tag:theconversation.com,2011:/uk/topics/basic-research-15729/articlesBasic research – The Conversation2024-01-16T13:41:32Ztag:theconversation.com,2011:article/2158662024-01-16T13:41:32Z2024-01-16T13:41:32ZCongress is failing to deliver on its promise of billions more in research spending, threatening America’s long-term economic competitiveness<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/569192/original/file-20240114-27-122rn5.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&rect=107%2C116%2C5883%2C3871&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">Federal funding was essential to the development of the COVID-19 vaccine.</span> <span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://newsroom.ap.org/detail/VirusOutbreakMalaysia/581dec54b4fa47c1a85266ebf75aadff/photo?Query=covid%20mrna%20vaccine&mediaType=photo&sortBy=arrivaldatetime:desc&dateRange=Anytime&totalCount=248&digitizationType=Digitized&currentItemNo=NaN&vs=true">AP Photo/Vincent Thian</a></span></figcaption></figure><p>The <a href="https://www.newsweek.com/government-shutdown-debate-fuels-house-republican-civil-war-1859677">battle to keep the government open</a> may feel just like the crisis of the day. But these fights pose immediate and long-term risks for the U.S. </p>
<p>The federal government spends tens of billions of dollars every year to support fundamental scientific research that is mostly conducted at universities. For instance, the basic discoveries that made the <a href="https://www.nobelprize.org/prizes/medicine/2023/press-release/">COVID-19 vaccine possible</a> stretch back to the <a href="https://doi.org/10.1038/d41586-021-02483-w">early 1960s</a>. Such research investments contribute to the health, wealth and well-being of society, <a href="https://new.nsf.gov/tip/updates/nsf-pilot-assess-impact-strategic-investments-regional-jobs">support jobs and regional economies</a> and are vital to the U.S. economy and national security.</p>
<p>If Congress can’t reach an agreement, then a temporary government shutdown <a href="https://www.govexec.com/management/2024/01/new-turmoil-over-possible-government-shutdown/393314/">could happen on Jan. 19, 2024</a>. If lawmakers miss a second Feb. 2 deadline, then <a href="https://www.aaas.org/news/what-fiscal-responsibility-act-means-rd-funding">automatic budget cuts</a> will hit future research hard. </p>
<p>Even if lawmakers <a href="https://ww2.aip.org/fyi/the-week-of-january-8-2024">avoid a shutdown</a> and pass a budget, America’s future competitiveness could suffer because federal research investments are on track to be <a href="https://fas.org/publication/fy24-chips-short-7-billion/">billions of dollars below</a> targets Congress set for themselves less than two years ago.</p>
<p><a href="https://public.websites.umich.edu/%7Ejdos/">I am a sociologist</a> who studies how <a href="https://www.sup.org/books/title/?id=26387">research universities contribute to the public good</a>. I’m also the executive director of the <a href="https://iris.isr.umich.edu/">Institute for Research on Innovation and Science</a>, a national university consortium whose members share data that help us understand, explain and work to amplify those benefits. </p>
<p>Our data shows how endangering basic research harms communities across the U.S. and can limit innovative companies’ access to the skilled employees they need to succeed. </p>
<h2>A promised investment</h2>
<p>Less than two years ago, in August 2022, university researchers like me had reason to celebrate. </p>
<p>Congress had just <a href="https://www.whitehouse.gov/briefing-room/statements-releases/2022/08/09/fact-sheet-chips-and-science-act-will-lower-costs-create-jobs-strengthen-supply-chains-and-counter-china/">passed the bipartisan CHIPS and Science Act</a>. The “science” part of the law promised <a href="https://doi.org/10.1038/d41586-022-02086-z">one of the biggest federal investments</a> in the <a href="https://www.nsf.gov">National Science Foundation</a> – America’s premier basic science research agency – in its 74-year history.</p>
<p>The CHIPS act authorized US$81 billion for the agency, promised to double its budget by 2027 and directed it to “address societal, national, and geostrategic challenges for the <a href="https://www.congress.gov/117/plaws/publ167/PLAW-117publ167.pdf">benefit of all Americans</a>” by investing in research.</p>
<p>But there was one very big snag. The money still has to be appropriated by Congress every year. Lawmakers haven’t been good at doing that recently. The government is again poised to shut down. As lawmakers struggle to keep the lights on, fundamental research is likely to be a casualty of political dysfunction. The budget proposals released so far <a href="https://fas.org/publication/fy24-chips-short-7-billion/">fall $5 billion to $7.5 billion short</a> of what the CHIPS act called for in fiscal year 2024. Deal or no deal, science is on the chopping block in Washington. </p>
<figure class="align-center ">
<img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/569123/original/file-20240112-29-o5dds.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&rect=380%2C171%2C7799%2C4831&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/569123/original/file-20240112-29-o5dds.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/569123/original/file-20240112-29-o5dds.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/569123/original/file-20240112-29-o5dds.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/569123/original/file-20240112-29-o5dds.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/569123/original/file-20240112-29-o5dds.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/569123/original/file-20240112-29-o5dds.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">A lag or cut in federal research funding would harm U.S. competitiveness in critical advanced technologies like artificial intelligence and robotics.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.gettyimages.com/detail/photo/teacher-in-a-stem-class-at-the-lab-developing-a-royalty-free-image/1348130740?phrase=research%20lab%20ai">Hispanolistic/E+ via Getty Images</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<h2>Research’s critical impact</h2>
<p>That’s bad because fundamental research matters in more ways than you might expect. </p>
<p>Lagging research investment will hurt U.S. leadership in critical technologies like artificial intelligence, advanced communications, clean energy and biotechnology. Less support means less new research work gets done, fewer new researchers are trained and important new discoveries are made elsewhere. </p>
<p>But disrupting federal research funding also directly <a href="https://theconversation.com/who-feels-the-pain-of-science-research-budget-cuts-75119">affects people’s jobs, lives and the economy</a>. </p>
<p><a href="https://nyuscholars.nyu.edu/en/publications/proximity-and-economic-activity-an-analysis-of-vendor-business-tr">Businesses nationwide thrive</a> by selling the goods and services – everything from pipettes and biological specimens to notebooks and plane tickets – that are necessary for research. Those vendors include high-tech startups, manufacturers, contractors and even Main Street businesses like your local hardware store. They employ your neighbors and friends and contribute to the <a href="https://theconversation.com/when-the-federal-budget-funds-scientific-research-its-the-economy-that-benefits-80651">economic health of your hometown and the nation</a>. </p>
<p>Nearly a third of the $10 billion in federal research funds that 26 of the universities in our consortium used in 2022 directly <a href="https://irisweb.isr.umich.edu/reports/spending_report/15114/53a139385e/5293dc024f/ne">supported U.S. employers</a>, including:</p>
<ul>
<li>A Detroit welding shop that sells gasses many labs use in experiments funded by the National Institutes of Health, National Science Foundation, Department of Defense and Department of Energy. </li>
<li>A Dallas-based <a href="https://www.beckgroup.com/projects/texas-university-systems-national-center-innovation-advanced-development-manufacturing/">construction company</a> that is building an advanced vaccine and drug development facility paid for by the Department of Health and Human Services.</li>
<li>More than a dozen Utah businesses, including surveyors, engineers and construction and trucking companies, working on a <a href="https://utahforge.com/">Department of Energy project</a> to develop breakthroughs in geothermal energy.</li>
</ul>
<p>When Congress’ problems endanger basic research, they also damage businesses like these and people you might not usually associate with academic science and engineering. Construction and manufacturing companies earn more than $2 billion each year from <a href="https://irisweb.isr.umich.edu/reports/new-vendor-report/15115/24ae1564e6/3be59f6032/ne">federally funded research</a> done by our consortium’s members.</p>
<h2>Jobs and innovation</h2>
<p>Disrupting or decreasing research funding also slows the flow of STEM – science, technology, engineering and math – talent from universities to American businesses. Highly trained people are essential to <a href="https://www.doi.org/10.1126/science.aac5949">corporate innovation</a> and to U.S. leadership in key fields, like AI, where companies depend on hiring to secure <a href="https://www.aei.org/research-products/report/the-industry-of-ideas-measuring-how-artificial-intelligence-changes-labor-markets/">research expertise</a>. </p>
<p>In 2022, federal research grants paid wages for about 122,500 people at universities that shared data with my institute. More than half of them were students or trainees. <a href="https://irisweb.isr.umich.edu/reports/employee-report/15110/e656278fea/1c4bfff4a0">Our data shows</a> that they go on to many types of jobs, but are particularly important for leading tech companies like Google, Amazon, Apple, Facebook and Intel.</p>
<p>More comprehensive numbers don’t exist, but that same data lets me estimate that over 300,000 people who worked at U.S. universities in 2022 were paid by federal research funds. Threats to federal research investments put academic jobs at risk. They also hurt private-sector innovation because even the most successful companies need to hire people with expert research skills. Most people learn those skills by working on university research projects, and most of those projects are federally funded.</p>
<h2>High stakes</h2>
<p>The last shutdown was the <a href="https://www.cnn.com/2023/09/29/politics/last-federal-government-shutdown-longest-dg/index.html">longest in 40 years</a>, but even short delays in research funding have <a href="https://weiyangtham.com/files/tcps_funding-delays.pdf">big negative effects</a> on the scientific workforce and lead expert researchers to look outside the U.S. for jobs. Temporary cuts to research funding hurt too because they <a href="https://doi.org/10.1093/qje/qjac046">reduce high-tech entrepreneurship and decrease publication</a> of new findings. </p>
<p>Lasting stagnation or shrinking investments would have even more pronounced effects. Over time, companies would see fewer skilled job candidates, academic and corporate researchers would produce fewer discoveries, and fewer high-tech startups would mean slower economic growth. America would become less competitive in the age of AI. This would make one of the fears that led lawmakers to pass the CHIPS and Science Act into a reality.</p>
<p>Ultimately, it’s up to lawmakers to decide whether to fulfill their promise to invest more in the research that supports jobs across the economy and American innovation, competitiveness and economic growth. Whether the current budget deal succeeds or fails, basic research is on the table and the stakes are high.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/215866/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Jason Owen-Smith's research is supported by grants from the National Science Foundation, the National Institutes of Health, the Alfred P. Sloan Foundation and Wellcome Leap. He is executive director of the Institute for Research on Innovation and Science (IRIS).</span></em></p>The latest government showdown over the budget risks not only a shutdown but jobs, regional economies and America’s competitiveness in AI and other advanced fields.Jason Owen-Smith, Professor of Sociology, University of MichiganLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/2157472023-10-20T12:25:50Z2023-10-20T12:25:50ZQuantum dots − a new Nobel laureate describes the development of these nanoparticles from basic research to industry application<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/554426/original/file-20231017-23-nsxqeq.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&rect=617%2C37%2C7403%2C5450&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">Louis Brus, center, shares Nobel recognition with two other quantum dots pioneers.</span> <span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.gettyimages.com/detail/news-photo/screen-shows-this-years-laureates-us-chemist-moungi-bawendi-news-photo/1705016177?adppopup=true">Jonathan Nackstrand/AFP via Getty Images</a></span></figcaption></figure><p><em>The Nobel Prize in chemistry for 2023 goes to three scientists “for the <a href="https://www.nobelprize.org/prizes/chemistry/2023/press-release/">discovery and synthesis of quantum dots</a>.” <a href="https://theconversation.com/becoming-a-nobel-laureate-louis-brus-on-his-discovery-of-quantum-dots-podcast-215915">The Conversation Weekly podcast</a> caught up with one of this trio, physical chemist <a href="https://scholar.google.com/citations?user=GT0oh5QAAAAJ&hl=en&oi=ao">Louis Brus</a>, who did foundational work figuring out that the properties of these nanoparticles depend on their size. Brus’ phone was off when the Nobel reps called to inform him of the good news, but now plenty of people have gotten through with congratulations and advice. Below are edited excerpts from the podcast.</em></p>
<p><strong>When you were working at Bell Labs in the 1980s and discovered quantum dots, it was something of an accident. You were studying solutions of semiconductor particles. And when you aimed lasers at these solutions, called colloids, you noticed that the colors they emitted were not constant.</strong></p>
<p>On the first day we made the colloid, sometimes the spectrum was different. Second and third day, it was normal. There certainly was a surprise when I first saw this change in the spectrum. And so, I began to try to figure out what the heck was going on with that.</p>
<p>I noticed that the property of the particle itself began to change at a very small size.</p>
<p><strong>What you’d found was a quantum dot: a type of nanoparticle that absorbs light and emits it at another wavelength. Crucially, the color of these particles changes depending on the actual size of the particle. How do you even see a quantum dot crystal, since one is just a few hundred thousandths the width of a human hair?</strong></p>
<p>Well, you can’t see them with an optical microscope because they’re smaller than the wavelength of light. There are ways to see them too, using other types of specialist microscopes, such as an electron microscope. And a common way of demonstrating them is to line up a row of brightly colored glass flasks each with a solution of different sized quantum dots inside it.</p>
<figure class="align-center zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/554425/original/file-20231017-21-wzhcci.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="diagram of a molecule next to a soccer ball next to a planet" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/554425/original/file-20231017-21-wzhcci.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/554425/original/file-20231017-21-wzhcci.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=186&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/554425/original/file-20231017-21-wzhcci.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=186&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/554425/original/file-20231017-21-wzhcci.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=186&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/554425/original/file-20231017-21-wzhcci.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=234&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/554425/original/file-20231017-21-wzhcci.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=234&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/554425/original/file-20231017-21-wzhcci.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=234&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">A quantum dot is a crystal that often consists of just a few thousand atoms. In terms of size, it has the same relationship to a soccer ball as a soccer ball has to the size of the Earth.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.nobelprize.org/prizes/chemistry/2023/press-release/">Johan Jarnestad/The Royal Swedish Academy of Sciences</a>, <a class="license" href="http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nd/4.0/">CC BY-ND</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p><strong>One of your fellow laureates, <a href="https://www.nobelprize.org/prizes/chemistry/2023/ekimov/facts/">Alexei Ekimov</a>, was a Russian scientist, and he’d actually observed quantum dots in colored glass, but you weren’t aware of his findings at the time?</strong></p>
<p>Yes, that’s right. The Cold War was going on at that time, and he published in the Russian literature, in Russian. And he wasn’t allowed to travel to the West to talk about his work.</p>
<p>I asked around among all the physicists, was there any work on small particles? I was trying to make a model of the quantum size effects. And they told me no, nobody’s really working on this. Nobody had seen his articles, basically.</p>
<p>I was part of the U.S. chemistry community, doing synthetic chemistry in the laboratory. He was in the glass industry in the Soviet Union, working on industrial technology.</p>
<p>When I eventually found his articles in the technological literature, I wrote a letter to the Soviet Union, with my papers, just to say hello to Ekimov and his colleagues. When the letter came, the KGB came to talk to the Russian scientists, trying to figure out why they had any contact with anybody in the West. But in fact they had never talked to me or anyone in the West when my letter arrived in the mail.</p>
<p><strong>Have you met him since?</strong></p>
<p>Yes, they were able to come out of the Soviet Union during Glasnost, this would be the late 1980s. There’s Ekimov, and then there is his theoretical collaborator <a href="https://scholar.google.com/citations?user=upaytw8AAAAJ&hl=en">Sasha Efros</a>, who now works at the <a href="https://www.nature.com/articles/d41586-023-03179-z">U.S. Naval Research Lab</a>. I met them as soon as they came to the U.S.</p>
<hr>
<p><em>Listen to the interview with Louis Brus on The Conversation Weekly podcast. Each week, academic experts tell us about the fascinating discoveries they’re making to understand the world and the big questions they’re still trying to answer.</em></p>
<iframe src="https://embed.acast.com/60087127b9687759d637bade/652ff01993a2360012ccc1a9" frameborder="0" width="100%" height="190px"></iframe>
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<p><iframe id="tc-infographic-561" class="tc-infographic" height="100" src="https://cdn.theconversation.com/infographics/561/4fbbd099d631750693d02bac632430b71b37cd5f/site/index.html" width="100%" style="border: none" frameborder="0"></iframe></p>
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<p><strong>One of the issues with quantum dots, when you first observed them, was how to actually produce them and keep them stable. Then, in the 1990s, your fellow laureate, <a href="https://scholar.google.com/citations?user=8086TkwAAAAJ&hl=en&oi=ao">Moungi Bawendi</a>, figured this out. What do you think is the most striking thing that you’ve seen quantum dots used in so far?</strong></p>
<p>Usually when a new material is invented, it takes a long time to figure out what it’s really good for. Research scientists, they have ideas, you might use it for this, you might use it for that. But then, if you talk to people in the actual industry, who deal every day with manufacturing problems, these ideas are often not very good.</p>
<p>But the knowledge that we gained, the scientific principles, could be used to help to design new devices.</p>
<p>As far as first applications, people began to try to use them in biological imaging. Biochemists attach quantum dots to other molecules to help map cells and organs. They’ve even been used to detect tumors, and to help guide surgeons during operations.</p>
