Where does the public fit into the NSF mission? Besides being a beneficiary (directly or indirectly) of the output of NSF research dollars, what voice does the public have in determining what the NSF supports? What voice should it have?

It’s not clear that the NSF gave much consideration to these questions when soliciting input on revising the merit review criteria. The request for input referenced above was not posted in the Federal Register, where most proposed rules and regulations are posted for public comment, but just on the NSF website (and not in the News section). The description of the process in that request mentions reaching out to a wide variety of stakeholders inside and outside of NSF, but the public isn’t mentioned until the “about the NSF” paragraph near the end of the notice. An earlier notice requesting input was also not in the Federal Register and took the form of a “Dear Colleague” letter typically used for researchers in NSF-sponsored communities. Perhaps most critical, the Charge and Work Plan for the Merit Review Task Force doesn’t include contact with the public. Now, it is possible that there has been a lot of public input into this process that just isn’t publicized by NSF. But given the recent additional scrutiny of NSF research, it is hard to see what public input to NSF processes would not be publicized.

How might NSF solicit and use more public input in its mission to “maintain and strengthen the vitality of the U.S. science and engineering enterprise and to ensure that Americans benefit fully from the products of the science, engineering and education activities that NSF supports”? The YouCut program, where citizens were encouraged to review the NSF grants database for entries that seemed to be wasteful or frivolous, was problematic at best. People were asked to judge the merits of a grant based strictly on the abstract available online. Now, if the public has insight about fraudulent and wasteful research, it should certainly notify the NSF inspector general. But seeking general input from the public after grants are awarded seems best suited for crowd-sourced finger-pointing rather than assessing what areas of research the public thinks might best benefit them overall.

But that doesn’t mean the public cannot contribute to the discussion of what research should be funded moving forward. NSF merit review has two main criteria: the intellectual merit of a proposal (Is it a scientifically important, well-thought-out proposal?) and the broader impacts of the proposal (What effects could this research project have on other societal goals or societal goods?). It would be logistically difficult to have the public sit on review panels where intellectual merit is judged as most of the public would lack the background to judge the intellectual merit of scientific proposals.

The vast survey apparatus of NSF, however, could be used to gauge public opinion on what broader impacts should mean for scientific research. Such public outreach wouldn’t be the sole determinant—congressional input had a major influence this time around and will in the future—and it could serve other purposes besides defining “broader impacts.” A necessary companion to this survey work ought to be a broader communication of what NSF does and the broader outcomes (not just direct outputs) of the research it supports. NSF seems perfectly capable of explaining the value of research output, or the specific relevant problems that funded research seeks to address. That it does this usually after someone pokes fun at a research grant reflects a reactive rather than a proactive approach to the public. This is, unfortunately, consistent with the benign neglect of public input observed in the merit review revision process.

With the soon-to-close comment period, there is still an opportunity to encourage NSF to engage with the public in revising its merit review criteria. And while many would not consider NSF to be a mission agency, it still serves the public, and should engage that public more than it does.

David Bruggeman is the Policy Analyst for the Association for Computing Machinery (ACM), and blogs about science policy at Pasco Phronesis. The views here are his alone and do not represent the views of the ACM.

The report undercuts its own conclusions again and again, demanding more accountability while cutting support for accountants, asking that scientists propose experiments that are more difficult to justify while demanding they fill out more paperwork, and calling for higher-quality research while interfering in the review process for political reasons. Before cutting a federal agency’s budget, we should understand the agency’s mission, operations, and outcomes. Sen. Coburn’s report makes it clear that despite his protestations, he has little idea how science works, how the NSF supports science, or how scientific knowledge strengthens America.

The report’s central claim that the NSF failed to recover $1.7 billion in unspent grant funds is patently incorrect and is based on a simple misunderstanding of federal statutes, according to NSF officials. In fact, the $1.7 billion figure represents the pot of money obligated for multiyear grants, and the figure drops as research teams draw down their accounts over the course of their projects. “It’s being used for exactly the purpose for which it was intended,” explained an NSF budget official to ScienceInsider.

Beyond the blatant misreading of federal statutes, “Under the Microscope” drives home two main points: First, the NSF is poorly administered; second, the activities that it funds are silly. Coburn has a clear vision for the NSF: It is an agency that should solely fund “transformational research.” Quoting from “Under the Microscope,” which quotes from an NSF memo, transformative research is research that promises extraordinary outcomes, such as:

Revolutionizing entire disciplines; creating entirely new fields; or disrupting accepted theories and perspectives –in other words, those endeavors which have the potential to change the way we address challenges in science, engineering, and innovation.  Supporting more transformative research is of critical importance in the fast paced, science and technology-intensive world of the 21^st century.

The problem is that “transformative research” can only be identified in retrospect. We often don’t know where the next breakthrough will come from, or which scientific theories will prove critical in the long run. The closest we can come to supporting transformative research is looking for what Thomas Kuhn called potentially “paradigm-shifting science.” In The Structure of Scientific Revolutions, Kuhn noted that scientists work within paradigms—broad sets of ideas, concepts, and theories that define what a valid scientific question is and how it can be answered. As scientists fill out various parts of a paradigm, they accumulate inconsistencies, observations that don’t fit their paradigm. Mostly, these inconsistencies are ignored, but at some point they reach a critical mass and a bright mind develops a new theory, which incorporates the inconsistencies.

For example, an Aristotelian astronomer saw his job as observing the stars and accurately describing their motion through epicycles, minor patterns of rotation. As centuries of observation accumulated, the initially elegant and logical geocentric model of the universe required too many arbitrary epicycles to make it work. Copernicus realized that the Earth travels around the sun, Galileo popularized it, and Newton proved it with his theory of gravity, resulting in a paradigm shift in astronomy that led to calculus, modern mechanics, and a host of other scientific discoveries.

Unfortunately for Sen. Coburn’s recommendations, paradigm-shifting science cannot be produced on demand. Until the point at which the new paradigm is confirmed, its theories often sound like sheer madness: matter as both a particle and a wave, invisible organisms causing plagues, mankind descended from apes, the continents moving, the Earth orbiting the sun; at one point all of these accepted scientific truths were the most insane heresies. People were—and in some cases still are—burnt at the stake for proselyting these ideas. Furthermore, new paradigms are often strictly less useful for solving practical problems. For about a century after Copernicus, until the mathematics of elliptical orbits were worked out, the geocentric model of the universe was far better at predicting where stars would be in the night sky.

Trying to get a committee composed of top experts in their field to go against their paradigms and fund “transformative research” is psychologically impractical. Yet the NSF can’t go around handing out money to every crank and charlatan who promises to revolutionize science. Peer review committees serve as gatekeepers, evaluating proposals on the strength of the proposed plan of research, the expertise of the investigators, and likelihood of achieving its aims. Generally, the more ambitious and transformative a scientific theory is, the less likely it is to pan out. The compromise institutional science has made between working on hard problems in the accepted paradigm and creating new paradigms is giving researchers enough time, money, and intellectual freedom to discover something really novel.

Sen. Coburn’s solution to a lack of “transformative research” is more oversight. He complains that nearly 50 percent of NSF grant progress and final reports are turned in late, and 10 percent are never turned in at all, but doesn’t discuss how scientific publications already serve to mark progress. Scientists work to advance the sum total of human knowledge—and their own careers, by publishing articles in scientific journals, not filling out reports that will never see the light of day. Rather than further burdening researchers with government red tape, the NSF should be better equipped to keep abreast of the latest discoveries in the literature.

Of course, all this close oversight of the NSF, according to Sen. Coburn’s staff, is to be done on a smaller budget, since the agency spends too much on office space and airfare. It’s unclear how NSF employees are supposed to conduct site visits without plane tickets; perhaps they can use some of that CIA research on clairvoyance and telepathy.

