IT collaboration, support, and services must be a consideration at all stages of the research lifecycle, pre- and post-award, and serves as a catalyst to advance research by reducing overhead, ensuring compliance requirements are met, and providing secure scalable infrastructure. NU ITS's growing emphasis on supporting a scalable research IT environment will be a foundational element for researchers across NU to compute, store, collaborate, and execute their projects effectively. Current efforts include shared services, including compute, storage, cloud services, and AI capabilities. NU ITS is also working to achieve CMMC 1 and 2 compliance to enable secure research in partnership with the Department of War.