<figure class="align-center zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/554428/original/file-20231017-19-jmznq7.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="7 glowing vials" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/554428/original/file-20231017-19-jmznq7.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/554428/original/file-20231017-19-jmznq7.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=338&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/554428/original/file-20231017-19-jmznq7.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=338&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/554428/original/file-20231017-19-jmznq7.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=338&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/554428/original/file-20231017-19-jmznq7.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=424&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/554428/original/file-20231017-19-jmznq7.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=424&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/554428/original/file-20231017-19-jmznq7.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=424&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Quantum dot particles were continually improved so they would reliably emit very particular colors.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.gettyimages.com/detail/photo/quantum-dot-royalty-free-image/1311600163?adppopup=true">Tayfun Ruzgar/iStock via Getty Images Plus</a></span>
</figcaption>
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<p>And as scientists kept working to synthesize quantum dots, the quality of the particles kept improving. They were emitting pure colors, rather than distributions of light – like maybe red with a little bit of green, or maybe red with some pink. When you got a better particle, it would be just pure red, for instance.</p>
<p>So then people made the connection to the display industry – computer displays and television displays. In this application, you want to convert electricity into three colors: red, green and blue. You can make up any kind of image, starting with just those three colors in different proportions.</p>
<p>It takes a lot of courage. You have to invest a lot of money to develop the technology, and maybe at the end of it, it’s not good enough, and it will not replace what you already have. And there’s a lot of credit due to the Samsung Corporation in Japan. Hundreds of billions of dollars were invested in the technology of these particles to get them to the point where they could begin to manufacture displays and flat-panel TVs using quantum dots.</p>
<p><strong>Your work is an example of the importance of basic research, of being curious, trying to solve mysteries without a particular endpoint or industrial application in sight. What message would you have for a young chemist starting out today working on such basic research?</strong></p>
<p>The world is a huge place, and you could do basic research in a huge number of different areas. You want to pick a problem where, if you are spectacularly successful and you actually discover something really interesting, it might have some application in the world.</p>
<p>For better or for worse, you have to make a choice in the beginning, and it takes some intuition.</p>
<p>A good way to do it is you pick a subject that you know is important to technology, but there’s no understanding of the science at the present time. It’s a complete black box. Nobody understands the basic principles. That kind of problem, you can begin to take it apart and look to see what the basic steps are.</p>
<p><strong>What changes for you now that you’ve won the Nobel Prize?</strong></p>
<p>Well, this Nobel Prize, for better or for worse, has a special meaning in people’s minds all over the world. Yesterday when the mailman came I happened to be at the front door and he recognized me because my face was in the local newspaper. And he said, “I’ve never shaken the hand of a Nobel laureate before.”</p>
<p>For better or for worse, this is where I am right now, in a special category whether I like it or not. I still have my office in the university, but I don’t have a research group. I’m trying to leave that to the younger people. So this recognition probably means less for my research than it would if I was 40 years old.</p>
<p>I have received congratulations by email from a number of people who won the prize in past years. Their main recommendation is you must learn to say no. People will ask you to do all kinds of crazy things, and your time will be entirely taken up with these honorific university visits and giving little speeches. In order to have a real life and to be productive, you have to say no to all of these extraneous invitations.</p>
<figure class="align-center zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/554429/original/file-20231017-21-zysnay.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="elaborate stage ceremony" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/554429/original/file-20231017-21-zysnay.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/554429/original/file-20231017-21-zysnay.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/554429/original/file-20231017-21-zysnay.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/554429/original/file-20231017-21-zysnay.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/554429/original/file-20231017-21-zysnay.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/554429/original/file-20231017-21-zysnay.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/554429/original/file-20231017-21-zysnay.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
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<span class="caption">The Nobel Prize awards ceremony in Stockholm is a black-tie affair.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.gettyimages.com/detail/news-photo/general-view-of-the-nobel-prize-awards-ceremony-at-news-photo/1448161113?adppopup=true">Pascal Le Segretain/Getty Images</a></span>
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<p>And they also told me to have fun in Sweden! It’s an extremely elaborate schedule of events for that week in December when this award ceremony is. Extremely fancy. American culture, physics culture is different – if you win a prize from the American Physical Society, it’s a very low-key event. You just show up in an auditorium. It’s not even necessary to wear a suit.</p>
<p>So I will take my family, my grandchildren to Sweden and we’ll try to enjoy this as a great vacation.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/215747/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Louis Brus does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organization that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>Louis Brus explains some of the foundational research – and how even the letter carrier wants to shake your hand when you’ve just won a Nobel Prize.Louis Brus, Professor Emeritus of Chemistry, Columbia UniversityLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/2147702023-10-03T00:31:22Z2023-10-03T00:31:22ZTenacious curiosity in the lab can lead to a Nobel Prize – mRNA research exemplifies the unpredictable value of basic scientific research<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/551551/original/file-20231002-25-ii4mxj.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&rect=0%2C0%2C2100%2C1427&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">Basic research often involves lab work that won't be appreciated until decades down the line.</span> <span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.gettyimages.com/detail/photo/pcr-diagnostics-kit-royalty-free-image/1285418766">Sebastian Condrea/Moment via Getty Images</a></span></figcaption></figure><p><em>The <a href="https://www.nobelprize.org/prizes/medicine/2023/press-release/">2023 Nobel Prize in physiology or medicine</a> will go to Katalin Karikó and Drew Weissman for their discovery that modifying <a href="https://www.genome.gov/genetics-glossary/messenger-rna">mRNA</a> – a form of genetic material your body uses to produce proteins – could reduce unwanted inflammatory responses and allow it to be delivered into cells. While the impact of their findings may not have been apparent at the time of their breakthrough over a decade ago, their work paved the way for the development of the <a href="https://theconversation.com/how-mrna-and-dna-vaccines-could-soon-treat-cancers-hiv-autoimmune-disorders-and-genetic-diseases-170772">Pfizer-BioNTech and Moderna COVID-19 vaccines</a>, as well as many other therapeutic applications currently in development. The <a href="https://www.nobelprize.org/prizes/physics/2023/summary/">2023 Nobel Prize in physics</a> likewise will go to a team of scientists who used lasers to clarify the behavior of electrons, and many prior Nobels have honored basic research.</em></p>
<p><em>We asked André O. Hudson, a <a href="https://scholar.google.com/citations?user=zLwzHqcAAAAJ&hl=en">biochemist and microbiologist</a> at the Rochester Institute of Technology, to explain how basic research like that of this year’s Nobel Prize winners provides the foundations for science – even when its far-reaching effects won’t be felt until years later.</em></p>
<h2>What is basic science?</h2>
<p><a href="https://www.niaid.nih.gov/grants-contracts/basic-research-definition">Basic research</a>, sometimes called fundamental research, is a type of investigation with the overarching goal of understanding natural phenomena like how cells work or how birds can fly. Scientists are asking the fundamental questions of how, why, when, where and if in order to bridge a gap in curiosity and understanding about the natural world.</p>
<p>Researchers sometimes conduct basic research with the hope of eventually developing a technology or drug based on that work. But what many scientists typically do in academia is ask fundamental questions with answers that may or may not ever lead to practical applications.</p>
<p>Humans, and the animal kingdom as a whole, are <a href="https://www.cell.com/current-biology/pdf/S0960-9822(13)00265-0.pdf">wired to be curious</a>. Basic research scratches that itch.</p>
<h2>What are some basic science discoveries that went on to have a big influence on medicine?</h2>
<p>The <a href="https://www.nobelprize.org/prizes/medicine/2023/press-release/">2023 Nobel Prize in physiology or medicine</a> acknowledges basic science work done in the early 2000s. Karikó and Weissman’s discovery about modifying mRNA to reduce the body’s inflammatory response to it allowed other researchers to leverage it to make improved vaccines.</p>
<p>Another example is the <a href="https://theconversation.com/guns-not-roses-heres-the-true-story-of-penicillins-first-patient-178463">discovery of antibiotics</a>, which was based on an unexpected observation. In the late 1920s, the microbiologist Alexander Fleming was growing a species of bacteria in his lab and found that his Petri dish was accidentally contaminated with the fungus <em>Penicillium notatum</em>. He noticed that wherever the fungus was growing, it impeded or inhibited the growth of the bacteria. He wondered why that was happening and subsequently went on to isolate penicillin, which was approved for medical use in the early 1940s.</p>
<p>This work fed into more questions that ushered in the age of antibiotics. The 1952 Nobel Prize in physiology or medicine was awarded to Selman Waksman for his <a href="https://www.nobelprize.org/prizes/medicine/1952/summary/">discovery of streptomycin</a>, the first antibiotic to treat tuberculosis.</p>
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<figcaption><span class="caption">Penicillin was discovered by accident.</span></figcaption>
</figure>
<p>Basic research often involves seeing something surprising, wanting to understand why and deciding to investigate further. Early discoveries start from a basic observation, asking the simple question of “How?” Only later are they parlayed into a medical technology that helps humanity.</p>
<h2>Why does it take so long to get from curiosity-driven basic science to a new product or technology?</h2>
<p>The mRNA modification discovery could be considered to be on a relatively fast track from basic science to application. Less than 15 years passed between Karikó and Weissman’s findings and the COVID-19 vaccines. The importance of their discovery came to the forefront with the pandemic and the <a href="https://www.commonwealthfund.org/blog/2022/two-years-covid-vaccines-prevented-millions-deaths-hospitalizations">millions of lives</a> they saved.</p>
<p>Most basic research won’t reach the market until <a href="https://doi.org/10.1126/scitranslmed.aaa0599">several decades</a> after its initial publication in a science journal. One reason is because it depends on need. For example, <a href="https://www.fda.gov/drugs/information-consumers-and-patients-drugs/orphan-products-hope-people-rare-diseases">orphan diseases</a> that affect only a small number of people will get less attention and funding than conditions that are ubiquitous in a population, like cancer or diabetes. Companies don’t want to spend billions of dollars developing a drug that will only have a small return on their investment. Likewise, because the return on investment for basic research often isn’t clear, it can be a hard sell to support financially.</p>
<p>Another reason is cultural. Scientists are trained to chase after funding and support for their work wherever they can find it. But sometimes that’s not as easy as it seems.</p>
<p>A good example of this was when the <a href="https://theconversation.com/the-human-genome-project-pieced-together-only-92-of-the-dna-now-scientists-have-finally-filled-in-the-remaining-8-176138">human genome was first sequenced</a> in the early 2000s. A lot of people thought that having access to the full sequence would lead to treatments and cures for many different diseases. <a href="https://theconversation.com/why-sequencing-the-human-genome-failed-to-produce-big-breakthroughs-in-disease-130568">But that has not been the case</a>, because there are many nuances to translating basic research to the clinic. What works in a cell or an animal might not translate into people. There are many steps and layers in the process to get there.</p>
<h2>Why is basic science important?</h2>
<p>For me, the most critical reason is that basic research is how we <a href="https://dx.doi.org/10.1210%2Fme.2014-1343">train and mentor future scientists</a>. </p>
<p>In an academic setting, telling students “Let’s go develop an mRNA vaccine” versus “How does mRNA work in the body” influences how they approach science. How do they design experiments? Do they start the study going forward or backward? Are they argumentative or cautious in how they present their findings?</p>
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<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/551554/original/file-20231002-28-a388bt.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="Close-up of scientist wearing nitrile gloves looking into microscope hovering over Petri dish" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/551554/original/file-20231002-28-a388bt.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/551554/original/file-20231002-28-a388bt.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/551554/original/file-20231002-28-a388bt.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/551554/original/file-20231002-28-a388bt.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/551554/original/file-20231002-28-a388bt.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/551554/original/file-20231002-28-a388bt.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/551554/original/file-20231002-28-a388bt.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
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<span class="caption">There are many steps between translating findings in a lab to the clinic.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.gettyimages.com/detail/photo/scrutinising-a-new-sample-royalty-free-image/1206157642">Marco VDM/E+ via Getty Images</a></span>
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<p>Almost every scientist is trained under a basic research umbrella of how to ask questions and go through the scientific method. You need to understand how, when and where mRNAs are modified before you can even begin to develop an mRNA vaccine. I believe the best way to inspire future scientists is to encourage them to expand on their curiosity in order to make a difference. </p>
<p>When I was writing my dissertation, I was relying on studies that were published in the late 1800s and early 1900s. Many of these studies are still cited in scientific articles today. When researchers share their work, though it may not be today or tomorrow, or 10 to 20 years from now, it will be of use to someone else in the future. You’ll make a future scientist’s job a little bit easier, and I believe that’s a great legacy to have.</p>
<h2>What is a common misconception about basic science?</h2>
<p>Because any immediate use for basic science can be very hard to see, it’s easy to think this kind of research <a href="https://theconversation.com/funding-basic-research-plays-the-long-game-for-future-payoffs-100435">is a waste of money or time</a>. Why are scientists breeding mosquitoes in these labs? Or why are researchers studying migratory birds? The same argument has been made with astronomy. Why are we spending billions of dollars putting things into space? Why are we looking to the edge of the universe and studying stars when they are millions and billions of light years away? How does it affect us?</p>
<p>There is a need for <a href="https://doi.org/10.1073/pnas.1912436117">more scientific literacy</a> because not having it can make it difficult to understand why basic research is necessary to future breakthroughs that will have a major effect on society.</p>
<p>In the short term, the worth of basic research can be hard to see. But in the long term, history has shown that a lot of what we take for granted now, such as common medical equipment like <a href="https://www.aps.org/publications/apsnews/200111/history.cfm">X-rays</a>, <a href="https://nationalmaglab.org/magnet-academy/history-of-electricity-magnetism/pioneers/theodore-maiman/">lasers</a> and <a href="https://www.aps.org/publications/apsnews/200607/history.cfm">MRIs</a>, came from basic things people discovered in the lab. </p>
<p>And it still goes down to the fundamental questions – we’re a species that seeks answers to things we don’t know. As long as curiosity is a part of humanity, we’re always going to be seeking answers.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/214770/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>André O. Hudson receives funding from the National Institutes of Health. </span></em></p>The winners of the 2023 Nobel Prize in physiology or medicine made a discovery that helped create the COVID-19 vaccines. They couldn’t have anticipated the tremendous impact of their findings.André O. Hudson, Dean of the College of Science, Professor of Biochemistry, Rochester Institute of TechnologyLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/2083432023-06-27T12:24:42Z2023-06-27T12:24:42ZLab-grown meat techniques aren’t new – cell cultures are common tools in science, but bringing them up to scale to meet society’s demand for meat will require further development<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/533777/original/file-20230623-15-zpv5wg.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&rect=0%2C0%2C2121%2C1412&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">Cell cultures are often grown in petri dishes.</span> <span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.gettyimages.com/detail/photo/barcoded-petri-dishes-royalty-free-image/478184231">Wladimir Bulgar/Science Photo Library via Getty Images</a></span></figcaption></figure><p>You might be old enough to remember the famous “<a href="https://www.yahoo.com/news/the-inside-story-of-wendys-wheres-the-beef-ad-140051010.html">Where’s the Beef?</a>” Wendy’s commercials. This question may be asked in a different context since <a href="https://apnews.com/article/cultivated-meat-lab-grown-cell-based-a88ab8e0241712b501aa191cdbf6b39a">U.S. regulators approved</a> the sale of lab-grown chicken meat made from cultivated cells in June 2023.</p>
<p>Growing animal cells in the lab isn’t new. Scientists have been culturing animal cells in artificial environments <a href="https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-07758-1_3">since the 1950s</a>, initially focusing on studying developmental biology and cancer. This technique remains one of the major tools in life science research, especially for <a href="https://doi.org/10.1016%2Fj.jsps.2014.04.002">drug development</a>. </p>
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<figcaption><span class="caption">The USDA approved cell-cultivated chicken on June 21, 2023.</span></figcaption>
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<h2>What are cell cultures?</h2>
<p>Cell cultures are typically grown using either <a href="https://dx.doi.org/10.13070/mm.en.3.175">natural or artificial growth media</a>. Natural media comprise naturally-derived biological fluids, whereas artificial media comprise both organic and inorganic nutrients and compounds. Both contain the necessary ingredients to foster the growth and development of cells. These ingredients typically contain nutrients such as vitamins, carbohydrates, amino acids and other molecules that provide the fuel for cells to grow and multiply.</p>