Likewise, the inspector general’s office is criticized for spending too much of its time investigating porn viewing among senior management as opposed to actual fraud. Of course, the fact that NSF employees view porn during working hours is worthy of three pages in the report. As a very angry Steve Silberman says in his take on Sen. Coburn’s report, “They’re [scientists are] making fools of American taxpayers while indulging their liberal — indeed, sinful — excesses.” Sin and excess is a big theme of the report, including tales of porn surfing at work and lurid photos of Jell-O wrestling at the NSF-funded McMurdo Antarctic Station (what happens in Antarctica stays in Antarctica). The excess goes so far as to include an evening of pizza and bowling for undergraduates at an NSF-funded summer research internship. Responsible use of taxpayer funds is important, but let’s keep a sense of perspective here. McMurdo is an isolated research station; you can’t just go out on the town, and some kind of recreation is necessary to keep the crews’ morale up. We might also want to begin asking hard questions about the softball leagues and ice cream socials afforded to congressional interns.

Somehow, I find it hard to work up much outrage about fraud in the NSF, given that Minerals Management Service employees were caught up in a massive sex/drugs/corruption scandal with oil company representatives, or that 25-year-old stoners defrauded the Department of Defense on a $300 million arms contract, or that contractors in Afghanistan funneled military money to the Taliban, or pretty much everything connected with the Great Recession of 2008.

But “They’re more corrupt than me” is no defense, and scientists should hold themselves to a higher standard than arms dealers, oil prospectors, and bankers. While Sen. Coburn’s report makes a case for better accounting standards to ensure grant monies are spent, it also relies heavily on the work of the NSF’s own internal inspector general for its examples of fraud, and in several cases, the employees in question were fired for their transgression. It appears that the NSF is already capable of detecting and dealing with corruption, and that extra investigators might be more efficiently used in other areas of government.

But corruption and government oversight is not my forte. Let’s return to the science policy side of the report. Sen. Coburn’s “staff spent several years reviewing hundreds of NSF research awards” and picked the 50 or so of the least transformative, most ridiculous ones to share with the public. Thirty-six of these grants are in the social sciences, five are in education/public outreach, five are in biology, and one is in mechanical engineering. These numbers are in no way representative of what the NSF does, as science policy expert Dan Sarewitz[1] put it in his response, “The entire social and behavior science budget at NSF ($252 million) amounts to all of 3.6% of the total NSF budget, 0.3% of the civilian R&D budget, and 0.006% of the federal budget. Attacking social science is good conservative politics, but it has nothing to do with serious budget policy.” The NSF approves tens of thousands of proposals each year, and rejects countless more.

Why does this report overwhelmingly focus on such a small section of the NSF, to the exclusion of 96.4 percent of its activity? If I were to hazard a guess, the reason why social science projects predominate is not that the GOP dislikes the social sciences more than climate science or evolutionary biology, as Steve Silberman argues, but that it is very hard for congressional staffers to evaluate the worth of proposals like “Nodulin Intrinsic Proteins at the Plant-microbe Symbiotic Interface: Multifunctional Roles in Metabolite and Water Transport in Nitrogen Fixation and Stress Responses,” or “The ISM of Luminous Infrared Galaxies: Tracing Gas Properties, Dynamics and Starburst/AGN Activity,” to pick two grants at random from this week’s approvals. As the selection of projects in this report demonstrates, scientific peer review is done by experts because lay people can’t tell the difference between good and bad science just by examining grant proposals.

The social science work that the NSF does is far from frivolous. One study that Sen. Coburn calls out is one that examines the reasons why Turkish women wear veils. According to the study, rather than submission to Islamic law, many middle-class Turks wear the veil as an act of “fashion rebellion” against an authoritarian secular regime. Given current volatility in the Middle East, and Turkey’s traditional role as bridge between East and West, it seems useful to gain information about how radicalized 50 percent of the Turkish population is.

Studies on video games and virtual worlds are a particular bugbear of Sen. Coburn; however, video games are now a major entertainment industry on par with television and movies, with more than $10 billion in sales. Internet fundraising and activism has the potential to be a transformative force in politics, both at home and abroad. Children are effectively growing up in virtual worlds, and if Google is truly making us stupid, or if rumors spread through Twitter can bring down dictatorships, then it is important for us to understand these phenomena.

Another science policy issue that the report touches on is duplication, or the notion that NSF-funded activities are being done elsewhere. According to the report, research that might cure disease should be done in the NIH, while energy research is the sole province of the DOE, and training for scientists should be moved into the Department of Education. This attitude, however, is far too reductionist. Science cannot simply be divided into categories of basic and applied, or NSF and agency-mission based. Research into solid-state physics can probe both the fundamental properties of matter and improve the efficiency of solar panels. Studies on cell division might lead to a cure for cancer but will certainly advance biological knowledge as well.

“Science: The Endless Frontier,” the NSF’s informal constitution, makes explicit that the justification for basic research as conducted by the NSF is that it will eventually improve the security, prosperity, and health of the United States and its citizens. NSF proposals are ranked both on their intellectual merit and their broader social impacts. Recommending that the NSF no longer fund research on issues like health, energy, and jobs would separate the scientific community from problems of public concern, and likely lead to more of what Sen. Coburn derides as “silly science.”

Duplication of effort is an inherent problem for distributed organizations like the NSF. Scientists, working independently, tend to find the same problems interesting. Similarly, the need to continually present results and “publish or perish” leads to some amount of obvious and trivial science. But duplication of effort is strength rather than a weakness. Diverse approaches increase the chance that a solution to a given scientific question will be found. Rather than big pork-barrel research centers, the NSF funds scientists working in every state, creating a flexible and adaptive community of scientists.

At the cutting edge of science, there is no clear divide between research and education. Scientists learn by doing; the core of graduate training is planning, conducting, and writing up your own original research. The NSF’s education and outreach efforts are targeted not toward the general public but those students with exceptional potential who may go on to become award-winning scientists. For students, there is no substitute for imparting the excitement and importance of science like directly interacting with leading scientists, a mission better fitting the NSF than the Department of Education.

Of course, the decentralized style of the NSF is not the only way for the government to fund science. One proposed solution toward reducing duplication is a stronger development of a national innovation system, which would support all aspects of science and technology, from primary education to product development, and parcel scientists out based on identified national needs. A more centralized, activist role for the federal government in science, however, is an uncharacteristic policy for a small government conservative like Sen. Coburn to advocate.

Sen. Coburn wants a leaner NSF that is better at advancing American interests. This is an admirable goal for anybody who believes we need to innovate to maintain future economic competitiveness, military dominance, and even ecological survival, but the report is crippled by internal contradictions and blatant misrepresentations. As he calls for eliminating the NSF’s education and outreach efforts, Sen. Coburn wants a strong scientific enterprise without paying for the necessary human capital. Similarly, he approves of the role science plays in protecting us from natural disasters like tsunamis and earthquakes, while ignoring the many disasters—like  financial collapses, wars and conflicts, and anthropogenic climate change—whose human origins,might benefit from scientific investigation. Eliminating the Social, Behavioral, and Economics Directorate, as Sen. Coburn recommends, would dramatically reduce research into the human dimensions of scientific and technological issues.

The place of science in Sen. Coburn’s world is not that of an active participant that helps businessmen, politicians, and activists solve problems, but a miraculous force that constantly transforms society out of its existing problems. Science may appear smooth and monolithic from a distance, but at its bottom-most level, it is a very human endeavor, run by ordinary people who make mistakes, who have bad ideas, and who prefer working on their experiments to dealing with red tape. More than malfeasance in the NSF, or a failure to fund the right kind of science, this report reveals that Sen. Coburn believes he can score points with voters and the conservative punditocracy by attacking a pillar of American scientific excellence on any grounds he can gin up.

