Each year, the Foundation invites the presidents of 50 universities to nominate two early-career professors each from their institutions, and from those nominated, 16 Fellows receive individual grants of $875,000, distributed over five years. Packard Fellows must be faculty members who are eligible to serve as principal investigators engaged in research in the natural and physical sciences or engineering and must be within the first three years of their faculty careers. Requests for nominations will be sent to the university presidents in January; nominations are due to the Foundation in March.