Stimulus package may bolster U. science research

As part of the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act (ARRA), government bodies that support science research will receive funds that need to be distributed within 18 months, Jeremy Berg, the director of the National Institute of General Medicine, said in an e-mail.

The federal agencies standing to benefit the most include the National Institute of Health (NIH), which is receiving about $10 billion in stimulus money; the National Science Foundation (NSF), which is receiving about $3 billion; and the Department of Energy (DoE), which is receiving $1.8 billion, Richard Marchase, the president of the Federation of American Societies for Experimental Biology (FASEB), explained in an e-mail to FASEB members.

Most of the money will be distributed through funding research grants and other projects at universities and other institutions, The New York Times reported.

The NIH has a normal annual operating budget of about $29 billion, and the NSF has a budget of about $6 billion, the Times reported.

Chemistry professor Michael Hecht explained that grants from the NIH will likely fund research that is “biomedical, very broadly defined.”

Hecht said that funds from the NIH typically go to research in certain fields, including ecology and evolutionary biology, molecular biology and psychology. He noted, though, that the research must be related to biomedical issues.

“A lot of people have NIH funding because it’s very broadly defined, so there are a lot of people in chemistry, chemical engineering or physics” that could benefit from the stimulus package as well, Hecht added.

The NSF, meanwhile, can distribute funds to “every science and engineering department,” Hecht explained.

Smith said that all areas of science research are likely to receive some boost in funding because the government aid is directed toward a number of agencies.

“In principle, everyone is going to benefit,” Smith said.

Since the money needs to be spent quickly, the agencies will focus first on funding grant proposals that have already been submitted, Smith said.

“The first money will be funding excellent proposals that are already in the system,” Smith explained. “I know from watching what is going on that Princeton has a very strong set of proposals in the pipeline, and it’s almost across the board.”

Get the best of the ‘Prince’ delivered straight to your inbox. Subscribe now »

Research grants typically support professors’ independent research as well as the salaries of students who conduct research with professors, Smith added.

Smith said that it is “a very fortunate alignment” that the NIH and the NSF are among the largest beneficiaries of the bill because “most of the [research] funding on campus comes from” those two agencies.

Researchers at the University currently receive roughly $120 million in government funding, not including funding to support the Princeton Plasma Physics Laboratory, Smith noted, adding that this funding represents around “10 to 12 percent of the University’s operating budget.”

Physics professor Paul Steinhardt, the director of the Princeton Center for Theoretical Science, said in an e-mail that the grant money will not be directed toward specific departments but rather toward individual projects.

“Funding won’t go to departments so much as research efforts,” Steinhardt explained. “Some may be efforts pursued by a group all within one department — a subset — and some will cross departmental lines, like investments in computing.”

Though many University scientists are eagerly expecting the increase in grant money, the professors said it is hard to predict how the federal grant money and the University budget cuts together will affect research on campus.

Molecular biology professor Mark Rose explained that federal grants and University funding support different aspects of research on campus.

“The University does not spend much money to support research directly,” Rose said. “It does support research by providing appropriate laboratory space and other kinds of indirect support [as well as] some discretionary funds to support facilities and staff.”

“Thus, while a department might get more funds overall from grants to support research … this would not be usable to offset any reductions from University spending,” Rose added.

Smith said that the University budget pays for the upkeep and construction of facilities, professors’ and other employees’ salaries and funding packages for new professors who are beginning to conduct research.

Additionally, the University is often required to provide some “cost sharing” funds, which supplement government money, for federally funded projects, Smith said.

“The main effect of this cutback on sciences has been the deferral of major construction projects. Construction of the new neuroscience building has been slowed down,” Smith explained. “On the operating side, a large fraction of operating support comes from grants.”

In the next few years, “the number of new hires will be fewer, and startup packages will probably be leaner,” Smith noted.

Still, “really big research programs and [postdoctoral] salaries are supported by grants, so this will really increase the research that is going on,” he added.

Smith said that he did not think that the University budget cuts would hurt researchers who are applying for government grants.

Though, “going forward, it will be more difficult to provide cost sharing funds,” Smith explained, the University is “already committed to those [proposals] that are in the pipeline,” so the University would be required to fund the projects if they got approved.

Additionally, Smith said, “most universities are in a more difficult position than we are, and they would be unable to provide cost sharing in any circumstances,” so the grant-distributing agencies may require less cost sharing.

Hecht added that he thought the University would likely still provide cost sharing funds for projects that win grant money.

“They’re not going to pull the plug on someone who got funding — quite the contrary,” he said.

Professors said the aid money would be a welcome departure from policies of the past decade.

“To give you a sense of the problem, in the past year, even some grants judged to be in the top 10 percent of applications were not funded by some NIH institutes,” Rose said.

Hecht explained that in recent years, “only the ‘excellent plus plus’ were able to be funded.”

Hecht added that he hoped at least some of the stimulus money would support undergraduates working in his lab. “I just sent something in yesterday as a supplement to my existing NSF grant to ask for additional support for undergrads.”

“Since the money has to be spent in the next two years, maybe the guy who was sitting in the chair before you came in will get his summer stipend,” Hecht added.

Smith also said he hoped his research would benefit from funds directed to the DoE.

“My research is in high-energy physics, which is funded by the Department of Energy. The DoE has decided to use most of its stimulus money to increase operations at the national laboratories, which indirectly but critically enhances Princeton research in this field,” Smith explained.

Chemistry department chair Robert Cava, however, said he expected the increased grant money would not compensate for other cuts to his funding.

“[I have not] heard from any of the agencies that fund my own personal research, except to hear that my funding will be cut due to the economic crisis rather than increased,” Cava said.