Science policy and government oversight deserve better.

Michael Burnam-Fink is a PhD student with the Consortium for Science, Policy and Outcomes at Arizona State University.

Science Insider: NIH details are sketchy, but include increases; NSF would see 8.5 percent bump; more for scientific facilities though DOE’s Office of Science; earth science research funding and Orion money for NASA; 37.5 percent increase for EPA.

The Intersection and Yale e360: spending initiatives assume passage of cap and trade legislation, a significant political maneuver.

The Washington Post has a useful comparison graphic (article) showing the 2007-2008 budget and the 2009-2010 with stimulus funds side-by-side for several agencies and departments.

Also notable: the budget outline includes $1.3 billion for NOAA “weather satellites and climate sensors”; $50 million to support creation of regional innovation clusters; and says that the Patent and Trademark Office will be granted full access to its fee collections, a problem because Congress has previously dipped into the funds, which are the source of operating funds for the overburdened office.

As the Science Insider reporters point out, the format of the release as a pdf is “decidedly old-school style for the digitally minded Obama Administration.” Let’s be honest: this information needs to be available in a fully machine-readable format. They could take some cues from the NYT’s unveiling this week of its API.

Image: flickr.com/afagen

Senate-House conferences are closed door affairs, and a clear picture of the horse-trading that went on in that room (with record-breaking speed, we might add; amazing what Congress can do when a holiday week is nigh) may not leak out for some time. Moreover, not every segment of the U.S. scientific enterprise came out ahead. The Centers for Disease Control, a perennial Congressional stepchild (when it’s not a full-blown whipping boy) got largely stiffed, despite a frightening array of looming public health issues on the horizon. And NASA is going to have to trim a few celestial sails.

But the end-product of this harrowing political process—$ 21.5 billion, or the equivalent of about a 15 percent “tip” on top of conventional, government-wide, annual science appropriations—reflects with gratifying fidelity President Obama’s oft-repeated commitment to get science and technology back on track after eight years of government-inflicted starvation and abuse.

Things were looking grim a few days ago. The National Science Foundation, for example, which is the major government funder of physical sciences and science education-related research in this country, had been in line to get $3 billion under the House plan, until the Senate trimmed that figure to $1.2 billion. But when conferees came out of their huddle, squinting in the limelight like a gaggle of groundhogs in Punxsutawney, Pennsylvania, funding had been restored—not to some compromise level but to the full $3 billion.

That bolus of money represents about half again what the NSF typically gets appropriated per year, and it is in line to be spent immediately—to fund grants that have already passed peer-review, to support science, technology, engineering, and mathematics education programs, and to purchase equipment and finance building construction.

The Department of Energy enjoyed a similar reprieve. After the House voted to authorize $1.6 billion for that department’s Office of Science and an additional $400 million for the new Advanced Research Projects Agency for Energy, or ARPA-E, the Senate reduced the science office allocation by about four-fifths to a mere $330 million and totally zeroed out the ARPA-E budget. At the end of the conference, however, both were fully funded again.

“I’m especially glad to see funding that will establish ARPA-E eighteen months after it was signed into law,” Rep. Bart Gordon (D-TN), chairman of the House Committee on Science and Technology, said in a news release suffused with an almost palpable sense of relief. ARPA is designed to mimic the renowned Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency, or DARPA, which has successfully pursued especially creative, blue-skies initiatives for the defense community. “Besides pursuing the high-risk, high-reward research, I believe ARPA-E is uniquely positioned to be the bridge to the new energy economy—and, with it, the ‘green’ jobs we need, the same way DARPA formed the underpinnings of the multi-billion dollar defense industry,” Gordon said.

The National Institutes of Health also pulled a rabbit out of its hat—though in this case it was the Senate language that saved the day. The House had promised $3.9 billion, and the Senate had upped that ante to $10.4 billion—a one-time boost amounting to more than a third of that agency’s standard operating budget. In the end, the Senate language carried the day, providing a long-needed cash infusion for the nation’s premier biomedical research agency, which has been flat-funded for the past five years.

These are important victories and, we can hope, down-payments on a debt to science that America is at last poised to repay. But the work of rebuilding the nation’s scientific infrastructure is far from complete.

NASA, for example, did not fare as well. The embattled agency, which faces tough decisions in the next few years as the shuttle program winds down and as other priorities—including climate-change-related earth observation research—orbit aimlessly as though weightless in limbo, was in line to get $600 million from the House while the Senate had pushed for fully $1.3 billion. In the end, it was told to settle for a compromise of $1 billion.

Worse, the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, which has important responsibilities in the arena of climate research and monitoring and whose leader, the widely renowned marine scientist Jane Lubchenco, is poised to be confirmed by the Senate any day now, had been in line to get $1 billion under the House plan and a tad more under the Senate plan but came out of conference with just $833 million.

Similarly, the ever-inadequately funded U.S. Geological Survey—the only science office within the Interior Department, responsible for earth science, as well as research on earthquakes and other natural disasters—had hopes of getting $200 million under the House plan but is now in line to get just $140 million, just a hair above the penurious $135 million recommended by the Senate.

And the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, which has long had a deserving hand extended for physical plant improvements, and was at last in line to get either $462 million (House) or $412 million (Senate) for buildings, ended up with not a penny from the conferees.

Finally, in an especially worrisomely short-sighted decision, House-Senate conferees zeroed out the $420 million that the House had recommended for pandemic flu preparations under the Department of Health and Human Services, despite accumulating evidence that a terrible emergency is brewing in Asian chicken farms. They also offered no funding at all for HHS biodefense countermeasures.

When it comes to bird flu, it seems, Congress has its head in the sand, hoping to get by on two wings and a prayer.

Rick Weiss is a Senior Fellow at the Center for American Progress and Science Progress.

The Act addresses many of the critical areas that politicians and economists alike have been discussing in recent weeks. It makes investments in clean energy that will form a solid foundation upon which to build a 21st-century low-carbon economy. It addresses the creaking infrastructure needs that are slowing down U.S. business competitiveness. It helps those most hurt by the recession, invests in education, lowers health care costs, and provides necessary funds to save vital public services at the state level.

But as outlined in the Center for American Progress report, “A National Innovation Agenda,” the Act also recognizes the importance of science, technology and innovation, which “have long provided the foundation for America’s prosperity.”

A key part of this agenda is ensuring that the United States has the innovation infrastructure necessary for it to compete on the global stage.

Getting the economy back on track is not enough unless the recovery is sustained and living standards once again rise in line with economic growth and increases in productivity. The steps necessary to achieve this were set out in the CAP report, “Progressive Growth.” A key part of this agenda is ensuring that the United States has the innovation infrastructure necessary for it to compete on the global stage. Although the United States remains the world’s most innovative economy, other countries particularly in East Asia are quickly catching up. Underinvestment in recent years has precipitated this decline.

To address this, the Recovery Act announced several critical investments, including $6 billion for broadband and wireless services, $20 billion for health information technology, $1 billion for technology improvements for a more efficient and secure government, $1 billion for education technology, and $11.7 billion for scientific research.

The stimulus proposal also includes significant funds supporting research and development efforts across the physical, environmental, and life sciences. Despite a modest supplemental boost in June, assistance here comes at a time when total budgetary authority for R&D has been dropping in real dollars; adjusted for inflation, it declined 1.9 percent overall in fiscal year 2007-2008. In biomedical research, the situation is more severe. Continuous flat funding for the National Institutes of Health has dropped its inflation-adjusted research budget to a level 13 percent lower than where it was five years ago.

The Recovery Act would allot $2 billion for NIH, the amount CAP Senior Fellow Rick Weiss recommended last October. This funding can support researchers who are working on cures for a healthier country. It can potentially help the younger generation of scientists who have been squeezed out of the NIH funding process because of the tightening budgets. Some 80 percent of grant requests go unfunded at the agency, and the competitive process favors established researchers—the average age of a scientist winning his or her first NIH grant is 42 years.

