Crowdfunding is the use of social media or other online resources to ask large groups from across the world to donate money and resources to projects or ideas. This type of funding can be used for business ventures, charities, projects or even school tuition.
See this page on Crowdfunding from the Grantspace Foundation Center.
Experiment is a crowdfunding website specifically for funding the next scientific study or research.
Indiegogo is a secure money funding online platform for creative entrepreneurial projects.
Kickstarter is a reward based funding system for creative projects, and has over 10 million financial backers on it's website.