Posts tagged with ‘funding’
Bell Labs, birthplace of technological breakthroughs like the transistor, the laser, and communications satellites, may have arrived at the end of its storied history. Industry support of basic research has been on the wan for years, but federal policies can bolster public and private R&D.
This week’s Policy Forum in
Science addresses the “structural disequilibria” in biomedical research that has resulted from the recent funding history of the National Institutes of Health. Addressing these problems would create a more hospitable career path for young researchers and yeild more medical advances.
In a recent paper in
Technology and Society, Neal Lane discusses the impact of the Mansfield Amendment and Bayh-Dole Act on federal R&D in the United States and the need for forward-looking innovation policy for the 21st century.
Embryonic stem cell research, strong scientific input on global warming policy, and more federal funding for scientific research: these are all things the American public wants.
A report released today by the Information Technology and Innovation Foundation analyzes the evolution of the innovation ecosystem in the United States over the last four decades and argues that in order to encourage innovation most effectively, policymakers must better understand where new ideas come from.
Colleges and universities are graduating more science and engineering Ph.D.s, but diminishing opportunities are derailing young scientists from future careers as scientific leaders.
Five factors influence biotechnology transfer—university policies, economic development agencies, venture capitalists, strategic partners, and financial markets. Understanding each of them is crucial to building regional centers of innovation.
Congress is moving forward to provide $400 million of additional funding for scientific research and education for fiscal year 2008. Last week the House passed legislation allocating the additional dollars to various scientific agencies.
Last Friday,
Science Progress kicked off the launch of its inaugural print edition with a gathering of distinguished science policy experts.
In response to recent outbreaks of food-borne illnesses, including salmonella-contaminated tomatoes, the Bush administration has asked Congress to add $275 million to the proposed 2009 budget of $2.4 billion for the Food and Drug Administration. But the patch won’t fix a fractured food safety system.
This week, Francis Collins stepped down from his post at NHGRI; members of Congress continued work on a supplemental funding bill that could include more money for R&D; the first World Science Festival kicked off in New York City.
This week, the Howard Hughes Medical Institute stepped in with $600 million in grant funding to 56 biomedical researchers pursuing high-risk, high-return work. The federal government should also fund researchers who “swing for the fences.”
As Congress considers the supplemental funding request and the spending earmarks that will accompany it, it’s worth looking at what states themselves spend on R&D.
President Bush’s latest request for Iraq war funding totals approximately $135.4 billion. What if we spent that money on domestic scientific research and development? Boosting R&D by the numbers.
“The future is likely to be very similar to the past, regardless of who the President is,” said Dr. John Marburger, the President’s science advisor at the AAAS S&T Policy Forum last Thursday. He was talking about funding, but let’s hope things are very different for scientific integrity under the next administration.
Part 2 of a break down of Tuesday’s House Energy and Commerce Committee hearing on the Renewable Fuel Standards, with a look at what witnesses had to say about the economic and environmental concerns.
Tuesday’s House Energy and Commerce Committee hearing pitted environmentalists, corn producers, oil refiners, grocery manufacturers, and renewable fuel advocates against one another in a contentious debate over the future of the Renewable Fuel Standard.
Science Progress tries to make sense of it all. First up, what’s right with the RFS and ways to make it better.
Thousands of scientists, engineers, corporate executives, and college presidents across the country have mobilized in an effort to convince Congress to set aside a small piece of this year’s wartime supplemental funding bill to boost science research funding.
The environmental, health, and safety (EHS) implications of nanotechnology and potential regulation were the only points of contention at an otherwise congratulatory Senate hearing held to discuss the reauthorization of the $1.5 billion National Nanotechnology Initiative last Thursday.
David Goldston wants to ask the big questions about federal science policy. Can the research establishment become unsustainably large? Are scientists always an asset to Congress? And what are the problems with current methods of creating science policy?
The National Science Foundation issued a “Dear Colleague” letter earlier this month to education grant applicants about the sometimes-misunderstood “broader impacts” criteria used to evaluate grant proposals.