Additional funding through the National Science Foundation—$3 billion—will expand opportunities for scientists working on America’s energy and health challenges, while investing in research for the future.

But just as grantmaking agencies can create and sustain good jobs with additional funding, they also have to maintain the facilities where scientists work. Just like the highway system, much of our country’s research infrastructure needs upgrading. Chairman Obey’s bill includes construction funds to renovate existing facilities at universities and institutes and build new ones: $400 million for the National Science Foundation, $1.5 billion for NIH, $462 million for the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, $300 million for the National Institutes of Standards and Technology, and $50 million to repair hurricane-damaged NASA facilities.

Support for basic research in the physical sciences will help maintain U.S. competitiveness in the field. While the Large Hadron Collider at CERN in Switzerland may have blown a gasket before going into operation last September, it nonetheless pulled the gravitational center of particle research away from the United States. The Recovery Act provides $1.9 billion for basic research through the Department of Energy, along with $400 million for the Advanced Research Projects Agency-Energy, which pursues potentially transformative high-risk, high return work—a critical approach that has fallen, all too often, out of federal funding favor.

As a complement to the $73 billion the stimulus package proposes for clean energy projects, the Act provides for Earth sciences research to better understand the state of our planet. This includes $400 million for NASA Earth scientists and $600 million for National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration satellite equipment and climate modeling, which will be crucial for global warming mitigation and adaptation policy.

To help translate discoveries from lab to market, there are also funds that can support regional technology-based economic development: $100 million for NIST labs to coordinate manufacturing standards, and another $100 million for the Technology Innovation Program and the Manufacturing Extension Partnership.

As Science Progress contributors explain in several recent features on regional centers of innovation, developing prosperous regional innovation clusters yields dividends to the domestic and world economies—whether it be information technology or life-saving medical advances. Regional centers also benefit local communities by attracting a talented and high-paid workforce, cultural organizations, and start-up businesses that generate tax revenue and support the cycle of growth—all key stepping stones on the path to economic recovery.

Will Straw is the Associate Director for Economic Growth at the Center for American Progress. Andrew Plemmons Pratt is the Assistant Editor for Science Progress.

In a 97-page report released today, the NRC criticizes the current research plan on human health and environmental impacts of the National Nanotechnology Initiative–multiagency project to ramp up nanotech in the United states. From the National Academies press release:

The research plan, developed by the National Nanotechnology Initiative, does not provide a clear picture of the current understanding of these risks or where it should be in 10 years, says the new report. Nor does the NNI plan include research goals to help ensure that nanotechnologies are developed and used as safely as possible. And though the research needs listed in the plan are valuable, they are incomplete, in some cases missing elements crucial for progress in understanding nanomaterials’ health and safety impacts. A new national strategic plan is needed that goes beyond federal research to incorporate research from academia, industry, consumer and environmental groups, and other stakeholders, the committee concluded.

Of particular concern is how nanomaterials interact with the human body. As Rick Weiss reported earlier this year, the FDA knows that it needs to at least issue guidance on super-potent nanoscale drugs and other consumer products like cosmetics that contain nanoengineered particles, but has consistently failed to do so. There are at least 800 products on the market today containing nanomaterials. The new report chides the NNI plans for supporting drug R&D without sufficient complimentary research on risks.

In response to the report’s release, the House Science and Technology Committee issued a statement saying that Chairman Bart Gordon (D-TN) would reintroduce legislation that aimed to cover these environmental, health, and safety gaps. The bill passed the House last year but then stalled in the Senate.

Andrew Maynard, Chief Science Advisor at the Wilson Center Project on Emerging Nanotechnologies, and who served on the NRC board that produced the report, framed the conclusions within a larger context on his blog, 2020 Science. He argues that without a national research strategy–and smart approaches to presenting the value of research to policymakers and the public–the investment in initiatives like the NNI won’t payoff. He writes:

And here’s the rub: if the new technology isn’t safe, isn’t perceived to be safe, or is plagued by uncertainty over how to use it safely, it will be stymied. And the economic and societal benefits will dwindle from a flood to a trickle.

He lays blame at the feet of the outgoing conservative administration the lack of an overarching innovation strategy and looks forward to new leadership under the president-elect.

UPDATE: The Project on Emerging Nanotechnologies underscored the criticisms of the NRC report and reminds policymakers of their recommendations for improved funding mechanisms for the NNI that could the the research plan on track.

More on nanotech at Science Progress:

• Rick Weiss: Nanoparticles Get Nanoregulation
• Rick Weiss: Time to Sweat the Small Stuff
• W. Patrick McCray: It’s Just Like That, Except Different

Weiss’s Notebook

CAP Senior Fellow Rick Weiss covered science and medicine for The Washington Post for 15 years, and now he brings his investigative eye to science policy. From cloning and stem cells to agricultural biotechnology and nanotechnology, Weiss examines the issues at the intersection of cutting edge research and public policy.

The presidential transition, begun quietly before the party conventions, now barrels ahead at full speed. And as soon as the transition team has completed its immediate work on the two most pressing issues of the day—national security and the economy—there is good reason to believe that the nation’s science agencies and offices will get fast and close attention.

It is a truism by now that the solutions to many of the major problems facing the United States—climate change, energy, the environment, health care, and food security, among others—have major scientific or technological components. It is also widely recognized that the Bush administration’s almost allergic rejection of scientific evidence and government oversight has badly stalled the development of new approaches to these problems, as well as others in the life sciences and public health. Transition officials clearly plan to act quickly to select new heads for the agencies responsible for these interlinked issues, with an eye toward enabling coordinated efforts.

Already, the Washington rumor mill is buzzing with names of possible science appointees. I have no inside information, but to satisfy the innate human urge to give and receive gossip, I’m happy to highlight some of what I’ve heard from others. For secretary of Health and Human Services, there is talk of former Majority Leader (and CAP senior fellow) Tom Daschle (D-S.D.), who released a book in February on the nation’s healthcare crisis; Nobel laureate and former National Institutes of Health Director Harold Varmus, currently president of Memorial Sloan-Kettering Cancer Center; Howard Dean, the Democratic National Committee chairman and a family physician; and Kathleen Sebelius (D), the governor of Kansas, who made a name for herself when she successfully fought a major battle against BlueCross-BlueShield’s plan to become a for-profit company.

For FDA Commissioner, some have floated the names of Mike Taylor, a former deputy FDA commissioner with particular expertise in food safety; Mary Pendergast, who had a top post in the FDA under President Clinton and has also consulted for the pharmaceutical industry; and even Steven Nissen, the Cleveland Clinic maverick M.D. who has become a chronic thorn in the side of big pharma by repeatedly challenging the data that drug companies have used to back up their claims of safety and efficacy.

It’s been easy for scientists to gripe about their mistreatment during the past eight years. But now is not the time to demand payback.

The parlor game could go on, and it will. But what is more interesting, really, is just how many high-level science openings there are to fill. There are the cabinet-level positions overseeing such science-heavy departments as Agriculture, Energy, and Commerce. There is the surgeon general, the directors of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, the National Institutes of Health, and the National Institute of Standards and Technology; the administrators of NASA and the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration; and the head of the United States Geological Survey, the all-important research arm of the Interior department.

Within the executive office of the president alone there is the director of the Office of Science and Technology Policy and science advisor to the president (a position that many in science hope will be elevated to a cabinet level “assistant to the president” post); four associate directors of the Office of Science and Technology Policy; a gaggle of presidentially appointed members of the President’s Council of Advisors on Science and Technology; the chairman of the Council on Environmental Quality; the director and three associate directors of the Office of Management and Budget; and the administrator of OMB’s Office of Information and Regulatory Affairs, which has in recent years become an increasingly important venue for scientific review and regulation.