<p>Researchers use cells grown using tissue culture to answer a <a href="https://doi.org/10.1016%2Fj.jsps.2014.04.002">variety of experimental questions</a>. <a href="https://scholar.google.com/citations?user=zLwzHqcAAAAJ&hl=en">As a biochemist</a>, I use plant tissue culture techniques in my courses and research program. Researchers can add viruses, bacteria, fungi, hormones, vitamins and other pathogens or compounds to cells grown in culture to observe how different factors affect the cells’ behavior or function, especially as it relates to which genes are turned on or off in the cell and which proteins respond to those pathogens or compounds. </p>
<p>In <a href="https://theconversation.com/from-the-research-lab-to-your-doctors-office-heres-what-happens-in-phase-1-2-3-drug-trials-138197">drug development</a>, growing cells in culture is usually the first step before potential drug candidates can be tested in animals.</p>
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<figcaption><span class="caption">Cell cultures involve growing cells outside of their native environment.</span></figcaption>
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<h2>How is lab-grown meat made?</h2>
<p>Researchers use similar techniques to <a href="https://thehumaneleague.org/article/lab-grown-meat">grow meat in the lab</a>. The process can generally be broken down into <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=u468xY1T8fw">three major steps</a>. </p>
<p>The first step involves removing a small number of cells – typically muscle or stem cells – from an animal during a harmless and painless procedure. <a href="https://theconversation.com/triggering-cancer-cells-to-become-normal-cells-how-stem-cell-therapies-can-provide-new-ways-to-stop-tumors-from-spreading-or-growing-back-191559">Stem cells</a> are cells from an organism that are not specialized and can be manipulated in the lab to turn into the many different types of cells of that organism.</p>
<p>The next step is culturing the cells. The cells are placed in an artificial environment favorable to their growth. Because of the large amount of cells that have to be grown to produce meat, the cells are incubated <a href="https://www.engr.colostate.edu/CBE101/topics/bioreactors.html">in a bioreactor</a> – a steel tank that provides controlled temperature, humidity, pressure and sterile conditions – with the appropriate medium to facilitate growth. The growth media are changed a number of times to encourage the cells to differentiate and multiply into the three major components of meat: muscle, fat and connective tissue. </p>
<p>In last step of the process, known as scaffolding, the cells are organized and packed tightly together to create the desired size, shape and cut of meat for consumption. </p>
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<figcaption><span class="caption">Making cultured meat has seen lots of progress in the lab, but there is still a long way to go.</span></figcaption>
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<h2>Pros and cons of cultured meat</h2>
<p>There are pros and cons to growing meat through cell culture techniques. While cultured meat may produce relatively less greenhouse gas than conventional livestock production in <a href="https://doi.org/10.1038/s43016-020-0112-z">certain conditions</a>, researchers <a href="https://doi.org/10.3389/fsufs.2019.00005">need to refine the process</a> before it can be cost-efficient and brought to scale. </p>
<p>A 2021 analysis estimated that lab-grown meat will <a href="https://doi.org/10.1002/bit.27848">cost US$17 to $23 per pound</a> to produce, and that does not include grocery store markups. In comparison, conventionally grown ground beef typically costs <a href="https://www.bls.gov/regions/mid-atlantic/data/averageretailfoodandenergyprices_usandmidwest_table.htm">a little under $5 per pound</a>. </p>
<p>A 2021 <a href="https://www.mckinsey.com/industries/agriculture/our-insights/cultivated-meat-out-of-the-lab-into-the-frying-pan">McKinsey report</a> estimates that it will take approximately <a href="https://www.greenbiz.com/article/lab-meat-has-3-big-problems-it-time-pivot">220 million to 440 million liters of bioreactor capacity</a> to meet 1% of current protein market share, but current bioreactor capacity tops out at 200 million liters. There are also concerns about the biological limitations of growing large numbers of various cell types in the same bioreactor.</p>
<p>Lab-grown meat may <a href="https://theconversation.com/no-animal-required-but-would-people-eat-artificial-meat-72372">improve animal welfare</a> and be less likely to carry disease or cause food-borne illnesses. However, consumers may also perceive lab-grown meat to be unnatural or have concerns about its taste.</p>
<p>Companies are likely paying attention and adapting to the public’s response. To put things in perspective, the <a href="https://www.forbes.com/sites/lanabandoim/2022/03/08/making-meat-affordable-progress-since-the-330000-lab-grown-burger/?sh=523ac7c24667">first lab-grown burger</a> cost $330,000 to create in 2013. The price has fallen to just under $10 per burger today, which is remarkable progress in just a decade.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/208343/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>André O. Hudson receives funding from the National Institutes of Health </span></em></p>Cell cultures are common tools in biology and drug development. Bringing them up to scale to meet the meat needs of societies will require further development.André O. Hudson, Dean of the College of Science, Professor of Biochemistry, Rochester Institute of TechnologyLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/1961002023-01-10T13:30:06Z2023-01-10T13:30:06ZOrgan-on-a-chip models allow researchers to conduct studies closer to real-life conditions – and possibly grease the drug development pipeline<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/501906/original/file-20221219-18-6xab1c.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&rect=0%2C0%2C2044%2C1581&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">The lung-on-a-chip can mimic both the physical and mechanical qualities of a human lung.</span> <span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://flic.kr/p/HQBa1g">Wyss Institute for Biologically Inspired Engineering, Harvard University/Flickr</a></span></figcaption></figure><p><a href="https://doi.org/10.1007/s40273-021-01065-y">Bringing a new drug to market</a> costs billions of dollars and can take over a decade. These high monetary and time investments are both strong contributors to today’s skyrocketing health care costs and significant obstacles to delivering new therapies to patients. One big reason behind these barriers is the lab models researchers use to develop drugs in the first place.</p>
<p><a href="https://www.fda.gov/patients/drug-development-process/step-2-preclinical-research">Preclinical trials</a>, or studies that test a drug’s efficacy and toxicity before it enters clinical trials in people, are mainly conducted on cell cultures and animals. Both are limited by their poor ability to mimic the conditions of the human body. <a href="https://doi.org/10.1016%2FB978-0-12-803077-6.00009-6">Cell cultures</a> in a petri dish are unable to replicate every aspect of tissue function, such as how cells interact in the body or the dynamics of living organs. And <a href="https://doi.org/10.1093/bioinformatics/btu611">animals</a> are not humans – even small genetic differences between species can be amplified to major physiological differences. </p>
<p><a href="https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3902221/">Fewer than 8%</a> of successful animal studies for cancer therapies make it to human clinical trials. Because animal models often fail to predict drug effects in human clinical trials, these late-stage failures can significantly drive up both costs and patient health risks. </p>
<p>To address this translation problem, researchers have been developing a promising model that can more closely mimic the human body – organ-on-a-chip. </p>
<p>As an <a href="https://scholar.google.com/citations?user=FppSA-0AAAAJ&hl=en">analytical chemist</a>, I have been working to develop organ and tissue models that avoid the simplicity of common cell cultures and the discrepancies of animal models. I believe that, with further development, organs-on-chips can help researchers study diseases and test drugs in conditions that are closer to real life.</p>
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<figcaption><span class="caption">Organs-on-chips offer an alternative model for early-phase biomedical research.</span></figcaption>
</figure>
<h2>What are organs-on-chips?</h2>
<p>In the late 1990s, researchers figured out a way to <a href="https://gmwgroup.harvard.edu/files/gmwgroup/files/1073.pdf">layer elastic polymers</a> to control and examine fluids at a microscopic level. This launched the field of <a href="https://doi.org/10.1016/j.mne.2019.01.003">microfluidics</a>, which for the biomedical sciences involves the use of devices that can mimic the dynamic flow of fluids in the body, such as blood.</p>
<p>Advances in microfluidics have provided researchers a platform to culture cells that function more closely to how they would in the human body, specifically with <a href="https://doi.org/10.1038/s41578-018-0034-7">organs-on-chips</a>. The “chip” refers to the microfluidic device that encases the cells. They’re commonly made using the same technology as computer chips. </p>
<p>Not only do organs-on-chips mimic blood flow in the body, these platforms have microchambers that allow researchers to integrate multiple types of cells to mimic the diverse range of cell types normally present in an organ. The fluid flow connects these multiple cell types, allowing researchers to study how they interact with each other.</p>
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<iframe width="440" height="260" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/M37ZU0Ptkww?wmode=transparent&start=0" frameborder="0" allowfullscreen=""></iframe>
<figcaption><span class="caption">Microfluidics can be used for many applications in biological research.</span></figcaption>
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<p>This technology can overcome the limitations of both static cell cultures and animal studies in several ways. First, the presence of fluid flowing in the model allows it to mimic both what a cell experiences in the body, such as how it receives nutrients and removes wastes, and how a drug will move in the blood and interact with multiple types of cells. The ability to control fluid flow also enables researchers to fine-tune the optimal dosing for a particular drug.</p>
<p>The <a href="https://doi.org/10.1126/science.1188302">lung-on-a-chip</a> model, for instance, is able to integrate both the mechanical and physical qualities of a living human lung. It’s able to mimic the dilation and contraction, or inhalation and exhalation, of the lung and simulate the interface between the lung and air. The ability to replicate these qualities allows researchers to better study lung impairment across different factors.</p>
<h2>Bringing organs-on-chips to scale</h2>
<p>While organ-on-a-chip pushes the boundaries of early-stage pharmaceutical research, the technology has <a href="https://doi.org/10.1016/j.drudis.2019.03.011">not been widely integrated</a> into drug development pipelines. I believe that a core obstacle for wide adoption of such chips is its high complexity and low practicality.</p>
<p>Current organ-on-a-chip models are difficult for the average scientist to use. Also, because most models are single-use and allow only one input, which limits what researchers can study at a given time, they are both expensive and time- and labor-intensive to implement. The <a href="https://doi.org/10.1039/c6lc01554a">high investments required</a> to use these models might dampen enthusiasm to adopt them. After all, researchers often use the least complex models available for preclinical studies to reduce time and cost.</p>
<figure class="align-center zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/501643/original/file-20221216-13-pjt0d0.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="Close-up of blood-brain barrier on a chip" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/501643/original/file-20221216-13-pjt0d0.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/501643/original/file-20221216-13-pjt0d0.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=433&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/501643/original/file-20221216-13-pjt0d0.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=433&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/501643/original/file-20221216-13-pjt0d0.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=433&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/501643/original/file-20221216-13-pjt0d0.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=544&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/501643/original/file-20221216-13-pjt0d0.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=544&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/501643/original/file-20221216-13-pjt0d0.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=544&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">This chip mimics the blood-brain barrier. The blue dye marks where brain cells would go, and the red dye marks the route of blood flow.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://flic.kr/p/HRUHqg">Vanderbilt University/Flickr</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>Lowering the technical bar to make and use organs-on-chips is critical to allowing the entire research community to take full advantage of their benefits. But this does not necessarily require simplifying the models. <a href="https://chenresearchlab.umbc.edu">My lab</a>, for example, has designed various <a href="https://doi.org/10.26434/chemrxiv.12964604.v1">“plug-and-play” tissue chips</a> that are standardized and modular, allowing researchers to readily assemble premade parts to run their experiments.</p>
<p>The advent of <a href="https://pubs.acs.org/doi/full/10.1021/ac403397r">3D printing</a> has also significantly facilitated the development of organ-on-a-chip, allowing researchers to directly manufacture entire tissue and organ models on chips. 3D printing is ideal for fast prototyping and design-sharing between users and also makes it easy for mass production of standardized materials.</p>
<p>I believe that organs-on-chips hold the potential to enable breakthroughs in drug discovery and allow researchers to better understand how organs function in health and disease. Increasing this technology’s accessibility could help take the model out of development in the lab and let it make its mark on the biomedical industry.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/196100/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Chengpeng Chen receives funding from the NIH.</span></em></p>Successes in the lab mostly don’t translate to people. Research models that better mimic the human body could close the gap.Chengpeng Chen, Assistant Professor of Chemistry and Biochemistry, University of Maryland, Baltimore CountyLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/1746072022-01-10T19:13:25Z2022-01-10T19:13:25ZARC grants: if Australia wants to tackle the biggest issues, politicians need to stop meddling with basic research<p>In countries like Denmark and Germany, gifts are given on Christmas Eve, rather than Christmas morning. Likewise, on Christmas Eve 2021, 587 groups of researchers at universities around Australia received a festive gift from the Australian Research Council (ARC), in the form of news that their 2022 Discovery Projects were to be funded. </p>
<p>More brutally, 2,508 other groups of researchers also received the less than festive news that their proposed Discovery Projects were to be denied funding.</p>
<p>This acceptance rate was even lower than it should have been. Among the 2,508 unlucky applications were six that had passed the ARC’s rigorous peer-review process, but were vetoed by Stuart Robert, acting federal education minister, on the grounds they “do not demonstrate value for taxpayers’ money nor contribute to the national interest”.</p>
<p>In an <a href="https://tinyurl.com/OpenLetterARC">open letter</a> published today, I and 62 of my fellow ARC laureate fellows – including one who is also a Nobel Laureate – complain vigorously to the minister and to the chief executive of the ARC about this political interference in the funding of basic research.</p>
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<strong>
Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/ministerial-interference-is-an-attack-on-academic-freedom-and-australias-literary-culture-174329">Ministerial interference is an attack on academic freedom and Australia's literary culture</a>
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<p>Discovery Projects are one of the main mechanisms to fund basic research in the sciences and humanities in Australia. They are an especially vital source of funding for early-career researchers. The Australian government spends around A$250 million of public money each year on these grants. With an acceptance rate of just 19%, these awards are highly competitive and prestigious.</p>
<p>The last time such ministerial intervention became public was in October 2018, when it <a href="https://theconversation.com/simon-birminghams-intervention-in-research-funding-is-not-unprecedented-but-dangerous-105737">emerged</a> the then education minister Simon Birmingham denied funding to 11 ARC grants over the preceding two years. There was understandable outrage. </p>
<p>In response to significant criticism about that intervention, the government introduced a <a href="https://www.arc.gov.au/news-publications/media/media-releases/funding-world-leading-research">national interest test</a>. And it was this very test that Robert used to veto funding last month.</p>
<p>The six grants rejected last month were all in the humanities, and included two on understanding modern-day China, and a third on the mass mobilisation of school students in climate change protests and what that means for their participation in democracy. </p>
<p>It’s hard to think of two topics more important for Australia’s future than understanding China and the climate change movement. But let’s put that aside for a moment.</p>
<h2>The value of basic research</h2>
<p>How and why should a nation decide to spend its precious tax revenue on basic research? The “why” is easy. Life expectancy has roughly doubled in the past 200 years because of investments governments have made in basic research. These investments have given us vaccines, for example, eliminating many diseases that used to kill us at a young age. </p>
<p>Besides being longer, our lives are also more enjoyable, thanks to inventions such as lasers and smartphones, and more knowledgeable, because of insights about everything from dinosaurs to political history.</p>
<p>The “how” is admittedly trickier. By the very nature of research, you don’t know the outcome before you start. But time and again, it has been shown that the best way to pick winners is not to pick winners. Instead, just let bright minds follow their curiosity.</p>
<p>Let me come back to the laser. It’s hard to imagine our lives without lasers. They are used everywhere from eye surgery to industrial welding, from the undersea cables that connect the internet, to barcode scanners in your supermarket checkout. Charles Townes, who won the Nobel Prize for helping discover them, never imagined these myriad uses when he set out to research the phenomenon of “light amplification by stimulated emission of radiation”. </p>
<p>In 1999, he wrote in his book <a href="https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/799380.How_the_Laser_Happened">How the Laser Happened</a>: </p>
<blockquote>
<p>The truth is, none of us who worked on the first lasers imagined how many uses there might eventually be […] Many of today’s practical technologies result from basic science done years to decades before. The people involved, motivated mainly by curiosity, often have little idea as to where their research will lead. Our ability to forecast the practical payoffs from fundamental exploration of the nature of things (and, similarly, to know which of today’s research avenues are technological dead ends) is poor. This springs from a simple truth: new ideas discovered in the process of research are really new.</p>
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<figure class="align-center ">
<img alt="Three laser pointers" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/439975/original/file-20220110-23-10k0blp.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/439975/original/file-20220110-23-10k0blp.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=450&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/439975/original/file-20220110-23-10k0blp.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=450&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/439975/original/file-20220110-23-10k0blp.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=450&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/439975/original/file-20220110-23-10k0blp.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=566&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/439975/original/file-20220110-23-10k0blp.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=566&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/439975/original/file-20220110-23-10k0blp.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=566&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