Colleges and universities received close to $2.25 billion from Congressional earmarks this year according to a new study released this week by
The Chronicle of Higher Education. A large chunk, $1.6 billion, will go towards scientific research at some 500 institutions.
The United States Department of Agriculture Rural Development Agency today announced a $267 million loan to Open Range Communications to bring portable, wireless broadband connectivity to rural areas in 17 states.
Last week’s stories about the future of grants for the younger generation of NIH investigators is just one piece of the larger puzzle over the state of funding biotech research. The Scientist offers a useful summary of the major stumbling blocks in pharmaceutical development and how they relate to financing questions in the drug industry, in university labs, at the NIH, and at start-up companies.
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.
The President’s plan to slash two highly successful National Institute of Standards and Technology programs drew the ire of Subcommittee members during a hearing on NIST’s FY 2009 budget request yesterday.
Microsoft Chairman Bill Gates will appear before the House Science and Technology Committee tomorrow in what will be the first of a series of hearing on challenges to our nation’s innovation agenda. A look at recent findings, including the National Science Foundation’s biennial report on the state of science and engineering research and education, shows that there is cause for concern.
Controversy marred a Wednesday hearing on the Department of Energy’s FY2009 budget request for research and development when two DOE undersecretaries invited to testify decided at the last minute to skip the event.
The House Committee on Science and Technology’s Subcommittee on Energy and Environment will hold a hearing tomorrow to discuss President Bush’s Department of Energy research and development budget proposal for fiscal year 2009. The Center for American Progress has taken a closer look at the numbers and has offered a set of recommendations for the DOE and future Federal spending on alternative and renewable energy research.
Communicating the importance and public good of scientific research is a responsibility of scientists and policy makers alike. To do so, we must draw clear connections between the policy issues that attract public attention and the technological innovation that underscores them.
The recently unveiled blog at the new Scientists and Engineers for America Action Fund website has a column from Gerald Epstein questioning a $2 billion request in the FY2009 budget for the Department of Homeland Security.
President Bush’s final Federal budget for FY 2009 contains significant boosts for physical sciences and programs supported by the Administration’s American Competitiveness Initiative, but proposes flat lining funding for National Institutes of Health, the largest source of funds for life sciences research. Today, the American Association for the Advancement of Science releases its preliminary analysis of R&D in the budget.
The Bush Administration released its final budget request today. It includes significant cuts to the budgets for the Centers for Disease Control, stagnant funding for the National Institutes of Health, and moderate boosts to the Department of Energy.
The DOE Basic Energy Sciences program is forced to cut grants after a meager budget increase. Are iPS cells ready to replace embryonic stem cells? A new report in
Science on climate change and reduced global food production.
“The answer to the question of how the U.S. manages its great scientific resources and potential,” wrote Dan Greenberg this week at the Chronicle’s Brainstorm blog, “is that it doesn’t.” The Federal government has a responsibility to support scientific and technological research, and the President must lead the way.
Progressives can get behind the president if he supports in words and deeds his calls for a doubling of federal spending on critical basic research, writes Ed Paisley.
The decline in basic scientific research in the United States is verifiable, writes Tom Kalil, but easily reversible with the right set of policies in place.
Tonight, President Bush offers the final State of the Union address of his presidency. Saying that science has gotten short shrift during the Bush years is nothing new. Science Progress takes a look at some of the key terms in science and tech policy that have, and have not, appeared in the previous six State of the Union addresses.
President Bush’s “Vision for Space Exploration,” unveiled in 2004, outlined new plans for the country’s space program. Four years later, some in the science and space community feel the current vision is “blurred” and in need of a new “prescription” for the future of science and space exploration in the United States.
Europe revises biofuels standards, NSF Science and Engineering Indicators in global context, and sub-national regions lead the world in climate policy.
President Bush’s last budget is unlikely to expand dedicated and critical federal spending on science. It’s a problem that must be overcome.
Sending humans to the Moon and Mars won’t answer any pressing scientific questions. That’s why NASA should focus its resources on Earth and space science that will teach us more about the home planet and the mysterious “dark energy” driving galaxies apart.
