The reserve supports Graduate Research Fellows from NOAA. Also, several projects funded through the Cooperative Institute for Coastal Estuarine Environmental Technology.
Much of the work by visiting researchers has been funded and promoted by the NERR Graduate Research Fellow program and through the Cooperative Institute for Coastal and Estuarine Environmental Technology (CICEET). However, NBNERR has attracted other visiting researchers in addition to these programs. This includes researchers from Brown University, the University of Rhode Island, the U. S. Environmental Protection Agency, the Smithsonian, the Lloyd Center, Roger Williams University, the University of Houston, and Save the Bay among many others.