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New Report Argues That “Broken Pipeline” At NIH Is Leaking Young Investigators
After steady increases from 1998 to 2003 that doubled the budget for the National Institutes of Health, five years of stagnant funding have reduced purchasing power at the NIH by 13 percent, according to a report released yesterday by a consortium of research universities. Released in conjunction with a hearing before the Senate Committee on Health, Education, Labor, and Pensions, the report, “A Broken Pipeline?: Flat Funding of the NIH Puts a Generation of Science at Risk,” piggy-backs on a 2007 study that also detailed the effects of slowed NIH funding on medical science research.
The plea for increased funding highlights some of the problematic internal mechanics of the Institutes. Among the issues: the constant focus on grant writing means that high-risk, high-return research does not get much support; and younger, less-seasoned investigators are leaving the labs because their proposals are less likely to get funded.
Greg Laden points out that while the almost decade-long push to increase the number of young investigators in biomedical research has been a good thing, the stagnant funding means that there are fewer dollars per scientist. In spite of their promising research, the new studies says, the average age of first-time recipients of the top-teir RO1 grants has risen from 39 in 1990 to 43 in 2008.
Comments on this article
The upcoming generations of scientists and engineers are vital to spurring innovation and maintaining U.S. competitiveness. The United States needs to do a better job of attracting and retaining talent in these fields at all levels of education- elementary through post-doc. Perhaps the NIH should set aside funding that is specifically targeted toward young investigators.
March 18th, 2008 at 10:32 am