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BIOPHYSICAL SOCIETY NEWSLETTER
4
NOVEMBER
2015
Public Affairs
2016 Federal Fiscal Year
Underway, but Budget
Still Uncertain
With a last minute agreement, Congress passed
a bill, known as a continuing resolution, to keep
the government operating at the beginning of
the 2016 fiscal year that started October 1. The
bill funds government agencies at 2015 levels
through December 11, 2015. The deal was made
after Speaker of the House
John Boehner
(OH-
R) announced that he was going to give up his
Speakership and his seat in Congress at the end of
October.
While avoiding a shutdown is considered a posi-
tive outcome, the delay puts federal agencies in
a bind; agency leaders do not know how much
money they will ultimately have in their budget
for the coming year, and therefore, must be very
conservative in how they spend money during this
time period. Sequestration was to go back into
effect on October 1 in order to meet decreased
spending caps set by Congress in 2011and so
there is a real chance that each agency could see
significant decreases in a final 2016 spending
bill compared to 2015. Each agency, and within
the National Institutes of Health (NIH), each
Institute, has its own policicies on how to operate
during a continuing resolution. NIH-wide, non-
competing research grant awards will be funded at
no more than 90% of the previously committed
level. This makes it difficult for principal inves-
tigators to run their labs, especially if they are up
for renewal or seeking initial funding.
The current continuing resolution expires on De-
cember 11. It is unclear how the President and the
Republican-controlled Congress will find a way
forward, and without an agreement, a shutdown
could occur at that time. Stay tuned!
Michael Lauer to Serve as
NIH Deputy Director for
Extramural Research
NIH Director
Francis Collins
announced the
appointment of
Michael S. Lauer
to be the NIH
Deputy Director for Extramural Research. Lauer
has worked at NIH since 2007 and has served as
the Director of the Division of Cardiovascular
Science at the National Heart, Lung, and Blood
Institute since 2009. Lauer is also serving as Co-
chair of the President’s Precision Medicine Initia-
tive. Lauer received his MD from Albany Medical
College in 1985.
Lauer was expected to assume his new role in
October. He replaces
Sally Rockey
who left the
post in September to become the Director of the
Foundation for Food and Agriculture Research.
National Academy Panel Calls
for Simplification of Research
Regulations
In late September, the National Academy of Sci-
ences released the first part of a two-part report
focused on regulation of federally funded aca-
demic research. In the report, entitled
Optimizing
the Nation’s Investment in Academic Research: A
New Regulatory Framework for the 21st Century:
Part I,
the Academy’s Committee on Federal Re-
search Regulations and Reporting Requirements
calls on the federal government to streamline its
regulation of federally funded academic research.
The purpose of the study and the report, were
to examine to what extent regulations, taken
together, cut into productivity and/or slow down
the return on the federal investment in research.
Indeed, the panel found that while regulations
are important for maintaining the integrity of the