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<span class="caption">Lasers: amazingly useful, and produced by basic research.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">Wikimedia Commons</span>, <a class="license" href="http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/">CC BY-SA</a></span>
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<p>I am lucky enough to have the opportunity to do such research. In 2021, I won an ARC Laureate Fellowship, the largest individual grant awarded by the ARC, to learn about how to build trustworthy AI systems. I don’t know yet how it will work out. </p>
<p>But what I do know is there’s no place for government interference in the ARC’s funding decisions. Comparable countries don’t let governments interfere in this way. In the United Kingdom, for example, this is enshrined in the <a href="https://publications.parliament.uk/pa/cm200809/cmselect/cmdius/168/16807.htm">Haldane Principle</a>, whereas in the United States, it is guided by engineer and science administrator Vannevar Bush’s stirring postwar manifesto, <a href="https://www.nsf.gov/od/lpa/nsf50/vbush1945.htm">Science, the Endless Frontier</a>, which helped power that country’s economic rise.</p>
<p>If Australia wants to come out of the pandemic healthier and stronger, and to tackle the many wicked problems we now face – including societal challenges like dealing with the politics of a changing climate and managing our troubled relationship with China – we must ensure basic research is not subject to political interference. </p>
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<em>
<strong>
Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/research-funding-announcements-have-become-a-political-tool-creating-crippling-uncertainty-for-academics-126919">Research funding announcements have become a political tool, creating crippling uncertainty for academics</a>
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<p><em>You can read our open letter <a href="https://tinyurl.com/OpenLetterARC">here</a>.</em></p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/174607/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Toby Walsh receives funding from the Australian Research Council in the form of a 5 year ARC Laureate Fellowship.</span></em></p>Basic research is best when it’s allowed to proceed on merit, rather than with political interference, says an open letter from 63 leading researchers protesting government interference in ARC grants.Toby Walsh, Professor of AI at UNSW, Research Group Leader, UNSW SydneyLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/1694432021-10-29T12:37:26Z2021-10-29T12:37:26ZAntibiotic resistance is at a crisis point – government support for academia and Big Pharma to find new drugs could help defeat superbugs<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/428912/original/file-20211027-17-sshvdh.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&rect=0%2C0%2C2119%2C1414&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">Bacteria that are resistant to every available antibiotic in the U.S. already exist.</span> <span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.gettyimages.com/detail/photo/bacteria-royalty-free-image/909752640">Rodolfo Parulan Jr/Moment via Getty Images</a></span></figcaption></figure><p>Antibiotic resistance poses one of the most important health challenges of the 21st century. And time has already run out to stop its dire consequences.</p>
<p>The rise of <a href="https://www.cdc.gov/drugresistance/biggest-threats.html">multidrug-resistant bacteria</a> has already led to a significant increase in human disease and death. The U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention estimates that approximately <a href="https://www.cdc.gov/drugresistance/biggest-threats.html">2.8 million people</a> worldwide are infected with antibiotic-resistant bacteria, accounting for 35,000 deaths each year in the U.S. and <a href="https://www.who.int/news/item/29-04-2019-new-report-calls-for-urgent-action-to-avert-antimicrobial-resistance-crisis">700,000 deaths around the globe</a>.</p>
<p>A <a href="https://www.oie.int/fileadmin/Home/eng/Media_Center/docs/pdf/IACG2019/IACG_final_report_EN.pdf">2019 joint report</a> by the United Nations, World Health Organization and World Organization for Animal Health states that drug-resistant diseases could cause 10 million deaths each year by 2050 and force up to 24 million people into extreme poverty by 2030 <a href="https://www.who.int/news/item/29-04-2019-new-report-calls-for-urgent-action-to-avert-antimicrobial-resistance-crisis">if no action is taken</a>. Superbugs are already able to evade all existing treatments – a 70-year-old woman from Nevada died in 2016 from a bacterial infection <a href="https://www.statnews.com/2017/01/12/nevada-woman-superbug-resistant/">resistant to every available antibiotic in the U.S.</a></p>
<p>I am a <a href="https://scholar.google.com/citations?user=zLwzHqcAAAAJ&hl=en">biochemist and microbiologist</a> who has been researching and teaching about antibiotic development and resistance over the past 20 years. I believe that solving this crisis requires more than just proper antibiotic use by doctors and patients. It also requires mutual investment and collaboration across industries and the government. </p>
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<figcaption><span class="caption">Antibiotics revolutionized modern medicine. But improper usage of antibiotics and lack of research funding have led to a growing crisis of antibiotic-resistant bacteria.</span></figcaption>
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<h2>How do bacteria become resistant to drugs?</h2>
<p>In order to survive, bacteria naturally <a href="https://theconversation.com/we-know-why-bacteria-become-resistant-to-antibiotics-but-how-does-this-actually-happen-59891">evolve to become resistant</a> to the drugs that kill them. They do this via two methods: genetic mutation and horizontal gene transfer.</p>
<p><a href="https://doi.org/10.1111/j.1469-0691.2006.01492.x">Genetic mutation</a> occurs when the bacteria’s DNA, or genetic material, randomly changes. If these changes let the bacteria evade an antibiotic that would have otherwise killed it, it will be able to survive and pass on this resistance when it reproduces. Over time, the proportion of resistant bacteria will increase as nonresistant bacteria are killed by the antibiotic. Eventually, the drug will no longer work on these bacteria because they all have the mutation for resistance.</p>
<p>The other method bacteria use is <a href="https://doi.org/10.1093/emph/eov018">horizontal gene transfer</a>. Here, one bacterium acquires resistance genes from another source, either through their environment or directly from another bacterium or bacterial virus.</p>
<figure class="align-center zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/428916/original/file-20211027-25-1jjmhcf.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="Diagram of bacterial horizontal gene transfer types." src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/428916/original/file-20211027-25-1jjmhcf.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/428916/original/file-20211027-25-1jjmhcf.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=306&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/428916/original/file-20211027-25-1jjmhcf.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=306&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/428916/original/file-20211027-25-1jjmhcf.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=306&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/428916/original/file-20211027-25-1jjmhcf.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=384&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/428916/original/file-20211027-25-1jjmhcf.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=384&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/428916/original/file-20211027-25-1jjmhcf.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=384&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
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<span class="caption">Bacteria can gain resistance via infection from a virus (transduction), picking it up from the environment (transformation) or direct transfer from other bacteria (conjugation).</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Bacterial_horizontal_gene_transfer.jpg">2013MMG320B/Wikimedia Commons</a></span>
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<p>But the antibiotic resistance crisis is largely <a href="https://doi.org/10.3390/w13192693">anthropogenic, or human-made</a>. Factors include the overuse and abuse of antibiotics, as well as a lack of regulations and enforcement pertaining to proper use. For example, doctors prescribing antibiotics for <a href="https://www.mayoclinic.org/healthy-lifestyle/consumer-health/in-depth/antibiotics/art-20045720">nonbacterial infections</a> and patients not completing their <a href="https://theconversation.com/why-you-really-should-take-your-full-course-of-antibiotics-81704">prescribed course of treatment</a> give bacteria the chance to evolve resistance.</p>
<p>There are also no regulations on <a href="https://dx.doi.org/10.3390%2Fmolecules23040795">antibiotic use in animal agriculture</a>, including controlling leakage into the surrounding environment. <a href="https://www.pewtrusts.org/en/research-and-analysis/articles/2019/10/28/fda-should-expedite-new-rules-on-antibiotic-use-in-food-animals">Only recently</a> has there been a push for more antibiotic oversight in agriculture in the U.S. As an October 2021 report by the National Academies of Sciences, Engineering and Medicine noted, antibiotic resistance is an issue that <a href="https://www.nationalacademies.org/news/2021/10/combating-antimicrobial-resistance-globally-requires-maintaining-safety-of-available-antibiotics-and-a-robust-pipeline-animal-and-environmental-health-strategies-also-needed">connects human, environmental and animal health</a>. Effectively addressing one facet requires addressing the others.</p>
<h2>The antibiotic discovery void</h2>
<p>One of the major reasons for the resistance crisis is the stalling of antibiotic development over the past 34 years. Scientists call this the <a href="https://www.reactgroup.org/toolbox/understand/how-did-we-end-up-here/few-antibiotics-under-development/">antibiotic discovery void</a>. </p>
<p>Researchers discovered the last class of highly effective antibiotics in 1987. Since then, no new antibiotics have made it out of the lab. This is partly because there was <a href="https://doi.org/10.1093/fqsafe/fyz003">no financial incentive</a> for the pharmaceutical industry to invest in further research and development. Antibiotics at the time were also effective at what they did. Unlike chronic diseases like hypertension and diabetes, bacterial infections don’t typically require ongoing treatment, and so have a lower return on investment.</p>
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<p>Reversing this trend requires investment not just in drug development, but also in the basic research that allows scientists to understand how antibiotics and bacteria work in the first place. </p>
<p><a href="https://www.formpl.us/blog/basic-research">Basic research</a> focuses on advancing knowledge rather than developing interventions to solve a specific problem. It gives scientists the opportunity to ask new questions and think long-term about the natural world. A better understanding of the driving forces behind antibiotic resistance can lead to innovations in drug development and techniques to combat multidrug-resistant bacteria.</p>
<p>Basic science also provides <a href="https://dx.doi.org/10.1210%2Fme.2014-1343">opportunities to mentor the next generation of researchers</a> tasked with solving problems like antibiotic resistance. By teaching students about the fundamental principles of science, basic scientists can train and inspire the future workforce with the passion, aptitude and competency to address problems that require scientific understanding to solve.</p>
<h2>Collaboration by triangulation</h2>
<p>Many scientists agree that addressing antibiotic resistance <a href="https://www.scientificamerican.com/article/how-to-solve-the-problem-of-antibiotic-resistance/">requires more than just responsible use</a> by individuals. The federal government, academia and pharmaceutical companies need to partner together in order to effectively tackle this crisis – what I call collaboration by triangulation.</p>
<p>[<em>The Conversation’s science, health and technology editors pick their favorite stories.</em> <a href="https://theconversation.com/us/newsletters/science-editors-picks-71/?utm_source=TCUS&utm_medium=inline-link&utm_campaign=newsletter-text&utm_content=science-favorite">Weekly on Wednesdays</a>.]</p>
<p>Collaboration between basic scientists in academia and pharmaceutical companies is one pillar of this effort. While basic science research provides the knowledge foundation to discover new drugs, pharmaceutical companies have the infrastructure to produce them at a scale typically unavailable in academic settings.</p>
<p>The remaining two pillars involve financial and legislative support from the federal government. This includes enhancing research funding for academics and changing current policies and practices that <a href="https://doi.org/10.1093/ofid/ofaa001">impede, rather than offer, incentives</a> for pharmaceutical company investment in antibiotic development.</p>
<figure class="align-center zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/428915/original/file-20211027-21-1et43ur.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="Antibiotic capsules filling white background." src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/428915/original/file-20211027-21-1et43ur.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/428915/original/file-20211027-21-1et43ur.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/428915/original/file-20211027-21-1et43ur.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/428915/original/file-20211027-21-1et43ur.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/428915/original/file-20211027-21-1et43ur.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/428915/original/file-20211027-21-1et43ur.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/428915/original/file-20211027-21-1et43ur.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Partnership between academia, pharmaceutical companies and the government could help expedite antibiotic development.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.gettyimages.com/detail/photo/colorful-of-antibiotic-capsules-pills-isolated-on-royalty-free-image/887228372">Fahroni/iStock via Getty Images Plus</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>To that end, a bipartisan bill proposed in June 2021, the <a href="https://www.statnews.com/2021/06/25/pasteur-act-help-fight-superbugs-antimicrobial-resistance/">Pioneering Antimicrobial Subscriptions to End Upsurging Resistance (PASTEUR) Act</a>, aims to fill the discovery void. If passed into law, the bill would pay developers contractually agreed-upon amounts to research and develop antimicrobial drugs for <a href="https://www.fda.gov/drugs/development-approval-process-drugs/frequently-asked-questions-patents-and-exclusivity#howlongpatentterm">a time period</a> that ranges from five years up to the end of the patent.</p>
<p>I believe the passage of this act would be an important step in the right direction to address antibiotic resistance and the threat it poses to human health in the U.S. and around the globe. A monetary incentive to take up basic research around new ways to kill dangerous bacteria seems to me like the world’s best available option for emerging from the antibiotic resistance crisis.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/169443/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Andre Hudson receives funding from the National Institutes of Health. </span></em></p>If no action is taken to address antibiotic resistance, infections from multidrug-resistant bacteria could cause 10 million deaths each year by 2050.André O. Hudson, Professor and Head of the Thomas H. Gosnell School of Life Sciences, Rochester Institute of TechnologyLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/1627432021-07-21T12:16:19Z2021-07-21T12:16:19ZInsulin was discovered 100 years ago – but it took a lot more than one scientific breakthrough to get a diabetes treatment to patients<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/412304/original/file-20210720-15-sb91vs.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&rect=0%2C91%2C2902%2C2241&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">A single brilliant insight is only part of the story of how diabetes became a manageable disease.</span> <span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.gettyimages.com/detail/news-photo/diabetic-girl-injecting-her-arm-with-insulin-news-photo/3324678">Douglas Grundy/Three Lions via Getty Images</a></span></figcaption></figure><p>Diabetes was a fatal disease before insulin was discovered on July 27, 1921. A century ago, people diagnosed with this <a href="https://www.niddk.nih.gov/-/media/Files/Strategic-Plans/Diabetes-in-America-2nd-Edition/chapter10.pdf">metabolic disorder usually survived only a few years</a>. Physicians had no way to treat their diabetic patients’ dangerously high blood sugar levels, which were due to a lack of the hormone insulin. Today, though, nearly <a href="https://www.diabetes.org/resources/statistics/statistics-about-diabetes">1.6 million</a> Americans are living normal lives with Type 1 diabetes thanks to the discovery of insulin.</p>
<p>This medical breakthrough is usually attributed to one person, Frederick Banting, who was searching for a cure for diabetes. But getting a reliable diabetes treatment depended on the research of two other scientists, Oskar Minkowski and Søren Sørensen, who had done earlier research on seemingly unrelated topics. </p>
<p><a href="https://scholar.google.com/citations?user=Itgu0QwAAAAJ&hl=en&oi=ao">I’m a biomedical engineer</a>, and I teach a course on the history of the treatment of diabetes. With my students, I emphasize the importance of unrelated basic research in the development of medical treatments. The story of insulin illustrates the point that medical innovations build on a foundation of basic science and then require skilled engineers to get a treatment out of the lab and to the people who need it.</p>
<h2>Basic research pointed to the pancreas</h2>
<p><a href="https://doi.org/10.4239/wjd.v7.i1.1">Diabetes had been known since antiquity</a>. The first symptoms were often a prodigious thirst and urination. Within weeks the patient would be losing weight. Within months, the patient would enter a coma, then die. For centuries, no one had any clue about what caused diabetes.</p>
<p>People had, though, been aware of the pancreas for centuries. The <a href="https://doi.org/10.1016/0002-9610(83)90286-6">Greek anatomist Herophilos</a> first described it around 300 B.C. Based on its anatomical location, people suspected it was involved in the digestive system. But no one knew whether the pancreas was an essential organ, like the stomach, or extraneous, like the appendix.</p>
<figure class="align-right zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/412040/original/file-20210720-25-1i67eeo.JPG?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="Portrait of a bearded man with glasses" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/412040/original/file-20210720-25-1i67eeo.JPG?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=237&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/412040/original/file-20210720-25-1i67eeo.JPG?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=855&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/412040/original/file-20210720-25-1i67eeo.JPG?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=855&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/412040/original/file-20210720-25-1i67eeo.JPG?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=855&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/412040/original/file-20210720-25-1i67eeo.JPG?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=1075&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/412040/original/file-20210720-25-1i67eeo.JPG?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=1075&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/412040/original/file-20210720-25-1i67eeo.JPG?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=1075&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Oskar Minkowski discovered the pancreatic origin of diabetes almost by accident.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Minkowski.JPG">Wikimedia Commons</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>In 1889, <a href="https://doi.org/10.1007/BF00271257">Oskar Minkowski</a>, a pathologist at the University of Strassburg, in what was then Germany, was one of the most talented surgeons of his time. As part of a study, he performed a surgical feat that was thought to be impossible: keeping an animal alive after totally removing its pancreas.</p>
