BIOPHYSICAL SOCIETY NEWSLETTER
10
JULY
2014
Public Affairs
Controversial FIRST Bill
Approved by Committee
On May 29, the full House Science, Space, and
Technology Committee approved the Frontiers
in Innovation, Research, Science and Technol-
ogy (FIRST) Act with a party line vote. The bill
authorizes National Science Foundation (NSF)
funding for FY 2015 at a level slightly higher than
the amount requested by the President and the
National Institute of Standards and Technology
(NIST) at a level less than the President’s request.
The purpose of this authorization bill, which the
committee had been working on since the fall of
2013, is to not only set funding targets, but also
policy for the NSF and the NIST for 2014 and
2015. Unlike previous authorizations for these
agencies included in the America COMPETES
Act, the FIRST bill has been controversial and
partisan since it was first introduced. Chairman
of the House Science, Space, and Technology
Committee,
Lamar Smith
(R-TX), has been an
outspoken critic of the NSF’s grant making process
and of funding for the Social, Behavioral and
Economic (SBE) Directorate of the Foundation.
The bill requires NSF to “publish a justification of
each grant’s scientific merits and relevance to broad
national interest.” Based on his opening remarks,
Smith strongly believes research funded by the SBE
Directorate does not have broad national interest.
The bill also sets spending targets for each of NSF’s
directorates, rather than for NSF as whole as has
been done in the past. By setting funding levels for
each Directorate, Smith was able to slash fund-
ing for SBE by 28% but still authorize increased
spending for the agency overall by moving the
money to other directorates. The bill also proposes
cutting funding for
international and integrative
activities, which include funding for graduate
research fellowships.
Prior to the vote, the Biophysical Society joined
with other members of the Coalition for National
Science Funding to express principles that should
be in a reauthorization, including authorization
levels that allow for growth and language that al-
lows scientists to choose the best science to fund
rather than mandating changes to peer review or
spending levels by directorate.
There is no timetable set for bringing the FIRST
Act to the House floor for consideration.
NRC Report Calls for
Coordination of
Convergent Research
Convergent research,
defined as research
that crosses tradi-
tional disciplinary
boundaries and
integrates tools and
knowledge from the
life sciences, physical
sciences, engineer-
ing, and other fields,
has the potential to
spur innovation, but
needs greater national coordination, according to
a May 2014 report from the National Research
Council. The committee that prepared the report
also found that partnerships are necessary to sup-
port boundary-crossing research and to translate
advances into new products. “Some of our most
difficult real-world problems do not respect disci-
plinary boundaries, and convergent science, which
brings together insights and approaches from many
fields, can help us find solutions,” said commit-
tee chair
Joseph DeSimone
, University of North
Carolina at Chapel Hill and North Carolina State
University, in a press release. “It is time for a sys-
tematic effort to highlight the value of convergence
as an approach to R&D, and to address lingering
challenges to its effective practice.”
The report identifies strategies that institutions
have successfully used to support convergence ef-
forts, such as creating research institutes or pro-
grams around a common theme, problem, or sci-
entific challenge; hiring faculty in transdisciplinary
clusters; and embedding support for convergence
