to discuss the Judging process and Judging process changes for 2009; the role of the Judges Panel in the award process; an overview of scoring data; the 2009 Baldrige Award cycle; the Judges Panel survey of applicants; and the Judges Panel mentoring process. Under each of these categories applicant information may be disclosed. The applications under review by the Judges Panel contain trade secrets and proprietary commercial information submitted to the Government in confidence.

Pursuant to the Federal Advisory Committee Act, 5 U.S.C. app. 2, notice is hereby given that there will be a meeting of the Board of Overseers of the Malcolm Baldrige National Quality Award on June 17, 2009. The Board of Overseers is composed of eleven members prominent in the fields of quality, innovation, and performance excellence and appointed by the Secretary of Commerce, assembled to advise the Secretary of Commerce on the conduct of the Baldrige Award. The purpose of this meeting is to discuss and review information received from the National Institute of Standards and Technology with the members of the Judges Panel of the Malcolm Baldrige National Quality Award. The agenda will include: Baldrige Program Strategic Plan, Initiation of Two Contracts, and Baldrige Collaborative and ``Trifecta'' (Baldrige Program, Baldrige Foundation, and the Alliance for Performance Excellence) Activities.

The National Institute of Standards and Technology announces that a free two-day public workshop on Smart Grid standards will be held on May 19-20, 2009, in the Washington, DC area.

Since 1896, the National Fire Protection Association (NFPA) has accomplished its mission by advocating scientifically based consensus codes and standards, research, and education for safety related issues. NFPA's National Fire Codes[supreg], which hold over 290 documents, are administered by more than 238 Technical Committees comprised of approximately 7,200 volunteers and are adopted and used throughout the world. NFPA is a nonprofit membership organization with approximately 80,000 members from over 70 nations, all working together to fulfill the Association's mission.

The Department of Commerce, as part of its continuing effort to reduce paperwork and respondent burden, invites the general public and other Federal agencies to take this opportunity to comment on proposed and/or continuing information collections, as required by the Paperwork Reduction Act of 1995.

The Department of Commerce (DOC), as part of its continuing effort to reduce paperwork and respondent burden, invites the general public and other Federal agencies to comment on the continuing and proposed information collection, as required by the Paperwork Reduction Act of 1995, Public Law 104-13 (44 U.S.C. 3506(c)(2)(A)).

The Department of Commerce, as part of its continuing effort to reduce paperwork and respondent burden, invites the general public and other Federal agencies to take this opportunity to comment on proposed and/or continuing information collections, as required by the Paperwork Reduction Act of 1995.

The National Institute of Standards and Technology's (NIST) Technology Innovation Program (TIP) announces that it has scheduled three public meetings (Proposers' Conferences) on April 13, 2009, in Boston, Massachusetts; on April 15, 2009, in Detroit, Michigan; and on April 17, 2009, in San Jose, California. These meetings are in addition to the Proposers' Conference scheduled for April 8, 2009, in Gaithersburg, Maryland, that was announced previously in the Federal Register on March 31.

The National Institute of Standards and Technology's (NIST) Technology Innovation Program (TIP) announces that it will hold a single fiscal year 2009 competition and is soliciting high-risk, high- reward research and development (R&D) proposals for financial assistance. TIP also announces that it will hold a public meeting (Proposers' Conference) for all interested parties. TIP is soliciting proposals under this fiscal year 2009 competition in two areas of critical national need entitled ``Civil Infrastructure'' and ``Manufacturing'' as described in the Program Description section below.

Pursuant to the Federal Advisory Committee Act, 5 U.S.C. App., notice is hereby given that the Information Security and Privacy Advisory Board (ISPAB) will meet Wednesday, April 1, 2009 from 8:30 a.m. until 5 p.m., Thursday, April 2, 2009, from 8:30 a.m. until 5 p.m., and Friday, April 3, 2009 from 8 a.m. until 12:15 p.m. All sessions will be open to the public. The ISPAB was established by the Computer Security Act of 1987 (Pub. L. 100-235) and amended by the Federal Information Security Management Act of 2002 (Pub. L. 107-347) to advise the Secretary of Commerce and the Director of NIST on security and privacy issues pertaining to federal computer systems. Details regarding the ISPAB's activities are available at https:// csrc.nist.gov/groups/SMA/ispab//.

The Department of Commerce, as part of its continuing effort to reduce paperwork and respondent burden, invites the general public and other Federal agencies to take this opportunity to comment on proposed and/or continuing information collections, as required by the Paperwork Reduction Act of 1995.

The National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST) announces that the following programs are soliciting applications for financial assistance for FY 2009: (1) The Electronics and Electrical Engineering Laboratory Grants Program; (2) the Manufacturing Engineering Laboratory Grants Program; (3) the Chemical Science and Technology Laboratory Grants Program; (4) the Physics Laboratory Grants Program; (5) the Materials Science and Engineering Laboratory Grants Program; (6) the Building Research Grants and Cooperative Agreements Program; (7) the Fire Research Grants Program; (8) the Information Technology Laboratory Grants Program; (9) the NIST Center for Neutron Research Grants Program; and (10) Center for Nanoscale Science and Technology Grants Program. Each program will only consider applications that are within the scientific scope of the program as described in this notice and in the detailed program descriptions found in the Federal Funding Opportunity (FFO) announcement for these programs. Prior to preparation of a proposal, it is strongly suggested that potential applicants contact the Program Manager for the appropriate field of research, as specified in the FFO announcement found at https://www.grants.gov, for clarification of the program objectives and to determine whether their proposal is responsive to this notice.

The National Institute of Standards and Technology Office of Law Enforcement Standards (OLES), in cooperation with the Department of Homeland Security's Office of Interoperability and Compatibility (DHS/ OIC) and representatives of the public safety community, will hold public meetings on March 11, 2009 and March 25, 2009. The first meeting will be held via WebEx over the Internet, and the second at the Institute for Telecommunication Sciences (ITS) in Boulder, CO. The purpose of these meetings is to bring Project 25 Compliance Assessment Program stakeholders together to discuss what the process will be to assess software based test tools for the Project 25 Compliance Assessment Program.

The Advisory Committee on Earthquake Hazards Reduction (ACEHR or Committee), will hold a meeting on Friday, January 23, 2009 from 3 p.m. to 5 p.m. Eastern Standard Time (EST). The primary purpose of this meeting is to review and approve the Committee's draft NEHRP reauthorization letter to the Interagency Coordinating Committee (ICC). The draft letter will be posted on the NEHRP Web site at https://nehrp. gov/. Interested members of the public will be able to participate in the meeting from remote locations by calling into a central phone number.