<p>The dog he operated on survived the surgery, but to Minkowski’s surprise, it began exhibiting all the symptoms of diabetes. Minkowski had discovered that removing the pancreas caused diabetes. Today, this is known as an animal model of the disease. Once an animal model of a disease is established, researchers can experiment with different cures in the animal in hopes they’ll find something that will then work in people.</p>
<p>Can you grind up a pancreas and feed it to a diabetic animal to cure or alleviate the symptoms of diabetes? No, that didn’t work. The problem, understood in today’s terms, is that the pancreas has two functions: producing enzymes for the digestive system and producing insulin. Mixed together, the digestive enzymes destroyed the insulin.</p>
<h2>Isolating the insulin</h2>
<p>In 1920, Fred Banting, a small-town doctor in London, Ontario, had an idea. He thought that he could surgically tie off the ducts between the pancreas and the digestive system in an animal. Wait for a few weeks, while the part of the pancreas that produces those digestive enzymes decays, then remove the pancreas completely. This decayed pancreas, he thought, would contain the insulin, but not the destructive enzymes.</p>
<figure class="align-right zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/412303/original/file-20210720-27-tr5jkz.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="two men in early 20th C clothes standing with a dog between them" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/412303/original/file-20210720-27-tr5jkz.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=237&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/412303/original/file-20210720-27-tr5jkz.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=816&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/412303/original/file-20210720-27-tr5jkz.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=816&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/412303/original/file-20210720-27-tr5jkz.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=816&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/412303/original/file-20210720-27-tr5jkz.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=1025&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/412303/original/file-20210720-27-tr5jkz.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=1025&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/412303/original/file-20210720-27-tr5jkz.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=1025&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Charles Best (left) and Frederick Banting with one of the first dogs to be kept alive with insulin.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.gettyimages.com/detail/news-photo/discoverers-of-insulin-charles-best-and-frederick-banting-news-photo/2667496">Hulton Archive via Getty Images</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>On July 27, 1921, he concluded this experiment <a href="https://insulin.library.utoronto.ca/">in the laboratory of J.J.R. Macleod</a> at the University of Toronto. Banting, working with a Toronto student named Charles Best, prepared an extract from the atrophied pancreas of a dog. Then he injected the extract into another dog that had induced diabetes, due to the removal of its pancreas. The animal’s diabetes symptoms began to disappear.</p>
<p>Although Banting’s experiment was successful, his method of insulin purification was impractical. J.J.R. Macleod assigned the biochemist James Collip the task of coming up with a practical method of purifying insulin from a pancreas.</p>
<p>Collip developed a method based on alcohol purification. The concept was simple: He’d mash up a fresh pig pancreas, readily available from butcher shops, and mix it into a solution of alcohol and water. Collip slowly increased the percentage of alcohol in the solution. He found that the insulin would stay dissolved in the solution until he reached a critical concentration of alcohol, then it would suddenly fall out of solution, no longer dissolved in the liquid. By collecting that solid precipitate at the bottom of a flask, he had a purified form of insulin.</p>
<p>Collip’s extraction of insulin allowed Banting and others at the University of Toronto Hospital to <a href="https://insulin100.utoronto.ca/">begin treating patients</a>. The first injections took place in January 1922. Within weeks, the results were miraculous. These injections of insulin helped dozens of patients who were close to dying regain normal activities. Word spread. Demand for insulin increased.</p>
<h2>Insight from a brewery</h2>
<p>But disaster struck when Collip failed to purify larger batches of insulin. He was puzzled why, following the exact same recipe as he’d used before, his preparations lacked insulin. J.J.R. Macleod now turned to Eli Lilly and Company, a commercial firm in Indiana that made medicinal capsules, for help.</p>
<p>At Eli Lilly, <a href="https://doi.org/10.1093/clinchem/48.12.2270">the purification problem fell to George Walden</a>, a 27-year-old chemist. Walden thought of a measure that Danish chemist <a href="https://doi.org/10.1038/143629a0">Søren Sørensen</a> had introduced a dozen years before. </p>
<figure class="align-center zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/412305/original/file-20210720-19-ejtxrh.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="beer with analysis tools at a brewery" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/412305/original/file-20210720-19-ejtxrh.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/412305/original/file-20210720-19-ejtxrh.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/412305/original/file-20210720-19-ejtxrh.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/412305/original/file-20210720-19-ejtxrh.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/412305/original/file-20210720-19-ejtxrh.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/412305/original/file-20210720-19-ejtxrh.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/412305/original/file-20210720-19-ejtxrh.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">The equipment has changed, but breweries still monitor the pH of their beers.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.gettyimages.com/detail/news-photo/still-life-analyze-still-life-beer-brewery-analysis-ph-news-photo/883613366">Stanzel\ullstein bild via Getty Images</a></span>
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<p>Sørensen was the director in the early 1900s of the Carlsberg Laboratory, set up by the beer company to advance the science of brewing. He introduced the concept of pH as a way to quantify the acidity of a solution. A higher pH during the brewing stage leads to a more bitter-tasting beer.</p>
<p>When Walden measured the pH of the pancreas solution, he discovered that the acidity was far more important to the solubility of insulin than the alcohol concentration. He set up a purification procedure like Collip’s but based on pH rather than alcohol concentration. Collip’s failure to scale up purification of insulin was probably because he neglected to control the pH of the solution carefully.</p>
<p>This insight allowed for mass production of insulin.</p>
<h2>Vanquishing a human disease</h2>
<figure class="align-right zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/412306/original/file-20210720-23-181jgrc.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="ampules of commercial insulin from the 1920s" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/412306/original/file-20210720-23-181jgrc.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=237&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/412306/original/file-20210720-23-181jgrc.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=652&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/412306/original/file-20210720-23-181jgrc.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=652&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/412306/original/file-20210720-23-181jgrc.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=652&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/412306/original/file-20210720-23-181jgrc.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=820&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/412306/original/file-20210720-23-181jgrc.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=820&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/412306/original/file-20210720-23-181jgrc.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=820&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Insulin samples from the 1920s.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.gettyimages.com/detail/news-photo/still-life-analyze-still-life-beer-brewery-analysis-ph-news-photo/883613366">Science & Society Picture Library via Getty Images</a></span>
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</figure>
<p>By May 1924, diabetes was no longer a fatal disease. Physician Joseph Collins, writing in The New York Times, described it this way: “One by one the implacable enemies of man, the diseases which seek his destruction, are overcome by Science. <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/1923/05/06/archives/diabetes-dreaded-disease-yields-to-new-gland-cure-previous-claims.html">Diabetes, one of the most dreaded, is the latest to succumb</a>.”</p>
<p>Today, the implacable enemies of man include cancer, Alzheimer’s disease and schizophrenia. The cures for each will likely be built from advances made by basic research.</p>
<p>[<em>Get our best science, health and technology stories.</em> <a href="https://theconversation.com/us/newsletters/science-editors-picks-71/?utm_source=TCUS&utm_medium=inline-link&utm_campaign=newsletter-text&utm_content=science-best">Sign up for The Conversation’s science newsletter</a>]</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/162743/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>James P. Brody has in the past received funding from the National Science Foundation, the National Institutes of Health and the US Department of Defense.</span></em></p>A biomedical engineer explains the basic research that led to the discovery of insulin and its transformation into a lifesaving treatment for millions of people with diabetes.James P. Brody, Professor of Biomedical Engineering, University of California, IrvineLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/1565862021-05-26T18:09:24Z2021-05-26T18:09:24ZCOVID-19 budget pressures threaten curiosity-driven science. That’s a bad thing<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/401830/original/file-20210520-19-1xxbb8u.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">Some of the dishes that make up the Square Kilometre Array's radio telescope system. This kind of "blue skies" research can have great real-world value. </span> <span class="attribution"><span class="source">MUJAHID SAFODIEN/AFP via Getty Images</span></span></figcaption></figure><p>Management of the COVID-19 pandemic has governments around the world walking a delicate tightrope between containing the spread of the virus and the interactions required to sustain daily living. <a href="https://www.worldbank.org/en/publication/global-economic-prospects">Economies</a> and <a href="https://www.imf.org/en/News/Articles/2020/08/03/na080320-south-africa-looks-toward-inclusive-recovery-to-stabilize-debt-boost-growth">national budgets</a> have been placed under tremendous pressure.</p>
<p>This means that budgets are being cut. And one area that’s affected is research. In South Africa, for instance, in 2020 the national science budget was <a href="https://www.researchprofessionalnews.com/rr-news-africa-south-2020-7-this-is-the-butcher-s-bill-for-south-africa-s-science-cuts/">reduced by 15%</a> – a direct result, the <a href="https://www.researchprofessionalnews.com/rr-news-africa-south-2020-7-this-is-the-butcher-s-bill-for-south-africa-s-science-cuts/">government confirmed</a>, of the pandemic’s effects. In May 2021 it <a href="https://researchprofessionalnews.com/rr-news-africa-south-2021-5-parliament-rallies-behind-south-africa-s-cash-strapped-science-department/">was increased</a>, but only by 1.4% – below inflation.</p>
<p>A shift in government spending is likely to continue in the coming months and years. So, where does this leave blue skies science? Will it also be a casualty of COVID-19?</p>
<p><a href="https://www.labmate-online.com/news/news-and-views/5/breaking-news/what-is-lsquoblue-sky-sciencersquo/30187">Blue skies science</a> is the kind of research that’s driven by curiosity. Its real world applications – or its relevance to society – aren’t always immediately apparent; it begins because scientists ask one simple question: “why?” For example, <a href="http://aappsbulletin.org/myboard/read.php?Board=apctp&id=111">wifi grew out of a technique</a> that was developed by radio astronomers in the late 1970s to analyse radio waves from black holes, and the <a href="https://www.aps.org/publications/apsnews/200705/physicshistory.cfm#:%7E:text=By%201920%2C%20physicists%20knew%20that,born%20in1891%20in%20Manchester%2C%20England.">discovery of the neutron in 1932</a> has led to new fields in applied science, including energy production and materials diagnostics.</p>
<p>The pandemic has underscored that the world requires agility for survival. That makes blue skies science – which encourages curiosity and nimble thinking – perhaps more important than ever. But this will require a long-term view from governments and funders, particularly by providing decades of funding and freedom to allow scientists to ask the “why?” questions. </p>
<p>I have been fortunate to spend almost two decades working in astronomy research, which is just about as “blue skies” as one can get. It was the support and vision of South Africa’s commitment to blue skies science, especially astronomy, that drew me and many other researchers back home from a position abroad. In my role at the <a href="http://www.astro4dev.org/">Office of Astronomy for Development</a>, I’ve seen firsthand how blue skies science acts as a gateway into science, technology and data science fields and how a combination of skills in applied and blue-skies science can contribute to pressing socio-economic questions.</p>
<p>Now budget pressures are intensifying. But, I would argue, unless there is increased support for researchers in exploratory fields and in forays into cross disciplinary projects, the expertise, momentum and benefits that have accumulated over the last decades will be lost. There may be short-term successes, but they will likely be at the expense of longer term, potentially bigger impact science.</p>
<p>Continued funding for both blue skies and applied science is necessary as boundaries between the two become more porous. This is important because it would mean that scientists could increasingly contribute to immediate societal impact, while following avenues out of pure curiosity. </p>
<h2>Scientific agility</h2>
<p>In the year since COVID-19 first emerged as global pandemic, my colleagues and I have watched scientific agility in action in South Africa on a number of fronts.</p>
<p>One example has been the role that the South African Radio Astronomy Observatory took to help lead the country’s <a href="https://www.dailymaverick.co.za/article/2020-07-07-from-telescopes-to-ventilators-how-the-countrys-engineers-and-designers-have-retooled-for-the-covid-19-crisis/">national ventilator project</a>. Ventilators are crucial for those with severe COVID-19, but there were limited numbers available worldwide. The national ventilator project aimed to manufacture simple non-invasive ventilators using locally available materials and processes. </p>
<p>The Office of Astronomy for Development, the African Planetarium Society and African Astronomical Society <a href="http://www.astro4dev.org/call-for-covid-19-related-proposals/">collectively redirected funding</a> to assuage the effects of the pandemic. With some organisational agility, the funding could be redirected to causes slightly outside the key mission of these organisations.</p>
<p>We’ve also seen scientific agility at an individual level. Statisticians and simulation scientists from numerous fields have <a href="https://www.nasa.gov/ames/covid-19">responded to the call</a> to work with epidemiologists in modelling the pandemic.</p>
<p>Similarly, many blue skies science projects, like the <a href="https://icecube.wisc.edu/">IceCube Neutrino Observatory</a> and the <a href="https://www.bsu.edu/news/press-center/archives/2020/4/planetarium-computers-used-to-battle-covid19">Charles W. Brown Planetarium</a>, have made computing power available to model the virus protein properties of SARS-CoV-2. </p>
<h2>In it for the long haul</h2>
<p>Building solid research capabilities is a long-term endeavour. It is often internationally funded and operated, and can last several decades. One example is the <a href="https://theconversation.com/how-the-ska-telescope-is-boosting-south-africas-knowledge-economy-96228">Square Kilometre Array (SKA)</a>. A multinational endeavour, it is <a href="https://www.peralex.com/radio-astronomy/">spurring</a> technological breakthroughs and industrial spin-offs.</p>
<hr>
<p>
<em>
<strong>
Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/a-big-moment-for-africa-why-the-meerkat-and-astronomy-matter-99714">A big moment for Africa: why the MeerKAT -- and astronomy -- matter</a>
</strong>
</em>
</p>
<hr>
<p>Projects like this have significant momentum. Due to high sunk costs as well as cross-national mutual accountability, they’re unlikely to be halted, even if they are subjected to delays or de-scoping. </p>
<p>They are even likely to survive the immediate impact of budget cuts. These, however, have an immediate effect on a range of shorter term research projects. They also affect students and training. Most students and early career researchers are funded by “soft money”, allocated to a particular project over a short timescale, usually two or three years.</p>
<p>Having less soft money to go around means fewer graduate students to train, and fewer early career researchers to be employed. For those students who are funded, it may also mean reduced opportunities to receive training that will help them exploit the available research infrastructure. This funding pressure mounts up, and the impacts become visible over the medium term: reduced numbers of publications and projects are undertaken on these facilities, and there’s less opportunity to build and develop skills.</p>
<h2>What next?</h2>
<p>The value in blue skies science requires us to look beyond the obvious. It also requires us to consider timescales longer than the political. </p>
<p>The question is not so much about redirecting funding, but about designing a research environment that can accommodate integration of ideas across traditional research “silos”; an environment where there are avenues for experts to apply their skills outside their domains of expertise. As a collective, society would stand to gain so much more from blue skies research.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/156586/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Vanessa McBride works for the Office of Astronomy for Development and the South African Astronomical Observatory. She receives funding from the National Research Foundation.</span></em></p>The pandemic has underscored that the world requires agility for survival. That makes blue skies science, which encourages curiosity and nimble thinking, perhaps more important than ever.Vanessa McBride, Astronomer, International Astronomical Union's Office of Astronomy for DevelopmentLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/1459202020-12-10T13:35:04Z2020-12-10T13:35:04ZWhy do scientists care about worms?<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/374060/original/file-20201210-15-upgx8b.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&rect=110%2C0%2C6498%2C4476&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">Whether in the wild or in the lab, worms have an interesting story to tell.</span> <span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.gettyimages.com/detail/photo/ascariasis-is-a-disease-caused-by-the-parasitic-royalty-free-image/1045455096">Sinhyu/iStock via Getty Images</a></span></figcaption></figure><p>I traveled to a marine research station on a picturesque Swedish fjord many times over the four years I worked on my Ph.D. What brought me back again and again? Buried in the mud off the west coast of Sweden lives a small orangey brown worm, which, to the untrained eye, looks entirely insignificant.</p>