Now feel free to skip this paragraph—and to seek help if in fact you make it to the end—but I would be remiss not to mention as well that within the Agriculture Department alone the president needs to appoint three science-based under secretaries—for research, education, and economics; food safety; and food, nutrition, and consumer services. In Commerce he must choose an under secretary for oceans and atmosphere. In Defense he must find a director of defense research and engineering; an under secretary for acquisition, technology and logistics; a director for the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency; an assistant secretary for health affairs; an assistant secretary for networks and information integration; a chief information officer; and an assistant to the secretary for nuclear and chemical and biological defense programs. In Education he must pick a director of that department’s Institute of Education Sciences. In Energy there are slots that must be filled for an under secretary of science; an under secretary for energy and environment; an assistant secretary for energy efficiency and renewable energy; an assistant secretary for environmental management; an assistant secretary for fossil energy; an assistant secretary of nuclear energy; and an under secretary for nuclear security.

And remember, we’re just talking about the most science-y presidential appointments here. We’ll ignore the nearly 500 others for now (but see below for a more exhaustive list).

Of these myriad positions, the most important will be the director of the White House Office of Science and Technology Policy. This is a position that has traditionally been held by a physicist, a holdover from the days when the most important thing to think about in science was the risk of a nuclear attack. Today, as the nation faces a far broader array of scientific threats, including climate change and biological warfare, it will be interesting to see if the new president breaks with tradition and appoints an earth scientist or biologist to that central scientific coordinating position.

The fruits of all these transitional decisions will take time to ripen, but here are a few questions worth asking today:

Will HHS lead a quick and effective charge to focus more on prevention, reduce the cost of healthcare and insurance, and expand coverage to the un- and underinsured?

Will FDA work together with Agriculture to revamp the nation’s food safety system? Will it demand more of pharmaceutical companies, and will it regulate tobacco?

Will EPA get back to the job of using science to calculate honestly the effects of pesticides and other chemicals on the environment and human health? Will it lead the way to dealing with climate change and stand up for endangered species?

Will DOE jump-start the transition to a low-carbon economy by aggressively funding work on alternative energy sources and promulgating strict energy efficiency standards for homes and office buildings? Will it tackle the problem of nuclear waste?

And will Interior manage, in an integrated way, the nation’s precious fresh water resources and protect public lands for we the taxpayers who together own them?

To answer these questions in the affirmative will require a government commitment to data instead of ideology, which alone would constitute a real break from the Bush legacy. But it will also require a huge corps of scientists willing to speak up, and to provide and interpret those much-needed data for the good of the country.

The National Academies put it well in their 2008 report, “Science and Technology For America’s Progress: Ensuring the Best Presidential Appointments in the New Administration”:

The nature of our current national challenges, whether domestic or abroad, demands the best of science, engineering and technology to solve. “More of the same” will not work in the 21st century. Innovative thinking will be needed to a degree unprecedented in American history. Fortunately, large numbers of scientists, engineers, and health professionals have experienced positive change throughout their careers and have been enormously successful as a result. They have much to give back. Government service is an excellent means by which to repay that debt.

It’s been easy for scientists to gripe about their mistreatment during the past eight years. But now is not the time to demand payback. Now is the time for science to put its best foot forward and show the country what it’s been missing.

Rick Weiss is a Senior Fellow at the Center for American Progress and Science Progress.

Key Science and Technology Positions

Adapted from the NAS report, “Science and Technology for America’s Progress: Ensuring the Best Presidential Appointments in the New Administration”

PAS = presidential appointment with Senate confirmation

PA = presidential appointment (without Senate confirmation)

NA = noncareer appointment

FT = fixed term appointment, with length of appointment indicated

Examples of Scientific and Technical Federal Advisory Commitees, by Origin and Purpose

Americans get the importance of science and technology.

Because the American people are not dense. Despite all the news stories about the last-ditch efforts to keep creationism in our public schools, Americans know which side their bread is buttered on, and that side is science and technology. They can see on television that science and technology are fueling the economies of Europe and Asia. Science and technology will create the good jobs in the United States and will maintain the country’s preeminence in the 21st century. That is why the fact that our kids are falling behind the rest of the world in science literacy is viewed with alarm and a fair degree of nervous joking—Americans get the importance of science and technology.

The public also understands that solutions to some of the major challenges this nation and the entire world face—affordable fuels, global warming, controlling highly infectious diseases, growing sufficient and nutritious food, reducing pollution, cleaning up the oceans and improving transportation, all depend on science and technology. And while the public may not fully appreciate the fact that there have been breathtaking bursts of knowledge in areas such as genomics and neuroscience resulting from heavy taxpayer-supported government funding, they can easily understand that it would be foolish not to make the resources and incentives available to move this new knowledge into practical application in terms of jobs and better health as rapidly as possible.

So in the spirit of three is about as far as you can get (but cheating a little to cover all the areas I am hoping to get on the next administration’s radar) here are six things: three in health and three in science and technology that the next administration ought to argue for vigorously and fund generously during its first term.

Health

Modest but ethically important reform

Most discussions of our strained health care system focus on proposals for single-payer systems, universal health care, and the value of markets and choice. But consider this: the American health care system accounts for about 17 percent of our gross national product, and this inordinate expense is straining industrial productivity and cannot be justified in terms of what we get for our money.

Healthcare expenses affect every level of U.S. industry. For large corporations health care costs mean higher prices on our products along with massive “legacy costs” to insure retired employees. For small business owners healthcare expenses make it impossible both to hire candidates they would otherwise take or to sufficiently incentivize inefficient workers to move on, damaging productivity. Some economists maintain that as many as 42 million U.S. jobs are “susceptible” to offshoring in a future where technology allows the more efficient transfer of jobs and employee health care costs are far less.

As nearly every politician recognizes, something must be done. But the new administration needs to understand that a drastic overhaul of the gargantuan, money gobbling, bloated mess that passes for American health care is not going to fly. There are just so many stakeholders in the hugely inefficient, highly inequitable, but incredibly lucrative broken system that we now have to change it quickly.

The new president should talk boldly but move slowly. Praise the drive toward some day achieving universal coverage, but accelerate change by focusing political momentum on children—the group most likely to command ethical empathy across the political spectrum. The new administration should come up with a proposed basic package, including dental, hearing and eye care, for every American child. Prenatal and post-natal care for every mom ought be there as well.

Of course we need universal coverage for basic health care, but the place to start in practical terms is with those under eighteen years of age. Millions of American children lack health insurance. Not only do they deserve it, but they are the moral key to insuring the rest of us. Show success with kids and the rest will follow.

Stem cell research is great but…

Way, way too much political energy has gone into the embryonic stem cell issue. Working with embryonic stem cells is a very exciting area of biomedical research but it is hardly the only area; nor is it the one that will have guaranteed practical payoffs any time soon. All the new president needs to do is flip the Bush administration restrictions on federal funding, which are inconsistent and wildly unpopular; gin up a new federal panel at the NIH to make sure that oversight of all stem cell research is comprehensive, including all early animal and human trials public and private, transparent, and standardized among the states; put some Federal money into the pot; and get out of the way. The stem cell scientists—adult, fetal, embryonic, induced, and cloned—will take it from there.

America needs much more funding of basic research in genomics, proteomics, and bioinformatics. The “ics” hold the future in terms of mining the little we now know about a whole lot of genes. Without that investment, we will be stuck with half-witted, premature schemes to map our individual genomes—what we can call spitomics—spit-in–a-cup DNA testing. This rapidly growing sector is riding an ill-grounded wave of hype that makes weak, next-to-useless correlations between gene markers and disease states without really having much idea what to tell its customers to do about the risk information that testing companies find.

