Funding Shift Puts Research Over a Barrel : Academia Is Disturbed by Science Grant Trend

Almost $2 million in new science equipment is sitting idle in the laboratory of Prof. Henry Abarbanel because he and his colleagues at the UC San Diego Institute of Nonlinear Science have lost 40% of their project’s funding from the U.S. Defense Department.

Similarly, UCSD Prof. Siavouche Nemat-Nasser has had his advanced-materials research budget slashed 53% by the Defense Department, forcing him to cut faculty salaries and raising the specter of losing a core group of graduate students and postdoctoral fellows who will soon have to start looking for work on other campuses.

The cuts result not from funding problems with the defense program--begun two years ago as a way to stimulate basic scientific research--but with a congressionally mandated change in the funding philosophy.

That change, which has been developing over the past several years, involves the channeling of federal research dollars to campuses on the basis of geographical equity, without requiring professors to submit their proposals to traditional merit-review procedures.

Academia Disturbed

And it clearly bothers many in academia who see a disturbing trend in what they call “pork barrel science,” and in the need for universities--and perhaps states as well--to routinely pressure lawmakers for science funding in much the way that cities and states traditionally have lobbied for road and sewer funds.

Areas as diverse as California’s Silicon Valley and the Gulf Coast of Mississippi understand that research projects are a major boon to economic success today, just as officials previously viewed dams or freeways as predictors of new jobs and businesses.

In addition to its action on the Defense Department science program, Congress last year earmarked more than $225 million specifically for campus projects around the nation that had not been reviewed by science or engineering specialists for merit.

“Historically, federal grants and contracts to universities have been awarded on the basis of merit as judged by specialists in the field, the peer-review system,” said Lea Rudee, dean of the UCSD Division of Engineering.

Congress Intervened

“But in recent years, the Congress intervened and awarded some physical facilities (such as semiconductor and earthquake research centers) directly to campuses without peer review, but it had stayed clear of actual research support. This is no longer the case.”

Congress late last year mandated that under the Defense Department program, the percentage of dollar support going to all universities within a single state could not be greater than the national percentage of doctoral degrees granted by institutions in the state.

In the case of California--where universities issued 14% of the nation’s advanced degrees last year--the legislative directive dropped total support by $11 million. California had been receiving 21%, or $22.4 million, from the program, known as the University Research Initiative. Massachusetts and New York were the other big losers in the wake of the change, having received the second- and third-biggest chunks of money for the 86 science and engineering projects funded nationwide.

UCSD professors received the most--almost 25%--of those awarded to California universities.

Big Schools Favored

Rep. Martin Olav Sabo (D-Minn.) led the battle to disburse the funds on a geographical basis, arguing that grant distribution in general has been skewed in favor of well-known schools, such as UCSD, Massachusetts Institute of Technology, UC Berkeley, Harvard and Stanford. A congressional committee report criticized “the relatively closed nature of the review process” that governs distribution of the grants.

“A good peer-review system should distribute research funds more broadly than this program does,” the report from the House Appropriations Committee said.

That argument sits poorly with UCSD researchers.

“They’re funding weaker people more than they should” by bypassing peer review, said William Nierenberg, a UCSD professor and former director of the campus Scripps Institution of Oceanography.

‘Weakens the Country’

“I understand the congressional approach, where each (representative) wants something in his own neighborhood to strengthen his state’s science and technology, but you don’t do it by pork barrel. . . . That . . . weakens the country as a whole,” he said.

“You do it by offering scholarship programs and other things to boost universities not as well-known, and not by removing peer review where it is required.”

Abarbanel, of the nonlinear institute, was among 15 professors who put together a major proposal in 1986 in response to the new Defense Department research initiative. They sought to study the transition of fluid from a smooth regular flow to turbulent behavior. The results would have application to such problems as drag, which slows airplanes and boats, and the action of bubbles that damage the blades of ship propellers and turbines.

The proposal was among more than 1,000 received nationwide by four separate Defense Department agencies.

‘Rigorous Reviews’

“And contrary to what has been said, these projects underwent the most rigorous of reviews,” Abarbanel said, pointing out that UCSD and 26 other finalists in its subject category were visited by reviewers and also had their proposals read by a series of outside specialists.

“And after we were approved (in mid-1986), we went out and spent a great deal of time (through 1987) advertising for new graduate students and visiting faculty, buying equipment, making contacts with industry and government labs for collaboration . . . everything and more that the grant required us to do.”

By the end of last year, the project was ready to move forward in a major way, with 17 graduate students, eight postdoctoral researchers, one technician and three programmers primed to begin work using the $2 million in equipment purchased.

“This work constitutes 45% of the total institute work, and we’ve now lost $800,000 of the total budget,” Abarbanel said.

Lab Shut Down

So he has canceled the visitors program, all faculty summer salaries and purchases of additional equipment, and put into effect a virtual shutdown of the laboratory.

“That was our choice rather than to fire people since it would be so hard to get the people back once you let them go,” Abarbanel said. “In the meantime, some of them can do theoretical calculations and work at a much lower level, but not on essential lab research, because we can’t afford it now.”

Unless Congress decides to change direction on the program for next year, Abarbanel will have to begin laying off people this summer.

“Already, in planning for next year, we have assumed a 30% cut just to be on the safe side,” he said.

Nemat-Nasser took a 53% cut in his project because he is funded under a different Defense Department agency.

‘A Tremendous Blow’

“It’s a tremendous blow when you get reduced $500,000 in the middle of the game,” he said. “This is absolutely silly, to get started, make commitments to people, buy equipment, hire a good team and then, boom.

“What does this mean when compared to all the talk (nationally) about competitiveness with other countries?” he asked. “I have a young man, a postdoc, who is Japanese, and he can’t believe that this would ever be done in that nation.

“All that such arbitrary political limitations can do is to destroy the excellence in research. . . . This is exactly what we should not be doing if we are trying to improve our technological edge and boost competitiveness.”

Nierenberg, a veteran of scientific political wars in Washington through the years, said he remains “bullish” on the ability of California universities to attract money and top researchers without having to resort to pork barrel warfare themselves.

“I don’t think that California, with all the excellence that it has going for it, will be affected a lot . . . although the country as a whole will be hurt because it will have wasted a lot of money.

Support Urged

“The overriding attitude (in California) should be not to panic but to keep supporting our universities the way we should, and our intellectual climate and industrial proficiency will still attract the good people.”

But others at UCSD and elsewhere are not so sanguine.

“I came to UCSD from Northwestern,” Nemat-Nasser said. “And while you come because of the reputations, if coming is going to undermine your effectiveness to compete across-the-board for research support, then this will become a factor in deciding whether to come. If I were still at Northwestern, I would still have the (full) grant.”

Rudee, the engineering division dean, believes the congressional trend will soon begin affecting much larger agencies such as the National Science Foundation and the National Institutes of Health.

“It’s hard (for Congress) to oppose this (pork barrel) because there are so many short-term benefits for jobs and for getting industry,” Rudee said.

“But when you talk about basic research over the long run, where the creativity of participants is so important, whether you put the money in University A or University B is a critical factor in ultimate success.

“And that is why money should be received on the basis of merit.”