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“Everybody that has asked for bridge funding (and) conforms to the requirements of the solicitation that we put out, has received and is in the process of receiving bridge funding,â€� UA Senior Vice President Tomás Díaz de la Rubia told the ÃÛèÖÖ±²¥ in an interview Wednesday. “Nobody has been turned down that had a proposal that was consistent with the solicitation.â€�

UA spokesperson Mitch Zak said Thursday the bridge funding program has received 12 requests so far, out of which seven have been funded and five are under consideration.

The solicitation or evaluation criteria for research proposals were contained in an announcement sent by Díaz de la Rubia on March 6 to the university community. The bridge funding’s purposes were listed as: bridging the gap between an expired or soon-to-expire grant and an expected new grant award; bridging gaps created by federal funding agencies; and focusing on preserving Ph.D. student support for the semester.

That announcement said evaluations of the applications, to happen monthly, are based on: dean recommendations; impact of the funds on preserving Ph.D. students’ roles; likelihood of securing future funding; applicant’s track record of extramural funding; and clear evidence the funding gap is due to delays or disruptions in funding.

At the time of the March launch, Zak and Díaz de la Rubia declined to comment on how much money was being invested in the bridge funding or how long the funds were expected to last to support UA research. The UA is dealing with a budget deficit of $65 million this fiscal year that it plans to eliminate by July 1.

Díaz de la Rubia said Wednesday there is no budget or limit to the bridge funds since “there’s too much uncertainty in all the budgets right now.�

“It depends on who needs the resources, how many students are affected,� he said, adding it was impossible to put any limits since the funding landscape is constantly changing and evolving.

He said in six months, towards the end of the summer, UA administrators will evaluate and see where the program stands.

The UA’s original announcement of bridge funding came a few days after faculty senators blasted Díaz de la Rubia and the UA administration at a March 3 Faculty Senate meeting for not having such a plan in place — while some other universities including Yale did — to deal with the impacts of the Trump administration’s orders to cut federal funding.

The bridge funds are for research projects paused, stopped or in limbo because of federal orders and delays, Díaz de la Rubia said Wednesday.

“We have students that need to continue doing their work, right? We don’t want to lose our graduate students,� he said. “I mean, they work really hard, and they’re the future. So, we want to make sure, as much as we can, that we are able to protect those graduate students.�

The Trump administration has ordered numerous changes, delays and cuts to federal funding at universities.

So far, federal agencies under Trump have terminated UA research projects, including four foreign aid projects under the now-gutted U.S. Agency for International Development; and eight humanities projects cancelled by the National Endowment for Humanities.

Also, the National Institutes of Health is trying to cap its overhead or indirect cost rates at 15%, which would bring it down from 54.5% at the UA and potentially lead to a loss of $40.5 million for UA. That effort is being challenged in court.

Díaz de la Rubia said his understanding is that some project work funded by the NIH, the National Science Foundation, the departments of Energy and Defense, and the National Aeronautics and Space Administration, has been slowed or received stop work orders. But he also said a lot of projects that received stop orders have been reinstated.

“Understandably there’s a lot of anxiety, because there’s so much uncertainty. I mean, I completely understand it,� he said, speaking of the impacts on faculty and researchers. “Research is the lifeblood of many, many, many faculty members — it’s their passion, teaching and research. … And we live in a different environment right now. Uncertainty creates anxiety, it’s understandable. I don’t expect that people are not going to feel that anxiety.�

When asked if he was feeling the same anxiety, Díaz de la Rubia said, “of course, yeah.�

“I care about the research that we do, because it has an impact on society,â€� he said. “And then we think (about) things that impact our communities, that impact our Native American communities, that impact Southern ÃÛèÖÖ±²¥, water, all kinds of things, right? So, I care deeply about that, and so, of course, I have anxiety.â€