Fix public health

Our public health system is a wheezing, uncoordinated, underfunded eyesore. It needs to be rebuilt to face the challenges that 21^st century living poses to health, ranging from asthma, to diabetes, to the flu. City and county health departments need federal help across the board. Proactive public health is a key element of our national security. The next administration should demand that Congress pay for it.

So how are we going to fund all this glorious new research? In reality the price tag is not all that big—we hardly spend very much now as a percentage of gross domestic product on basic research in health, technology, and science, especially if you don’t count defense related research. But for those who want a new idea as to funding, here is a bonus suggestion for the next president: It is time to revisit the National Institutes of Health and National Science Foundation budgets and see whether a twist on the Bayh-Dole Act that gives universities incentives to work with industry makes sense.

The NIH budget does not grow in hard times. Congress won’t go there in times of deficit. Private companies wait to see what tax-payer funded basic research looks promising and then develop that, only to sell it back to the taxpayers (you and me) who originally funded the work at high prices. So why not put a 3 percent tax on all products that are generated from NIH, NSF, or other government-sponsored basic research? Keep the core budget there and adjust it to rise in response to inflation, but let American science and the American people really benefit from breakthroughs. In that way the incentives are there to translate basic research into practical products, while at the same time allowing the NIH budget to grow more rapidly without having to whine for more money from Congress every year. Here is a real incentive to universities, think tanks and academic scientists—make real and useful breakthroughs and watch your budget for future research grow!

Science and Technology

A New Push in Agricultural Research

We need safer, healthier food that has far less of a footprint on the environment. Science and technology can help but we need presidential leadership to get us there. To reduce the burden of chemically based farming that depends on fertilizers, herbicides, pesticides and huge amounts of irrigation, we need to apply the genetic revolution to agriculture. Let’s break the link forged by big agribusiness between the “old” chemically based agriculture and genomics and drive forward with a biology-based agriculture that uses genetic knowledge to screen foods and insure their safety; engineers them to make them heartier, more healthful and less oil and chemically-reliant; and creates the next generation of creative farming in cities, estuaries, empty government lands and national forests. And, for those who see creative possibilities in new forms of organic farming and alternative modes of agriculture— working to achieve the “natural” control of pests, better pollination through diversity and using less water through better soil management—give them a bit of money to let them show what they can do as well.

Clean Water

The president needs to understand that clear, drinkable water is going to be a major political issue both in this nation and worldwide very soon. If we have the technology in place to use less, to get more from the oceans, to recapture more from our current industry and farming uses, and ways to identify, track and get rid of microbial pollutants in lakes, rivers, and oceans, we will hold a key foreign policy card. Nanotechnology, micro-sensing technology, better semiconductor technology, and even improved synthetic biology are the tools to get us where we need to go. We just need a president committed to getting us there. If the new president wants to make fast friends in China, the Middle East, India, and Africa he could do worse then by promising to fund and share the science that will lead to more clean water.

Synthetic Biology

The next president and his administration can’t let human hubris about how wonderful our bodies and genes are fool them. We love to think that it is the science of human genetics and human biology that holds the key to our better future. But the fact is, microbes are usually easier to work with than human beings, and are just as useful for making gains in human health, well-being, safety, and security. That means the government should put more money into research in synthetic biology aimed at fighting diseases, making synthetic fuels, eating pollutants, cleaning the oceans and our arteries. As HIV and pandemic flu show, you cannot ever underestimate a microbe. By developing the microbial and synthetic biological science to manipulate these tiny critters, the next president can go a long way toward solving a host of our current headaches.

Keep It Real

In health care and in science and technology, the new administration can make a huge difference by keeping its eye both on what is practical and what is likely to provide the greatest return on investment. These have not always been the watchwords of health and biomedical science policy in the past. There is no need for administrations elected on a promise of “change” to let history repeat itself in the future.

Arthur L. Caplan, PhD is an adviser to Science Progress and the Emanuel and Robert Hart Professor of Bioethics, chair of the Department of Medical Ethics, and director of the Center for Bioethics at the University of Pennsylvania.

While this additional funding represents a step in right direction, the additional $150 million sent to the NIH with the passage of this supplemental bill falls woefully short of the annual 10 percent, or $2.59 billion, increase that is necessary to support critical biomedical and health research. The Bush administration has held the NIH budget flat for five years, and inflation has eroded the agency’s purchasing power. In order to truly bolster work that improves our country’s health, grows our economy, fuels the development of renewable energy technologies, and supports basic research, R&D funding for several key agencies should be set on a 10-year doubling course.

The Center for American Progress has proposed doubling the research and development funding for key federal agencies to bolster work that improves our country’s health, grows our economy, fuels the development of renewable energy technologies, and supports basic research. This doubling would take place over a 10 year period, with 10 percent annual increases. The FY2008 budget passed by Congress and signed by the President fell short of those 10 percent increases. So how does the money for the Iraq war compare with spending on R&D at these key offices, and how much of that war funding would we need to reallocate to set those offices on a doubling path?

$28,700,000,000: National Institutes of Health R&D budget for 2008, a 0.9 percent increase over 2007.
$2,586,000,000: Supplemental amount needed to boost FY2008 NIH R&D budget to 10 percent increase.
4.7: The numbers of years the NIH R&D could be funded at its current 2008 levels with latest Iraq war request.

$4,500,000,000: National Science Foundation R&D budget for 2008, a 1.1 percent increase over 2007.
$399,000,000: Supplemental amount needed to boost FY2008 NSF R&D budget to 10 percent increase.
30: The number of years the NSF R&D could be funded at 2008 levels with latest Iraq war request.

$4,000,000,000: Department of Energy Office of Science budget for 2008, 4.6 percent increase over 2007.
$166,000,000: Supplemental amount needed to boost FY2008 DOE Office of Science R&D budget to 10 percent increase.
33.9: The number of years the DOE Office of Science could be funded at 2008 levels with latest Iraq war request.

$514,000,000: National Institute of Standards and Technology R&D 2008 budget, 4.7 percent increase over 2007.
$23,400,000: Supplemental amount needed to boost FY2008 NIST R&D budget to 10 percent increase.
263.5: The numbers of years the NIST R&D could be funded at 2008 levels with latest Iraq war request.

$6,476,400,000: Department of Defense R&D 2008 budget, 0.9 percent increase over 2007.
$72,380,000: Supplemental amount needed to boost FY2008 DOD R&D budget to 10 percent increase.
21.9: The number of years the DOD R&D could be funded at 2008 levels with latest Iraq war request.

$3,246,780,000: Total supplemental amount needed to boost FY2008 funding for these five key agencies to 10 percent increases.
2.4: Percentage of the $135,421,191,000 supplemental request this boost would require.

Funding Medical Research

Funding for the NIH has been flat for four years; accounting for inflation, the Institutes have lost 6 percent of their purchasing power during that time.

37,275: Total number of NIH research grants in 2007.

$403,528: Average size of each NIH research grant in 2007.

335,593: Number of additional average-sized NIH grants that Iraq war funding in the supplemental could finance.

Energy

The Center for American Progress has more information how the $600 billion spent since the start of the Iraq war could fund critical energy research.

When it comes to understanding emerging fields such as information technology, biotechnology, and nanotechnology, historical analogies are just as potent. They help shape debate and can validate, even suggest, possible futures. In the 1960s, as the U.S. and USSR raced to best each other with feats in space, historians debated over whether comparisons to 19^th century railroad infrastructure could help society prepare for the shocks that robust programs of space exploration would surely bring. In 1962, in fact, NASA sponsored a project that encouraged scholars to consider the long-term implications—economic, political, and social—of the national space program.

People hold food in a much different regard than, say, sunscreen or carbon nanotubes for high-tech television displays.