<figure class="align-right zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/374013/original/file-20201209-23-cs1eid.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="blobby brownish worm" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/374013/original/file-20201209-23-cs1eid.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=237&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/374013/original/file-20201209-23-cs1eid.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=610&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/374013/original/file-20201209-23-cs1eid.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=610&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/374013/original/file-20201209-23-cs1eid.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=610&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/374013/original/file-20201209-23-cs1eid.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=767&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/374013/original/file-20201209-23-cs1eid.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=767&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/374013/original/file-20201209-23-cs1eid.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=767&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">The author’s worm of choice, <em>Xenoturbella</em>.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">Fraser Simpson</span>, <a class="license" href="http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nd/4.0/">CC BY-ND</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>The fact that I devoted so much study to this boring-looking worm was a source of great amusement to my friends. To them, and perhaps to most people, the word worm conjures up the idea of a fat pink earthworm. So why sift through tons of mud from a freezing Swedish fjord to find a handful of animals I could dig up in the garden?</p>
<p>Broadly defined, a worm is any relatively small soft-bodied animal, but there’s an amazing amount of diversity in this group. These animals live across the globe, and some of them are remarkably resilient; they can be found in habitats ranging from deep-sea hydrothermal vents to lakes that are three times saltier than the sea. “Worm” is really a catchall term for a huge variety of animals with different characteristics that span the tree of life.</p>
<p>This diversity means that scientists from many different disciplines are interested in lots of different species of worms. For instance, my worm from the fjord, called <em>Xenoturbella bocki</em>, holds a pivotal position for understanding animal evolution.</p>
<p>At first glance you might think that people and all these worms have very little in common. But really, many worm species provide opportunities for scientists to perform basic research on cells and systems that can be translated into information about our biological origins, and even relevant applications for human development and health.</p>
<h2>Regeneration</h2>
<p>If your head is chopped off, you won’t grow a new one. But if you were a planarian flatworm, you wouldn’t just grow a new head – your head would also grow a new body. Cut one of these inconspicuous worms into hundreds of tiny pieces, and you’ll end up with hundreds of new animals. Planaria are truly the masters of regeneration.</p>
<figure>
<iframe width="440" height="260" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/vXN_5SPBPtM?wmode=transparent&start=0" frameborder="0" allowfullscreen=""></iframe>
<figcaption><span class="caption">Watch Planaria regenerate before your eyes.</span></figcaption>
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<p>In order to achieve this feat, both the instructions and the materials for constructing a new body must be present in each of those fragments. These building blocks are called neoblasts: <a href="https://doi.org/10.1007/s00427-012-0426-4">stem cells distributed throughout the worm</a> that have the potential to become any adult cell type.</p>
<p>[<em>Like what you’ve read? Want more?</em> <a href="https://theconversation.com/us/newsletters/the-daily-3?utm_source=TCUS&utm_medium=inline-link&utm_campaign=newsletter-text&utm_content=likethis">Sign up for The Conversation’s daily newsletter</a>.]</p>
<p>Planarian regeneration research has some surprising applications. Scientists can investigate which genes keep neoblasts in a flexible state, or direct them to become specific cell types during the regenerative process. This research won’t help researchers learn how to regenerate new human heads, but it can inform their <a href="https://doi.org/10.1101/gad.187377.112">understanding of wound healing</a> or suggest <a href="https://doi.org/10.1242/dmm.032573">new targets for cancer research</a>.</p>
<h2>Fossil record</h2>
<figure class="align-right zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/372847/original/file-20201203-23-11eukuz.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="Adult priapulid worm." src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/372847/original/file-20201203-23-11eukuz.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=237&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/372847/original/file-20201203-23-11eukuz.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=800&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/372847/original/file-20201203-23-11eukuz.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=800&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/372847/original/file-20201203-23-11eukuz.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=800&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/372847/original/file-20201203-23-11eukuz.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=1005&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/372847/original/file-20201203-23-11eukuz.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=1005&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/372847/original/file-20201203-23-11eukuz.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=1005&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">An adult priapulid.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Adult_priapulid.jpg">Bruno C. Vellutini/Wikimedia Commons</a>, <a class="license" href="http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/">CC BY-SA</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>If there were a prize for the most unfortunate-looking worm, it might go to the name-says-it-all “penis worms,” formally known as the Priapulida. Their unlucky appearance actually makes priapulids very well adapted to burrowing into the soft sediment where they live.</p>
<p>This behavior leaves a valuable legacy. The <a href="https://doi.org/10.1098/rspb.2018.2505">fossilized traces of burrowing worms</a> represent some of the most important fossils recovered from the Cambrian era. The first early representatives of most of the major animal groups date to this geological period, which began around 540 million years ago. Evidence indicates that priapulid-like worms created these trace fossils as they burrowed into the soft substrate where they lived.</p>
<figure class="align-right zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/374055/original/file-20201210-20-1v6hozy.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="rock fossil with outline of a worm creature" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/374055/original/file-20201210-20-1v6hozy.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=237&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/374055/original/file-20201210-20-1v6hozy.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=883&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/374055/original/file-20201210-20-1v6hozy.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=883&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/374055/original/file-20201210-20-1v6hozy.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=883&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/374055/original/file-20201210-20-1v6hozy.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=1110&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/374055/original/file-20201210-20-1v6hozy.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=1110&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/374055/original/file-20201210-20-1v6hozy.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=1110&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Fossil evidence of an ancient priapulid.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.gettyimages.com/detail/news-photo/fossils-protostomia-priapulida-archaeopriapulida-ottoia-news-photo/122223615">DEA/G. Cigolini/De Agostini via Getty Images</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>These ancient ancestors mean that Priapulids have been described as “living fossils.” Studying their developmental genetics offers an insight into the ancient origins of the different cell types and organs we find in animals today.</p>
<p>For example, by understanding how modern priapulids make their guts, scientists can infer the developmental processes and genes that shaped the guts of animals living hundreds of millions of years ago. Then, researchers can better understand how different animals have refined and modified what their gut looks like and how it is patterned in response to their environment and diet.</p>
<h2>Where did eyes come from?</h2>
<p>Even to Charles Darwin, the <a href="https://www.newscientist.com/term/evolution-of-the-eye/">evolution of the eye</a> posed a conceptual problem. How could such a complex structure have arisen through natural selection? </p>
<p>A relative of the earthworm and the leech, an annelid called <em>Platynereis dumerilii</em>, turns out to be an important animal to help understand how it happened. <em>Platynereis</em> is particularly slowly evolving, and, similar to priapulids, provides a window into the <a href="https://doi.org/10.1038/eye.2017.226">features found in our very ancient ancestors</a>.</p>
<figure class="align-center zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/372850/original/file-20201203-15-1vhwh79.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="Platynereis larvae in the lab at 48 hours of age" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/372850/original/file-20201203-15-1vhwh79.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/372850/original/file-20201203-15-1vhwh79.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=450&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/372850/original/file-20201203-15-1vhwh79.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=450&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/372850/original/file-20201203-15-1vhwh79.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=450&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/372850/original/file-20201203-15-1vhwh79.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=566&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/372850/original/file-20201203-15-1vhwh79.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=566&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/372850/original/file-20201203-15-1vhwh79.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=566&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Two-day-old <em>Platynereis dumerilii</em> larvae with their DNA stained blue.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Hoechst_33342_Stain_-_Platynereis_dumerilii_larvae.jpg">7and/Wikimedia Commons</a>, <a class="license" href="http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/">CC BY-SA</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p><em>Platynereis</em> larvae have one of the simplest eyes in the animal kingdom: a two-cell structure comprised of a photoreceptor, capable of detecting light, and a pigment cell. But it has an additional type of photoreceptor in its larval brain – one that is also found in the vertebrate eye. This suggests that <a href="https://doi.org/10.1038/news041025-18">both of these photoreceptor types</a> were present in an ancestral animal. By investigating how <em>Platynereis</em> uses these cells, scientists can hypothesize the steps by which cell types and circuitry ultimately were integrated to create the vertebrate eye.</p>
<p>The world of worms extends far beyond the humble earthworm in your backyard: There are literally millions of different species living all across the world. The examples outlined here are just a small representation of that diversity and the unexpected reach that research on these critters can have.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/145920/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Helen Robertson received PhD funding from the ERC </span></em></p>‘Worm’ is really a catchall term for a huge variety of animals with different characteristics that span the tree of life. They hold clues about our own origins as well as hints about human health.Helen Robertson, Postdoctoral Scholar of Organismal Biology and Anatomy, University of ChicagoLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/1004352018-08-07T10:40:25Z2018-08-07T10:40:25ZFunding basic research plays the long game for future payoffs<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/230804/original/file-20180806-191013-1fnl7ab.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&rect=429%2C222%2C3660%2C2667&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">It takes time to see which finding might be a golden egg.</span> <span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.shutterstock.com/image-photo/one-gold-egg-lays-among-common-111414110">Neamov/Shutterstock.com</a></span></figcaption></figure><p>The Senate recently proposed to increase the research budgets of the <a href="http://www.sciencemag.org/news/2018/06/senate-panel-proposes-2-billion-54-increase-nih">National Institutes of Health</a>, <a href="http://www.sciencemag.org/news/2018/06/nasa-science-and-nsf-do-well-senate-spending-bill">National Science Foundation and NASA</a>. While this is encouraging to the many scientists whose research is dependent on grants from these agencies, it comes at a time when scientific research is under increased scrutiny.</p>
<p>Questioning the merit of scientific research is certainly not new. In the 1970s and 1980s the <a href="https://www.wisconsinhistory.org/turningpoints/search.asp?id=1742">Golden Fleece Awards</a> were an ignominious honor bestowed by a U.S. senator on what he considered “wasteful” research. The majority of the ire was aimed at research thought to be “useless.” </p>
<p>But having no obvious immediate application <a href="https://theconversation.com/tracing-the-links-between-basic-research-and-real-world-applications-82198">doesn’t mean something will never be of use</a>.</p>
<p>Perhaps the difficultly in justifying basic research is in part a branding problem. The goal of this type of work is to understand the fundamental principles of nature, and it spans the STEM fields (Science, Technology, Engineering and Mathematics). Once these fundamental principles are understood, they can be applied to more translational research that can have direct benefits to patients or consumers. </p>
<p>But the benefits of basic research are often not instantly recognizable. Potential long-term payoffs – perhaps ones that haven’t even been imagined yet – won’t help consumers or patients now.</p>
<p>There are countless discoveries whose eventual impact would have been very difficult to predict when the research was in its infancy. Honors like the <a href="https://www.goldengooseaward.org/">Golden Goose Award</a>, presented every fall since 2012, combat the idea of basic research being “wasteful” or “useless” by underscoring that it’s actually the foundation for further scientific innovation. Given enough time and support, basic research can yield significant real-world benefits that were hard to predict in advance. Here are two examples of scientific curiosity paying substantial dividends decades after the initial discovery.</p>
<figure class="align-center zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/230806/original/file-20180806-34489-1u0hpnh.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/230806/original/file-20180806-34489-1u0hpnh.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/230806/original/file-20180806-34489-1u0hpnh.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/230806/original/file-20180806-34489-1u0hpnh.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/230806/original/file-20180806-34489-1u0hpnh.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/230806/original/file-20180806-34489-1u0hpnh.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/230806/original/file-20180806-34489-1u0hpnh.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/230806/original/file-20180806-34489-1u0hpnh.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">What could a bioluminescent jellyfish contribute to medical science?</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.shutterstock.com/image-photo/crystal-jellyfish-aequorea-victoria-bioluminescent-hydrozoan-671090275">LagunaticPhoto/Shutterstock.com</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<h2>From glowing jellyfish to biomedical imaging</h2>
<p>It was very unlikely that scientists were thinking of medical applications when in the 1950s they started studying why some <a href="https://doi.org/10.1098/rspb.1955.0066">jellyfish glow</a>. Marine biologists discovered that the jellyfish <em>Aequorea victoria</em> was <a href="https://ocean.si.edu/ocean-life/fish/bioluminescence">bioluminescent</a>. What was unclear at the time was how this jellyfish produces its light, which is a vibrant green color.</p>
<p>Seven years later a group of researchers discovered that the living light from the jellyfish came from a single protein they called <a href="https://doi.org/10.1002/jcp.1030590302">aequorin</a>. Strangely, the light from the purified aequorin protein was blue, not green. After another eight years of work they found that a partner protein to aequorin, which they called green fluorescent protein (<a href="https://doi.org/10.1002/jcp.1040770305">GFP</a>), produced the vibrant green-colored light seen in the living jellyfish.</p>
<p>The question then became how did the two proteins work together to produce this light? It took another 10 years of work to get the answer. A series of papers published in the early 1970s characterized a small molecule called a <a href="https://doi.org/10.2144/000113765">chromophore</a> that integrated into the <a href="https://doi.org/10.1016/0014-5793(79)80818-2">GFP protein structure</a>. The <a href="https://doi.org/10.1126/science.273.5280.1392">structure of GFP</a> was discovered in the early 1990s, which further helped researchers understand how this protein created light in living cells.</p>
<p>The first time the GFP protein was produced in an organism other than a jellyfish was in 1992. Expressing GFP in the small worm <em>C. elegans</em> and the bacterium <em>E. coli</em> <a href="https://doi.org/10.1126/science.8303295">made them both glow</a> a brilliant green color. This breakthrough, nearly 40 years after the initial jellyfish study, opened the door for using GFP as powerful tool for biomedical research. Today researchers use GFP to track protein interactions and movement in living cells, which is useful in the study of cancer and bacterial diseases. A current literature search in PubMed returns over 30,000 peer-reviewed published papers using the search term “<a href="https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/?term=%22green+fluorescent+protein%22">green fluorescent protein</a>.”</p>
<p>The impact of GFP has also been recognized with a <a href="https://www.nobelprize.org/nobel_prizes/chemistry/laureates/2008/advanced-chemistryprize2008.pdf">Nobel Prize</a> in 2008 and an inaugural Golden Goose Award in 2012.</p>
<figure class="align-center zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/230807/original/file-20180806-191031-1y0ysvs.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/230807/original/file-20180806-191031-1y0ysvs.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/230807/original/file-20180806-191031-1y0ysvs.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=450&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/230807/original/file-20180806-191031-1y0ysvs.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=450&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/230807/original/file-20180806-191031-1y0ysvs.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=450&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/230807/original/file-20180806-191031-1y0ysvs.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=566&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/230807/original/file-20180806-191031-1y0ysvs.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=566&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/230807/original/file-20180806-191031-1y0ysvs.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=566&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">What could a bacteria’s immune system add to genetic researchers’ toolkit?</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.shutterstock.com/image-illustration/3d-illustration-crisprcas13a-system-1029539410">Meletios Verras/Shutterstock.com</a></span>
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</figure>
<h2>From bacterial immunity to genome editing</h2>
