![]() Cancer cohorts have been lost, long-term studies decimated. “The last few years of funding uncertainties have been deadly, and several investigators I know have lost their jobs because grants were terminated. “The situation is serious,” says Gerald Denis, a School of Medicine associate professor of pharmacology and medicine in the Cancer Research Center and a fellow of the Obesity Society. But since government funding flatlined several years ago, scientists at BU and universities across the country are worried, very worried, not just about their research, but about the future of science in America. We also think that the government should pay for university research-and it does pay for the vast majority of it. Four centuries after Clement, German universities adopted the notion that it was the academy’s responsibility to advance the understanding of science, a conviction that we take for granted today. Galileo’s heretical revelation that the Earth revolved around the sun would have been unlikely if not for his education at the University of Pisa, which was founded by Pope Clement VI, remembered even today as a devoted patron of the arts and learning. Throughout the ages, science has moved forward with boosts from many well-heeled patrons, from monarchs to millionaires. Bell, who was at the time a professor of vocal physiology and elocution at Boston University’s School of Oratory, even borrowed money from his (famous) assistant, Thomas Watson. In the 1870s, when Alexander Graham Bell needed money to develop his “harmonic telegraph,” he got much of it from the wealthy father of one of his students, 16-year-old Mabel Hubbard. Part two shows how research can be misinterpreted part three investigates how one lab has forged a new model for success and part four examines the crisis of jobless postdocs and how a novel BU program is helping to reengineer their biomedical careers.įinding the money for scientific research used to be a lot more straightforward: people got it from people they knew. ![]() ![]() In part one, we look at the history of funding, and at current efforts to keep the money coming. Scientists say that much of the public-and many politicians-do not have a general understanding of the scientific process, knowledge critical for smart decision-making in our increasingly technological society.īU Today begins a four-part series delving into what many consider a serious crisis affecting the future of medical, technological, and scientific development. A recent Pew survey highlights a disturbing disconnect: while a majority of Americans support federally funded research, many also distrust science-especially when it comes to subjects like climate change. At universities across the United States, cuts in federal research funding are threatening to slow the pace of scientific progress.
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