When it comes to understanding potential societal and environmental implications of nanotechnologies, the historical analogy invoked most often by both nano-advocates and opponents is that of genetically-modified organisms. According to Kristen Kulinowski and Vicki Colvin of Rice University, GMOs followed a “wow to yuck” trajectory. Initially hailed as a solution to issues such as world hunger, activists saddled GMOs with a negative public image, criticized them as destructive to the environment, and condemned genetically engineered crops for the harm they might visit on the public and third world farmers.

The GMO-nano analogy, however, is historically inaccurate. The history of GMOs and the accompanying controversy cannot simply be reduced to a “wow to yuck” story in which public backlash derailed a promising industry or product. In reality, considerable ambivalence and critical debate about genetically engineered organisms existed from the technology’s very beginning. Moreover, people hold food in a much different regard than, say, sunscreen or carbon nanotubes for high-tech television displays. We deliberately eat food; we don’t ingest nanotech stain-resistant pants. By the same token, GMOs are developed for deliberate release into the environment, which is generally not the goal of most nano-oriented R&D. So while the comparison between GMOs and nanotech can help us understand some policy debates about social and environmental implications, other historical analogies would better inform policy debates and public understanding.

Another analogy that could help us understand the U.S.’s National Nanotechnology Initiative is the history of NASA’s space program. (Since 2000, the NNI has been this country’s multi-agency, multi-billion dollar nanotech program.) While not perfect, the analogy between the NNI and the formation of our national space enterprise provides several valuable points of comparison which might help us understand the nature of nano-research beyond the point where GMO/biotech association fails.

Like the space program, the NNI was conceived out of a spirit of competitiveness. Like competition with the USSR through the long twilight struggle of the Cold War, concerns that the U.S. was slipping economically relative to European and Asian countries helped foster support for the NNI. One aspect of the NNI that has received robust funding support has been the creation of national research centers—the NSF alone funds more than a dozen such sites devoted to research and public engagement—just as the flood of NASA-directed funding helped spawn a whole host of 60s-era federal and university research centers for space science and exploration.

Like space science, nanoscience research is, in principle, highly interdisciplinary, bringing together scientists and engineers from fields such as biology, chemistry, and solid-state physics. NASA itself funds four such nano-research centers, suggesting the continuation of a decades-old trend. And just as space science research in the 1960s influenced pedagogy and student training, today’s courses for budding nanotechnologists reflect a “new” hybridized approach to science education. While some skeptics have argued that the NNI’s focus on practical (i.e. commercial) applications has distorted traditional university-based research and education, the fact remains that much of 1960s space science research was done both to produce new knowledge and to get the U.S. to a clearly defined place such as the Moon or an orbit around Mars.

Broaden the view and more similarities snap into focus that suggest the power of the space-nano analogy. In 1926, the Russian space visionary Konstantin Tsiolkovsky wrote “First, inevitably, the idea, the fantasy, the fairy tale. Then, scientific calculation. Ultimately, fulfillment crowns the dream.” Whether or not today’s nano-advocates wish to admit it, the fact is that an aura of the fantastical has surrounded nanotechnologies since the 1980s. As late as 2000, Nobelist Richard Smalley of carbon nanotube fame was still recommending K. Eric Drexler’s 1986 techno-utopian Engines of Creation to government policy makers curious about what nano could do. Like the space frontier, advocates depicted the nano-frontier as the place where America’s manifest destiny in science and technology would next unfold. In congressional testimony, Smalley even invoked powerful imagery from the Apollo era, saying that what was needed was someone bold enough to “put a flag in the ground and say: ‘Nanotechnology, this is where we are going to go.”’

While such historical analogies can help us understand the past, and perhaps even the present, can they tell us anything about the future of emerging technologies? The now-comical phrase “power too cheap to meter” alone should be enough to induce caution when it comes to making predictions about future technologies. However, one can consider the directions the space program took after the Apollo era concluded and inject a note of caution for the U.S. nano initiative. To a large degree, as historians like Howard McCurdy have argued, NASA’s public policies were shaped by the public’s imagination as to what space exploration would be like. This entailed a strong focus on human (versus robotic) space exploration, elaborate manned space stations, and, eventually, bases on the moon and Mars. As satellites and space travel became routine, the Apollo era gave way to less exciting space shuttle flights and space probes that, while yielding tremendously exciting scientific information and inspiring vistas, did not have the same hold on the public’s attention as did the first Mercury flights or Apollo 11. As one NASA official put it, “We don’t give ticker tape parades for robots.” Ultimately, NASA’s grand ambitions were re-directed from the initial vision that many citizens found so compelling. How will the public react when it doesn’t get the nanobots or molecular assemblers that early visionaries first proposed and which were so widely promoted in hundreds of newspaper stories and popular science magazines?

Today, it is almost a cliché for science policy makers to call for another Apollo or Manhattan Project-style effort to address pressing energy needs or global warming. We must carefully choose an appropriate historical analogy in framing these suggestions, however. What policy maker would want to initiate a program that eschews long-term goals for a single spectacular feat or develop a technology under classified, wartime conditions and not fully consider its potentially profound social and ethical implications?

While invoking the Apollo era may conjure nostalgic visions of America’s past and what was right about the country at the time of great social unrest and an unpopular war, it should not be the pole star by which science policy navigates. When considering the implications of emerging technologies like nano, the power of historical analogies to shape discourse, frame media coverage, and inform the public demands more careful and reasoned attention.

W. Patrick McCray is a historian at the University of California, Santa Barbara and directs one of three main research projects at UCSB’s NSF-funded Center for Nanotechnology in Society. He is also on the Science Progress advisory board.

Concerned the U.S. is losing its technological edge and falling behind in measures of national competitiveness, the science community has been out in full force calling for new funds. These concerns are real, argues Science Progress Advisor Tom Kalil, citing reports published by the National Science Board showing that U.S. scientific output is stumbling. Looking at the funding numbers, Science Progress Advisor John Irons finds that the Administration has done little to stop the bleeding. He noted in January that even “the slight increase in the dollars for non-defense R&D was more than surpassed by projected inflation.”

With an economy on egg shells, a recommitment to federal funding of research is crucial in maintaining U.S. global leadership in the science and technology, major drivers of economic productivity. In their report, “A National Innovation Agenda,” both Kalil and Irons outline policy recommendations which would ensure that the U.S. continues to lead the way in innovation, reaping the economic benefits along the way.

In 1997 the NSF simplified to two the agency’s principal criteria for the merit-based review of grant applications: intellectual merit and broader impacts. The NSF was reacting to pressure from Congress and the White House to show it was using federal tax dollars for more than just ivory-tower, fundamental research.

Ever since, many academic researchers have been perplexed and annoyed by the broader-impacts requirement, often called “Criterion 2.” Although the NSF has stressed that it gives equal weight to both criteria, some scientists have said that intellectual merit should count for more. They also point out that socially useful applications of fundamental research can be difficult to predict and take years to appear.

According to the AAAS R&D Budget and Policy Program, the NSF budget for R&D in FY 2008 was $4.45 billion. The President’s budget request for FY 2009 would grow that amount to $5.17 billion.

According to NSF data, the number of individuals working in science and engineering (S&E) occupations grew by 4.3 percent, and their unemployment rate dropped to 2.5 percent in 2006, the lowest unemployment rate since the early 1990s.

The NSF, which produces these reports on a two-year cycle, will be releasing an updated report with 2008 data this coming fall, painting a clearer picture of the current science and engineering labor market.