<p>A more recent example of how basic research is now driving incredible innovation can be found in the fields of synthetic biology and genome editing, thanks to what actually started out very humbly as the characterization of bacteria. In the late 1980s, researchers found that certain bacteria had <a href="https://doi.org/10.1128/jb.169.12.5429-5433.1987">short repeated regions</a> in their genome, but they didn’t know their purpose. They called these DNA sequences Clustered Regularly Interspaced Short Palindromic Repeats; you’ve probably heard its acronym nickname <a href="https://doi.org/10.1046/j.1365-2958.2002.02839.x">CRISPR</a>. Work characterizing and cataloging bacteria that had these short repeated sequences continued for 20 years before researchers discovered proteins associated with the short DNA repeats. They called them CRISPR associated, or Cas, proteins.</p>
<p>One major advance happened in 2005 when researchers realized that CRISPR sequences found in bacterial genomes <a href="https://doi.org/10.1099/mic.0.28048-0">match DNA in phages</a>, viruses that infect bacteria. A few more years later, scientists showed that the CRISPR-Cas system was a type of <a href="https://doi.org/10.1126/science.1138140">adaptive immunity</a> that bacteria use to remember phage infection and prevent it from happening again. The Cas protein cuts invading phage’s DNA to stop infection. This discovery was groundbreaking; no one had known something as simple as a single-celled bacterium could have a sophisticated immune system.</p>
<p>And then in 2013, researchers realized this type of directed DNA cutting could be used to <a href="https://doi.org/10.1126/science.1231143">edit the genomes of other organisms</a>, not just bacteria. The method was quickly adapted for use in yeast, worm, fruit fly, zebrafish, mouse, plant and human cells. Genome editing in this way will have far-reaching implications for everything from food production to stem cell therapies.</p>
<p>Thirty years after its discovery, the scope of CRISPR research is truly impressive; a current literature search in PubMed returns over 10,000 peer-reviewed published papers using the search term “<a href="https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/?term=CRISPR">CRISPR</a>.” The technologies stemming from CRISPR have not won a Golden Goose Award or Nobel Prize yet, but some speculate it is only a <a href="http://blogs.plos.org/synbio/2017/10/05/when-will-crispr-get-a-nobel-prize/">matter of time</a>.</p>
<h2>Curiosity and patience yield dividends</h2>
<p>Answering fundamental questions – Why do jellyfish glow? Why do bacterial genomes have short repeating DNA sequences? – <a href="https://www.goldengooseaward.org/awardees/">can lead to innovation and tangible benefits</a> in many aspects of everyday life. And a Golden Goose Award or Nobel Prize is not required to show that a discovery has translational application. An entrepreneurship study published in 2017 highlighted that more than 75 percent of research articles published are <a href="https://doi.org/10.1126/science.aam9527">eventually referenced in at least one patent disclosure</a>. This study showed a strong link between patent applications, ostensibly a quantitative metric of innovation, and basic research taking place at universities and government laboratories. </p>
<p>Real-world impacts stemming from basic research can take decades to unfold. If basic science is not supported and funded in the U.S., other countries will take over the innovation leadership role. Much like the goose that laid golden eggs, time and patience are required to get the most out of basic research.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/100435/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Jeffrey Gardner receives funding from the US Department of Energy. </span></em></p>Basic research can be easy to mock as pointless and wasteful of resources. But it’s very often the foundation for future innovation – even in ways the original scientists couldn’t have imagined.Jeffrey Gardner, Associate Professor of Biological Sciences, University of Maryland, Baltimore CountyLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/938302018-06-28T10:38:37Z2018-06-28T10:38:37ZInventing the future in Chinese labs: How does China do science today?<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/224729/original/file-20180625-19375-1hfyx93.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&rect=0%2C98%2C1867%2C1352&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">China's political system sets the course for the science in universities, government labs and industry.</span> <span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:HUST-Main-building-4111.jpg">Vmenkov</a>, <a class="license" href="http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/">CC BY-SA</a></span></figcaption></figure><p>Genetic engineering, the search for dark matter, quantum computing and communications, artificial intelligence, brain science – the list of potentially disruptive research goes on. Each has significant implications for future industries, defense technologies and ethical understandings of what it means to be human.</p>
<p>And, increasingly, the <a href="https://www.washingtonpost.com/national/health-science/china-challenges-american-dominance-of-science/2018/06/03/c1e0cfe4-48d5-11e8-827e-190efaf1f1ee_story.html">notable achievements in these fields</a> are coming not from the great centers of science in the West, but Beijing, Shanghai, Hefei, Shenzhen and a number of other Chinese cities that make up China’s extensive research system. Inevitably, the question arises: How much of the future is being invented in Chinese labs?</p>
<p>The current <a href="https://theconversation.com/us/topics/us-china-trade-17448">trade negotiations between China and United States</a> have brought <a href="https://www.bloomberg.com/news/features/2018-06-19/china-s-getting-ready-to-take-on-the-world-s-biggest-drugmakers">China’s rapidly developing technological capabilities</a> into clearer focus. As China aims to achieve leadership in emerging key technologies, the U.S. is quick to attribute much of Chinese progress to the <a href="https://ustr.gov/sites/default/files/files/Press/Reports/2018%20Special%20301.pdf">theft of American intellectual property and forced technology transfers</a>. But, <a href="http://china-us.uoregon.edu/papers.php">as someone who has followed China’s scientific development for years</a>, I’ve seen dramatic improvements in China’s own innovative capacity, along with the science base needed for success in the knowledge-intensive industries it seeks to master. </p>
<p>In its <a href="https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0195347">quest for scientific achievement</a>, China’s <a href="http://digital.rdmag.com/researchanddevelopment/2018_global_r_d_funding_forecast?pg=1#pg1">research and development spending has grown rapidly</a> over the past two decades. It’s now second only to the United States. China has become a <a href="https://doi.org/10.1038/d41586-018-00927-4">leading contributor</a> to the world’s science and engineering literatures, with Chinese papers in selected fields attracting an increasing number of citations.</p>
<p>Generous government science budgets have allowed China to build world-class facilities in a number of fields. And China is home to <a href="https://www.nsf.gov/statistics/2018/nsb20181/report/sections/science-and-engineering-labor-force/global-s-e-labor-force">one of the world’s largest research communities</a>, now enriched by high-quality domestic university programs as well as scientists returning from abroad with advanced degrees from the world’s leading universities.</p>
<p>But how is the enterprise of science in China organized? Who sets the priorities? And are its mechanisms of governance suitable for sustained progress?</p>
<h2>Chinese science, by sector</h2>
<p>In contrast to the U.S., where basic research is concentrated in universities, where there are strong traditions of corporate R&D and where research in government labs supports the missions of government agencies, the institutional arrangements for science in China reflect a different design. </p>
<p>Though each has been extensively reformed, Chinese science today is still largely conducted in five institutional sectors. The Chinese Academy of Sciences (CAS), a legacy institution from the 1950s, oversees some 120 institutes – including China’s “big science” facilities – and three institutions of higher education. Following a series of reforms over the past two decades, scientists in many of its labs now engage in world-class research across a range of disciplines, including quantum physics, mathematics and neuroscience.</p>
<p>Universities comprise the second institutional system, with the top schools competing with CAS for talent and prestige. University-based research was not emphasized in the pre-reform era. But over the past two decades, China’s top universities have emerged as important centers of basic and applied research, while also promoting a culture supportive of high-tech entrepreneurship.</p>
<figure class="align-center zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/225144/original/file-20180627-112620-14bn6ws.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/225144/original/file-20180627-112620-14bn6ws.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/225144/original/file-20180627-112620-14bn6ws.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/225144/original/file-20180627-112620-14bn6ws.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/225144/original/file-20180627-112620-14bn6ws.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/225144/original/file-20180627-112620-14bn6ws.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/225144/original/file-20180627-112620-14bn6ws.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/225144/original/file-20180627-112620-14bn6ws.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">2017 visitors to the annual China Beijing International High-Tech Expo, a showcase for Chinese domestic technology companies and innovation.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="http://www.apimages.com/metadata/Index/China-High-Tech-Expo/93bce0f1368e49eaa12bf36a4b5980cf/1/0">AP Photo/Mark Schiefelbein</a></span>
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<p>China’s industrial enterprises constitute the third institutional sector. Two of the most significant changes over the past two decades have been the growth of company-based R&D, especially in information and communications technology fields, and the emergence of non-state-owned, market-oriented high tech firms. R&D expenditures in the enterprise sector now amounts to <a href="https://www.csis.org/analysis/fat-tech-dragon">roughly 80 percent of the nation’s total</a>.</p>
<p>Government research institutes under civilian ministries – such as those for agriculture, public health, environmental protection, natural resources and so on – constitute a fourth system. </p>
<p>Finally, research and development in support of the military constitutes a fifth sector, one which remains largely opaque. In cooperation with civilian sectors, and guided by civil-military integration policies, it’s producing <a href="https://theconversation.com/chinas-quest-for-techno-military-supremacy-91840">increasingly sophisticated national defense systems</a>.</p>
<p>In the last few years, the Chinese government has introduced policies to <a href="http://english.cas.cn/Special_Reports/Pioneer_Initiative/">encourage collaborative research across these sectors</a>. In particular, China has established national laboratories and other major new national research centers, inspired by the national lab experience in the U.S. and other countries. <a href="https://doi.org/10.1038/d41586-018-00544-1">These new institutions</a> – cross-disciplinary and problem-focused by design – are engaged in <a href="https://doi.org/10.1038/d41586-018-00544-1">world-class research of international interest</a>. For example, the University of Science and Technology in Hefei is home to a leading facility for quantum physics and quantum information. </p>
<p>The government has also sponsored the establishment of major government-owned national research centers within leading Chinese companies. For instance, iFlytek, a leader in voice recognition technologies, hosts one on human-machine interactions. China National Offshore Oil Corporation hosts another on natural gas hydrates.</p>
<h2>Encouraging policy from the top</h2>
<figure class="align-right zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/225146/original/file-20180627-112607-125aeu2.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/225146/original/file-20180627-112607-125aeu2.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=237&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/225146/original/file-20180627-112607-125aeu2.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=825&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/225146/original/file-20180627-112607-125aeu2.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=825&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/225146/original/file-20180627-112607-125aeu2.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=825&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/225146/original/file-20180627-112607-125aeu2.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=1036&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/225146/original/file-20180627-112607-125aeu2.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=1036&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/225146/original/file-20180627-112607-125aeu2.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=1036&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Chinese President Xi Jinping, left, and Premier Li Keqiang have thrown the government’s support behind the country’s research efforts.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="http://www.apimages.com/metadata/Index/China-Politics/0a6ca1c6f90f45a893fced58dabfab53/2/0">AP Photo/Ng Han Guan</a></span>
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<p>In contrast to the current U.S. administration, which has yet to define a <a href="https://theconversation.com/how-does-a-us-president-settle-on-his-science-policy-69953">clear policy for science and technology</a>, China’s quest for global scientific leadership is <a href="http://www.xinhuanet.com/english/2017-05/27/c_136321055.htm">driven by its top political leaders</a> who see China’s future wealth and power being derived from its research and innovation capabilities. </p>
<p>Chinese science policy, as a result, is characterized by a strong emphasis on national needs as defined by a top-down design process. At the national government level, funding for research has become more centralized. It’s now channeled through national programs, or “platforms,” administered by the Ministry of Science and Technology (MOST). These do permit “bottom-up” investigator-initiated proposals, and efforts are being made to strengthen professional reviews and assessments of research projects. Nevertheless, the funding system is still characterized by strong state direction.</p>
<p>The themes of national science policy are also found in the <a href="http://www.xinhuanet.com/english/2018-01/24/c_136921495.htm">initiatives of local governments</a>, many of which have become <a href="http://www.china.org.cn/china/2018-06/26/content_53526105.htm">major funders</a> of R&D and partners in building the country’s new research facilities.</p>
<p>The emphasis on national needs had, until recently, biased the nation’s research away from basic science. Chinese policymakers, however, have come to realize that leadership in science-based industries requires basic research conducted at international frontier levels. As a result, <a href="https://doi.org/10.1093/nsr/nwy008">financial support for basic research is increasing</a>.</p>
<p>But, a <a href="https://doi.org/10.1038/d41586-018-03246-w">controversial administrative reorganization</a> in March of this year changed the status of China’s key agency for supporting basic science, the <a href="http://www.nsfc.gov.cn/english/site_1/index.html">National Natural Science Foundation of China</a> (NSFC). No longer an independent agency under China’s State Council, NSFC is now an entity <a href="http://www.china.org.cn/china/2018-06/20/content_52761022.htm">under the broad administrative direction of the Ministry of Science and Technology</a>.</p>
<p>The NSFC had been seen as a pioneer in promoting a culture of basic science through the support of original investigator-driven, peer-reviewed research. Members of the scientific community now fear that NSFC operations will succumb to the more applications-oriented, bureaucratic procedures of its new home ministry.</p>
<figure class="align-center zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/225148/original/file-20180627-112628-mwz0qw.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/225148/original/file-20180627-112628-mwz0qw.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/225148/original/file-20180627-112628-mwz0qw.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/225148/original/file-20180627-112628-mwz0qw.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/225148/original/file-20180627-112628-mwz0qw.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/225148/original/file-20180627-112628-mwz0qw.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/225148/original/file-20180627-112628-mwz0qw.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/225148/original/file-20180627-112628-mwz0qw.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Chinese researchers announced they’d cloned primates in early 2018, a step other countries had held off on taking.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="http://www.apimages.com/metadata/Index/China-Cloned-Monkeys/443351fa8d6f4156a6887a670a802d5d/9/0">AP Photo/Mark Schiefelbein</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<h2>Socialist science</h2>
<p>China’s aspirations for scientific distinction, and its aggressive science policy in support of those aspirations, is occurring in a political environment that’s quite different from that of other countries with strong traditions of science.</p>
<p>The differences have come into sharper focus under the leadership of President and Party Chairman Xi Jinping. While Xi has redoubled political support for science, he has also altered the political climate by insisting on more demanding ideological commitments from the academic community to his own worldview, by strengthening the role of the Communist Party in research institutions and universities and by harnessing China’s technological progress to the development of a surveillance state, leaving little room for privacy and dissent.</p>
<p>Combined with China’s long tradition of bureaucratic rule, these initiatives set the models of science-state relations, and Chinese scientific development more generally, apart. Other leading nations in science have political systems based on law and the protection of human rights, on free and open communications and on civil society traditions, which permit the autonomous operation of professional societies.</p>
<p>The Chinese model, arguably, has been quite successful in producing rapid development over the past 30 years of scientific and technological “catch-up.” China has certainly caught up in selected fields and, in some, is advancing the frontier. But, whether this model of science-state relations is suitable, over time, for the kinds of original innovation and creative scientific breakthroughs envisioned by the leadership – and for <a href="https://doi.org/10.1093/nsr/nwy036">managing the complex ethical issues arising</a> from new technologies – are among the more intriguing questions about China’s future.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/93830/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Richard P. Suttmeier receives funding from National Science Foundation, US-China Economic and Security Commission of Congress.</span></em></p>China’s government is prioritizing world-class science and tech. An expert describes the Chinese research landscape – and questions its sustainability.Richard P. Suttmeier, Professor Emeritus of Political Science, University of OregonLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/933222018-06-05T10:46:58Z2018-06-05T10:46:58ZWith federal funding for science on the decline, what’s the role of a profit motive in research?<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/221412/original/file-20180601-142069-1d17td4.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&rect=318%2C661%2C4572%2C3163&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">Money doesn't grow in flasks – scientists have to find funds outside the lab.</span> <span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://unsplash.com/photos/UmncJq4KPcA">chuttersnap/Unsplash</a>, <a class="license" href="http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/">CC BY</a></span></figcaption></figure><p>What is the place of a profit motive in the production of knowledge at public universities?</p>