India ramps up science and engineering education; the European Commission has more questions for Microsoft; the International Linear Collider may end up in Japan; Supreme Court rules that terminally ill patients do not have a constitutional right to developmental drugs; FCC could have trouble selling all its wireless licenses.
New helmet sensors will improve army body armor; the disorganization of state stem cell initiatives; acute stress spikes after 9/11; think tanks for developing nations.
The quest to restore dedicated science advice for Congress through a reborn Office of Technology Assessment has proven more difficult than one might have supposed.
Without greater access to public markets, startup entrepreneurs trying to commercialize cutting-edge science and technology will founder.
Various outlets are lamenting the cuts and paltry increases to Federal science funding in the omnibus spending package passed by Congress and headed for the President’s desk. AAAS calculates that over all, “Federal funding for basic and applied research would decline in real terms for the fourth year in a row.”
This week saw good news and new thinking on the power of technology to foster open and accountable governance: an article on “Wiki-Government,” a report on the “searchability” of government info, and the launch of a new site offering data on Federal spending.
Open government takes a step forward with the launch of Project Sunlight, a website dedicated to tracking and making public the details of government decision making in the Empire State.
Three young women scientists make history; arguments over the impact of climate change on global health; how not to get funding from the NSF; John Marburger talks with the National Journal; conflicts of interest at the FDA; the ailing Discovery Corps Fellowship program; and what is Evo-Devo?
Maine voters recently voted to support targeted investment in the state’s technology sector through the Maine Technology Initiative. Technology investments have yielded significant gains for the state economy since the 19th century.
The Center for American Progress today releases the first pieces of
Progressive Growth, its Economic Plan for the Next Administration, which includes a chapter on expanding growth and opportunity through science and technology.
Entrepreneurial, venture capital-backed innovation industries require a deft public policy hand to find the financing they need to help boost economic prosperity.
Researchers working independently in Japan and the U.S. published papers this week announcing the creation of non-embryonic pluripotent stem cells. The method side-steps the ethical concerns over the destruction of embryos and could open the doors for federal funding of research on stem cells and the medical breakthroughs they promise.
President Bush vetoed the Labor-HHS-Education appropriations bill, which would have increased funding for the National Institutes of Health from $29 billion to $30 billion and required open access to published NIH-funded research.
October 4 marked the 50th anniversary of Sputnik, and as we leave that milestone behind, 21st-century America needs to prepare for the century of science and engineering. One pathway is adoption of a new National Defense Education Act.
While President Bush’s “Vision for Space Exploration” will send the U.S. back to the Moon and on to Mars, NASA has many competing responsibilities, and the next administration may have its own vision.
The New Jersey appellate court cleared the way for a $450 million referendum funding stem cell research in the state. But how much will go to work with embryonic stem cells, and how much will go to the less-promising work with adult stem cells?
New Jersey boasts about its embryonic stem cell research ambitions, but most of the grant money is going toward adult stem cell research. What gives?
Andrew A. Rosenberg on how “emphasizing what we don’t know often drowns out what we do know.” Also, a new Urban Institute study claims that the U.S. has more than enough scientists and engineers.
The InterAcademies Council report released Monday on sustainable energy options reiterates familiar suggestions for greening the planet’s energy future, but it also presents a compelling argument for applied scientific and technological research in pursuit of the common good.
Cures Without Cloning, a Missouri group that opposes embryonic stem cell research, is trying to overturn the results of last year’s ballot initiative that protected stem cell research in the state. The CAP Bioethics Initiative posted an update last week. Here’s a roundup of the latest.
WWII contracting out of scientific inquiry in the interest of national security was the springboard for mid-20th century reform of American government that yielded great successes but has lost its moorings. It’s time to re-envision the role of private contractors in the public service.
The U.S. is pursuing new approaches to nurture science and technology innovation—and so is the UK. This week’s National Dialogue on Entrepreneurship newsletter sets the two plans next to one another. Perhaps each government could learn from the other.
