JUNE 3, 2003

The National Science Board, the policy body for the National Science Foundation, has released a report concluding that funding for academic research infrastructure "has not kept pace with rapidly changing technology, expanding research opportunities, and an increasing number of facility users." It recommended that increased funding and attention be devoted to science and engineering research infrastructure at the nation’s colleges and universities to achieve maximum results at these institutions, which represent the vast majority of the nation’s base of support for fundamental research.

The report represents a significant change in thinking about research infrastructure, the NSB notes. Typically thought of as being the "hardware on the floor," the term infrastructure now encompasses "distributed" systems of hardware, software, databases and expert systems, thanks to the information revolution.

Citing new information technology and other tools that will require researchers and educators to "be connected to a sophisticated array of facilities, instruments, databases (and) technical literature," the NSB said it is "urgent" to increase federal investments for the "latest and best science and engineering infrastructure" as well as to update infrastructure currently in place in order to provide broad access to these resources by scientists and engineers nationwide.

Specifically, the NSB said the current 22 percent share of the NSF budget devoted to small and medium-scale infrastructure is too low, considering the added needs for cyberinfrastructure, and recommended a share of up to 27 percent. Special emphasis should be placed on advanced instrument technology and computational tools, increased mid-sized infrastructure projects ranging from several million to tens of millions of dollars that have been unfulfilled priorities, large facility projects that have been approved for funding but not provided the budgetary support, and development and deployment of advanced cyberinfrastructure on a broad scale. The NSB was particularly concerned about the large infrastructure projects, saying that an annual investment of $350 million is needed over several years to address the backlog of facility construction. Further postponement of this investment, the Board said, "will not only increase the future costs of these projects, but also result in the loss of U.S. leadership in key research fields."

Other recommendations of the NSB included the need to expand education and training opportunities at research facilities, strengthen the infrastructure planning and budgeting process and develop interagency plans to establish infrastructure priorities, deployment strategies, protection of resources and partnering among organizations to enable mutual support of research facilities across national boundaries.

The final report, which is expected to guide NSF’s future funding priorities, is available at http://www.nsf.gov/nsb/documents/2003/start.htm

It will be months before final spending levels are set in appropriations bills for the Department of Defense, but the authorization language approved by both the House and Senate last month don’t augur well, calling for cuts in funding for Basic Research (6.1) and Applied Research (6.2) programs, and significant increases in the Advanced Technology Development program (6.3). The authorization for total funding for all three programs remains basically unchanged from fiscal year 2003 levels, at 2.7 percent of the total DOD budget (as opposed to the 3.0 percent recommendation in the Quadrennial Defense Review).

The Coalition for National Security Research, a broadly based coalition including the Federation of Materials Societies, of which TMS is a member, has adopted a position statement endorsing the Quadrennial Defense Review recommendation, specifically calling for:

• An increase in funding to not less than $11.4 billion for DOD’s core S&T programs in FY04 – a 5.8 percent increase over current year funding;
• A halt to the diversion of funds from 6/1 (basic research) accounts to meet shortages in other accounts, which undermines the long-term goal of defense transformation and future capabilities development;

• Maintaining critical, joint, multidisciplinary S&T programs at the Office of the Secretary of Defense. Given the results of previous proposals to devolve or transfer such activities, such a move could damage the unique nature and design of these programs and would inhibit cross-service integration and coordination.