In their report, “A National Innovation Agenda,” Science Progress advisors Tom Kalil and John Irons argued for a ten percent yearly increase to the NSF budget because of the central role the agency plays in spurring innovation and high tech job creation in the United States. Dr. Bement echoed these same sentiments in his testimony, equating investment in the NSF with investment in economic security and emphasizing the important role the agency plays in attracting bright young scientists and students from around the world. Other countries are increasing funding for their science, technology, engineering, and mathematics education, he said, and if the U.S. fails to keep up, multinational companies will take their operations and high-paying jobs overseas. The FY2009 budget tries to address this concern with a boost to education funding skewed toward graduate student fellowships and grants, but continues to underfund K-12 STEM education, which is logistically difficult to improve due to a lack of a national science education standard, said Dr. Bement.

Dr. Steven Beering, Chairman of the National Science Board, offered testimony calling for the NSF to focus on both international cooperation and innovation sharing. “Science is an international language,” he said, asking that Congress designate money for international collaboration on scientific initiatives. He also spoke on one of the NSB’s upcoming projects to create a taskforce to study the engineering and science challenges related to sustainable energy.

Tomorrow, the House Appropriations Subcommittee on Commerce, Justice, and Science will hold their own hearing on the NSF FY2009 budget request.

Their perennial complaints about inadequate financial support by Washington are generally disregarded as standard, selfish clamor from government dependents.

His characterization highlights the point that communicating the importance and public good of scientific research is a responsibility of scientists and policy makers alike. Basic research is important, and supporting it is one component of bolstering U.S. competitiveness in a global economy. But scientists and decision makers in the federal government must also draw clear connections between the policy issues that attract public attention–like health care, the economy, and green energy initiatives–and the technological innovation that underscores each.

Science Progress advisors John Irons and Tom Kalil noted in January columns that federal research funding has not kept up with the rate of inflation for several years and private industry support for basic research has been declining for a decade. Targeting increases in the research budgets for federal agencies can expand R&D programs developing energy solutions for a low-carbon economy while expanding industries that will create more “green collar” jobs. Increasing support for NIH-funded research can build on the promise of fast-moving work in regenerative medicine. Supporting university-industry collaborations can both make up for the decline in high-risk, high-return research private industry has abandoned and encourage investment in regional economies. Improving science, technology, engineering, and mathematics education, especially for students in undeserved demographics, can boost young people’s success in a competitive economy.

Those fruits of increased funding hardly amount to a “selfish clamor”–they serve the interests of the entire country. But when scientists and policy makers are asking for more money, it certainly doesn’t hurt to connect the promise of research to positive outcomes.

Aside from funding and grant-making, the NSF is also in the early stages of coordinating these state and local efforts through an upcoming “Science and Innovation” website, developed as an “experimental tool for decision-makers and users in the states.” The prototype version that premiered at the conference featured an interactive map of the U.S. along with different categories of programs according to grade level and subject area. Designer Joni Falk, Co-director of the Center for School Reform at TERC Inc., noted that the website features program “highlights with replicable knowledge and contacts…so [educators] don’t have to re-invent the wheel.” She also said that the prototype version currently has 60 projects, but that the final website will have thousands. She boasted that the project makes the NSF the “first federal agency to actually document impact.”

Dr. Jan Kettlewell, Rosalind Barnes, and Sheila Jones of the University System of Georgia highlighted the University System of Georgia Math and Science Partnership, which created a public awareness campaign called “math + science = success.” The campaign grew from market research demonstrating that the strongest influence on children’s educational choices comes from their parents. This led the program to disseminate a free parent’s guide with information about science and math education. They also aired TV commercials and advertised on billboards about the impact of science and math education in preparing students for the workforce. Mini-grants enabled schools to hold “Math/Science Family Nights,” and provided incentives for scholars from higher education to research and work with elementary school teachers. Since the inception of this program, Georgia has seen higher test scores, a higher graduation rate, and a lower dropout rate.

Ruth Wooden, of the research firm Public Agenda, also presented findings from her report, “Important, but Not for Me,” which noted an “immense” gap between the beliefs of policy-makers who say that STEM education needs improvement, and the general public that thinks things are fine. Wooden said that “parents’ concerns about math and science have fallen since the 90s.” A bright point from the study found “no significant difference between boys and girls” in terms of numbers of students claiming they wanted to go into a math or science-related job. She also echoed the team from Georgia when she reported that “parents have a much greater influence on students than they think,” especially “parents of youngsters in grades 4 through 8.”

Image: MSPNet

How is science doing in America? The National Science Board, the oversight agency of the National Science Foundation (NSF) released its biennial report on the state of science and engineering research and education in the U.S. According to the report, the United States is still the leader in scientific and technological innovation but the gap is closing quickly as Asian countries ramp up their science and engineering efforts. To keep the innovation ball rolling, the NSB recommends expanding science funding and increasing “intellectual exchange” between academia and industry.

Science magazine recently interviewed embattled Department of Energy Undersecretary Raymond Orbach on the state of physics research in the United States. The DOE’s Office of Science endured cuts to proposed budget increases in the new Congressional spending bill, and many in the scientific community are wondering what the future holds for physical science research. He discusses the status of the International Thermonuclear Experimental Reactor (ITER), the U.S. involvement in the International Linear Collider, and the funding prospects for physical sciences in the 2009 budget.

Robert Palazzo argues in The Scientist that the United States is in danger of losing its leadership role in biotechnology innovation if it continues to scale back support of research. By flat-funding the NIH and other programs, foreign scientists will end up returning to their home countries where, increasingly, more resources are becoming available. In addition, scientists are forced to spend more time writing grants competing for funding than devoting their time to research and innovation. In light of greater international collaboration in science, the United States needs to reaffirm its commitment to life science programs if it hopes to continue leading the way in progress and improving the quality of life around the world.

You have a new tool to track the pulse of science reporting. The Columbia Journalism Review announced the launch of the The Observatory, a department whose sole purpose is to track and critique press coverage of science and the environment. Built on the mounting national discussions of climate change, stem cells, and public health, the new department hopes to improve national discourse by improving the quality of science journalism in the media and on the Internet.

The hearing focused on the recent National Academies report, “Beyond Bias and Barriers,” which explains that in order “to maintain its scientific and engineering leadership amid increasing economic and educational globalization, the United States must aggressively pursue the innovative capacity of all of its people—women and men.”

The report recommends that “higher education organizations should consider forming an inter-institution monitoring organization,” and compares the work of such an organization to the mass effort required to open and equalize athletics programs.

Hearing witness and NSF Deputy Director Kathie Olsen seconded Shalala’s call for an inter-collegiate organization analogous to the NCAA to enforce Title IX regulations, saying that what’s needed is a full institutional shake-up. “Entire campuses have been dozing on this issue,” she said, adding that making better environments for women improves possibilities for other minorities and for men as well. The NSF currently supports the advancement of women in science and engineering careers with its ADVANCE grants.

The Chronicle of Higher Education (subscription) noted that while other witnesses supported the idea, no one offered specifics about the structure or membership of the organization. Higher education leaders should heed the National Academies recommendations and could grab headlines by framing the new organization as an analog to the NCAA. From there, they can start competing for tournament trophies.

For more:
Inside Higher Ed
The Chronicle

This week, the Senate resumes consideration of the Commerce-Justice-Science appropriations bill (HR 3093, summary [pdf]), which funds science education ($28 billion, $2 billion more than 2007), global climate change initiatives ($1.85 billion for a program that has not existed previously), NASA ($10.5 billion, $1.01 billion more than 2007), NOAA ($4.0 billion, $56.9 million above 2007), NSF ($5.96 billion, $500 million more than 2007), and the National Institute of Standards and Technology ($831.2 million, $154.3 million above 2007 ).

Also in the Senate this week: the Labor-Health-Education appropriations bill (HR 3043, summary [pdf]), which funds the Department of Health and Human Services, including the National Institutes of Health and the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. In its current form, the bill provides $29.4 billion total for NIH ($549 million, or 3 percent, more than the current level) and $6.5 billion for the CDC ($192 million, or 8 percent, more than the current level).