Long View on Science Funding

Since the National Science Foundation was established in 1950, Congress has often hesitated to fund its esoteric research in physics, mathematics and computer science. By contrast, Congress has been good to the medical research coordinated by the National Institutes of Health, whose payoffs manifestly benefit ordinary Americans. From fiscal years 1993 to 1997, federal spending on medical sciences increased by 14%, while spending on physics and mechanical engineering declined by 29% and 50%, respectively.

This year is no exception. While the Clinton administration requested a $250-million increase in the NSF’s $3.7-billion budget for the next fiscal year, last month the House Appropriations Committee proposed a $35-million decrease in the agency’s budget, and House leaders now say they are considering additional across-the-board cuts.

Since its founding, the NSF has helped drive powerful engines of the American economy. Biotechnology, for instance. In 1952, Caltech professor Max Delbruck used one of the agency’s first grants to invent molecular biology techniques that enabled one of his students, James Watson, to determine the molecular structure of DNA and another, David Baltimore, to unravel some of its mysteries.

Today, the NSF is helping the United States retain its competitive edge in high-technology areas that the private sector, focused on next quarter’s profits, is by all accounts ignoring. For example, the agency is now funding research on how engineers might build a supercomputer using DNA memory chips. Theoretically at least, a beaker of DNA could have more memory than all the computers in the world.

As they head into conference on a final version of the federal budget, House and Senate negotiators should keep the long view in mind.