<p>The Trump administration’s initial budget request presented in 2017 offered one answer to that question. According to the American Association for the Advancement of Science, the budget proposal included a <a href="https://www.aaas.org/page/fy-2018-rd-appropriations-dashboard">17 percent reduction in funding for basic research</a>. Proposed cuts to particular agencies and programs within them, such as research on <a href="https://www.nature.com/polopoly_fs/1.22036.1496251823!/menu/main/topColumns/topLeftColumn/pdf/nature.2017.22036.pdf?origin=ppub">basic energy sciences at the Department of Energy</a>, were particularly acute. And while <a href="https://www.theatlantic.com/science/archive/2018/03/trump-science-budget/556229/">Congress intervened</a> to avoid these cuts, the current funding package is nevertheless part of a long-term trend of reduced federal commitment to science. </p>
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<p>Proposed and actual funding conveys a recurring message to American academic scientists: do more to attract money from other sources. In most instances, this means industry funding.</p>
<p>On the face of it, partnerships between academia and industry in the production of knowledge are both sensible and critical. Given sluggish economic growth and the prevalence of societal problems that require technological solutions, one might argue that universities should be extensively engaged in contributing to innovation and less concerned with research lacking an apparent connection to real-world impact. Why spend time and money on studying the mating habits of Japanese quail when there are problems like Alzheimer’s disease and excessive reliance on non-renewable fossil fuels that urgently need solutions right now? </p>
<p>Yet many critics argue that a profit motive in science creates a scenario in which scientists place their values and potential personal gain ahead of the public good, resulting in <a href="https://mobile.nytimes.com/2015/09/06/us/food-industry-enlisted-academics-in-gmo-lobbying-war-emails-show.html">bias and conflicts of interest</a>. Whether you are concerned about the advancement of science, economic innovation, or both, it’s worth considering the value and appropriateness of partnerships between academic scientists and the corporate sector.</p>
<p>What do researchers themselves think? I’ve spent more than a decade sitting down with hundreds of scientists around the world for in-depth conversations about their work. In my recent book, “<a href="https://jhupbooks.press.jhu.edu/content/fractured-profession">A Fractured Profession: Commercialism and Conflict in Academic Science</a>,” I examine how scientists experience the rise of commercialism in academic science. These researchers shared views with me that don’t necessarily fall neatly in line with either those who celebrate a profit motive in science nor those who lament it.</p>
<h2>What actually motivates scientists?</h2>
<p>Even if university administrators and federal officials reward profitable science, the scientists I spoke with say that profits are rarely their motivation. Commercialist scientists in academia certainly do not dismiss the importance of revenues or resources for research, but societal impact and the pursuit of status in science were more highly prized by the scientists in my study. Being able to claim that you reduced the cost of making a vaccine to less than the cost of the bottle in which it is stored, for example, is a new way to stand out at a university where most scientists are publishing in the top journals in their field. In this respect, self-interest – generating money and prestige – can coincide with the public good.</p>
<p>Perhaps more importantly to those who think that universities should operate even more like businesses <a href="https://jhupbooks.press.jhu.edu/content/academic-capitalism-and-new-economy">than they already do</a>, scholars are finding that average rates of return from commercialization — even at universities with the highest licensing income — <a href="https://www.kauffman.org/what-we-do/research/2011/06/rules-for-growth-promoting-innovation-and-growth-through-legal-reform">are relatively low</a>. In the same way that relatively few universities benefit considerably from big-time college sports, relatively few universities — typically those that are rich already — actually produce blockbusters that lead to financial windfalls. </p>
<p>Unlike some commentators and <a href="https://theconversation.com/people-dont-trust-scientific-research-when-companies-are-involved-76848">members of the public</a>, most of the scientists I spoke with are relatively unconcerned with <a href="https://rowman.com/ISBN/9780742543713/Science-in-the-Private-Interest-Has-the-Lure-of-Profits-Corrupted-Biomedical-Research-">conflicts of interest and bias</a> in commercially oriented research. In their view, peer review mitigates such questions. Even if a scientist stands to gain financially from the outcomes of her research, if an invention is not scientifically sound, researchers contend it would have little chance of success in the market.</p>
<p>The traditional scientists in academia I spoke with reported <a href="https://theconversation.com/rather-than-being-free-of-values-good-science-is-transparent-about-them-84946">two chief values</a>: support for curiosity-driven research and a long-term vision of the technological fruits of scientific research. Traditionalists are still the majority, but they encounter scarce resources for basic research and increasing pressure to connect their work to concrete societal impacts. In the words of one scientist, much of what scientists understand about cancer stems from work based on Nobel Prize-winning biologist Lee Hartwell’s curiosity-driven research on how yeast cells divide. “If he had to apply his research, he probably would have had to work for Budweiser,” he said.</p>
<h2>Investing in a mix of sorts of science</h2>
<p>What should be the role of the state and the market in the production of knowledge in the American research university? Both are critical.</p>
<p>History shows there’s an intrinsic value to letting people explore, because such <a href="https://theconversation.com/tracing-the-links-between-basic-research-and-real-world-applications-82198">exploration is critical to later marketplace innovations</a> and economic prosperity. Today’s multi-billion-dollar global positioning system industries rely on Einstein’s general theory of relativity and ideas from 19th-century geometry, the latter of which were dismissed by contemporaries as useless. Other technologies, such as Teflon, saccharine and the pacemaker, were accidental creations. While corporations once valued having internal basic science laboratories where exploratory or “blue-sky” research took place, now the U.S government is the chief, and under-resourced, patron for this important work.</p>
<p>Few universities generate vast commercial returns from commercially oriented research. As a society, we must therefore be cautious in how eagerly we unleash the forces of the market in funding science in academia. Similar experiments in substituting the market for the state in <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2017/09/05/magazine/michigan-gambled-on-charter-schools-its-children-lost.html">primary schooling</a>, <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2018/04/10/us/private-prisons-escapes-riots.html">prisons</a> and <a href="https://www.brookings.edu/articles/outsourcing-war/">the military</a> have not clearly paid off. </p>
<p>Much as a diversified investment portfolio includes various assets that balance returns and risk, society would benefit most from a healthy mix of investment in curiosity-driven, use-inspired and highly market-oriented research in academia.</p>
<p>Until scientists can better articulate why science is as worthy of investment as any other form of infrastructure, they will likely continue to encounter the message delivered today: look to the market.</p>
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<header>David R. Johnson is the author of:</header>
<p><a href="https://jhupbooks.press.jhu.edu/content/fractured-profession">A Fractured Profession: Commercialism and Conflict in Academic Science</a></p>
<footer>Johns Hopkins University Press provides funding as a member of The Conversation US.</footer>
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</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/93322/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>This research was funded by the National Science Foundation Grant #0957033 “A New Reward System in Academic Science.”
Johns Hopkins University Press provides funding as a member of The Conversation US.</span></em></p>Money always seems tight for university scientists. A sociologist conducted hundreds of interviews to see how they think about funding sources and profit motives for basic and applied research.David R. Johnson, Assistant Professor of Higher Education, University of Nevada, RenoLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/892612017-12-21T14:20:47Z2017-12-21T14:20:47ZWith science under siege in 2017, scientists regrouped and fought back: 5 essential reads<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/199506/original/file-20171215-17878-iqytoq.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&rect=242%2C23%2C4789%2C3002&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">You can't keep a good scientist down.</span> <span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://unsplash.com/photos/nKNrOZ5MXZY">Vlad Tchompalov on Unsplash</a>, <a class="license" href="http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/">CC BY</a></span></figcaption></figure><p>2017 may well be remembered as the year of alternative facts and fake news. Truth took a hit, and experts seemed to lose the public’s trust. Scientists felt under siege as the Trump administration <a href="https://theconversation.com/how-the-guerrilla-archivists-saved-history-and-are-doing-it-again-under-trump-72346">purged information from government websites</a>, appointed <a href="https://theconversation.com/why-politicians-think-they-know-better-than-scientists-and-why-thats-so-dangerous-72548">inexperienced or adversarial individuals</a> <a href="https://theconversation.com/trump-administrations-zeal-to-peel-back-regulations-is-leading-us-to-another-era-of-robber-barons-84961">to science-related posts</a> and left <a href="https://theconversation.com/how-does-a-us-president-settle-on-his-science-policy-69953">important advisory positions</a> empty. Researchers braced for cuts to federally funded science.</p>
<p>So where did that leave science and its supporters? Here we spotlight five stories from our archive that show how scholars took stock of where scientists stand in this new climate and various ways to consider the value their research holds for society.</p>
<h2>1. A risk to standing up for science</h2>
<p>In April, the March for Science mobilized more than a million protesters worldwide to push back against what they saw as attacks on science and evidence-based policy. But some people in the research community <a href="https://theconversation.com/whats-at-risk-if-scientists-dont-think-strategically-before-talking-politics-63797">worried about a downside</a> to <a href="https://theconversation.com/should-scientists-engage-in-activism-72234">scientists being perceived as advocates</a>.</p>
<p>Emily Vraga, assistant professor in political communication at George Mason University, <a href="https://theconversation.com/can-march-for-science-participants-advocate-without-losing-the-publics-trust-76205">put the conundrum this way</a>:</p>
<blockquote>
<p>“On one hand, scientists have relevant expertise to contribute to conversations about public policy…. On the other hand, scientists who advocate may risk losing the trust of the public.” </p>
</blockquote>
<p>Maintaining that trust is imperative for scientists, both to be able to communicate public risks appropriately and to preserve public funding for research, she wrote.</p>
<p>Vraga and her colleagues’ research suggests that scientists don’t lose credibility when they advocate for policies based on their expertise. But there’s a distinction to be made between advocacy and mere partisanship – statements motivated by the science are received differently than if they’re perceived as driven by political beliefs.</p>
<h2>2. Rhetorical tools at the ready</h2>
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<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/199722/original/file-20171218-27591-17bzy4t.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/199722/original/file-20171218-27591-17bzy4t.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=237&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/199722/original/file-20171218-27591-17bzy4t.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=497&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/199722/original/file-20171218-27591-17bzy4t.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=497&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/199722/original/file-20171218-27591-17bzy4t.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=497&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/199722/original/file-20171218-27591-17bzy4t.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=624&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/199722/original/file-20171218-27591-17bzy4t.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=624&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/199722/original/file-20171218-27591-17bzy4t.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=624&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
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<span class="caption">Protesting is one thing, communicating a message is another.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">Peter Cedric Rock Smith</span>, <a class="license" href="http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/">CC BY-NC-ND</a></span>
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<p>With the feeling that there’s a “war on science” afoot, savvy scientists are thinking about how to defend their work. University of Washington professor of communication Leah Ceccarelli says they can <a href="https://theconversation.com/defending-science-how-the-art-of-rhetoric-can-help-68210">look toward the field of rhetoric</a> for help in how to get their messages across. She writes:</p>
<blockquote>
<p>“Before dismissing this recommendation as a perverse appeal to slink into the mud or take up the corrupted weapons of the enemy, keep in mind that in academia, ‘rhetoric’ does not mean rank falsehoods, or mere words over substance.”</p>
</blockquote>
<p>It’s about building persuasive arguments, built on solid foundations, she says. Rhetoricians study effective communication – and they’re happy to open their toolbox to scientists.</p>
<p>Indeed, the <a href="https://theconversation.com/getting-a-scientific-message-across-means-taking-human-nature-into-account-70634">science of science communication</a> is becoming a hot area of inquiry, as practitioners <a href="https://theconversation.com/what-do-gorilla-suits-and-blowfish-fallacies-have-to-do-with-climate-change-72560">investigate and disseminate</a> <a href="https://theconversation.com/communicating-climate-change-focus-on-the-framing-not-just-the-facts-73028">various techniques</a> for effectively <a href="https://theconversation.com/inoculation-theory-using-misinformation-to-fight-misinformation-77545">spreading accurate scientific information</a>.</p>
<h2>3. What you miss out on when science gets cut</h2>
<p>Scientists are always scrambling to secure funding for their research, and during the first year of the Trump administration, it seemed science projects were consistently on the budget chopping block. </p>
<p>Christopher Keane, the vice president for research at Washington State University, made the case that federal funding for science ultimately <a href="https://theconversation.com/when-the-federal-budget-funds-scientific-research-its-the-economy-that-benefits-80651">revs up regional economies</a>, particularly when scholars within academia join forces with entrepreneurs in the private sector:</p>
<blockquote>
<p>“<a href="http://www.sciencecoalition.org/downloads/AMI_v3_4-17-17.pdf">Thousands of companies</a> can trace their roots to federally funded university research. And since the majority of federally funded research takes place <a href="https://www.cbo.gov/sites/default/files/cbofiles/ftpdocs/82xx/doc8221/06-18-research.pdf">at America’s research universities</a> – often in concert with federal labs and private research partners – these spinoff companies are often located in their local communities all across the country.”</p>
</blockquote>
<h2>4. Slashing science projects hurts workers</h2>
<p>Ohio State University economist Bruce Weinberg described how <a href="http://iris.isr.umich.edu">a unique data set</a> allowed him and his colleagues to <a href="https://theconversation.com/who-feels-the-pain-of-science-research-budget-cuts-75119">actually follow the money</a> on federally funded scientific research. Using administrative data, they were able to identify everyone paid to work on a research project, not just the few who appear as authors on any culminating journal articles.</p>
<blockquote>
<p>“This is valuable because we’re able to identify students and staff, who may be less likely to author papers than faculty and postdocs but who turn out to be an important part of the workforce on funded research projects. It’s like taking into account everyone who works in a particular store, not just the manager and owner.”</p>
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<p>The majority of people employed on research projects turn out to be somewhere in the training pipeline, whether undergraduates, graduate students or postdocs.</p>
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<p>And to do all that work, Weinberg points out, labs need to purchase everything from “computers and software, to reagents, medical imaging equipment or telescopes, even to lab mice and rats.” Cut the federal funding for science and the economic effects will ripple out far beyond just university science buildings.</p>
<h2>5. Basic research powers later patents</h2>
<p>Skeptics may wonder: What’s the big deal? So we take a few years off from funding some basic research. Does basic research really matter? <a href="https://theconversation.com/tracing-the-links-between-basic-research-and-real-world-applications-82198">As Northwestern University’s Benjamin F. Jones and Mohammad Ahmadpoor put it</a>, the:</p>
<blockquote>
<p>“‘ivory tower’ view of academic endeavors suggests that science is an isolated activity that rarely pays off in practical application. Related is the idea that marketplace innovation rarely relies on the work of universities or government labs.”</p>
</blockquote>
<p>But is that right? To find out if basic research actually does lead to usable practical advances, they <a href="https://doi.org/10.1126/science.aam9527">designed a study to investigate</a> the links between patentable inventions and scientific research. Jones and Ahmadpoor created a “social network” style map, which connects patents and science papers using the reference citations in each. They found that:</p>
<blockquote>
<p>“Among research articles that receive at least one citation, a full 80 percent could be linked forward to a future patent. Meanwhile, 61 percent of patents linked backward to at least one research article.”</p>
</blockquote>
<p>It’s impossible to predict which basic research projects will be important in the marketplace, but they wrote that a very high share of scientific research does link “forward to usable practical advances. Most of the linkages are indirect, showing the manifold and unexpected ways” in which basic research can ultimately pay off.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/89261/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
President Trump’s first year was a rough one for scientists and others who value truth and expertise. Many rallied to the cause, while others used research to make the case for the value of science.Maggie Villiger, Senior Science + Technology EditorLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/848882017-10-01T23:10:07Z2017-10-01T23:10:07ZGenome editing of human embryos broadens ethics discussions<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/188207/original/file-20170929-21094-1qm6boi.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">Scientists are using a powerful gene editing technique to understand how human embryos develop.</span> <span class="attribution"><span class="source">shutterstock</span></span></figcaption></figure><p>For several years, scientists have experimented on human embryos with a powerful genome editing tool called CRISPR to see if they could correct genetic errors or reduce the risk of disease. In September, <a href="https://www.crick.ac.uk/kathy-niakan">Kathy Niakan at the Francis Crick Institute</a> in London and her colleagues reported they had <a href="https://www.nature.com/nature/journal/vaop/ncurrent/full/nature24033.html">used this tool on human embryos for a very different purpose</a> — to better understand human development.</p>
<p>The use of CRISPR (pronounced “crisper”) to modify human embryos has prompted a healthy debate on the ethics of human genetic technologies. This tool is controversial, in part, because changes that are made to the embryo could be passed down to future generations. Niakan’s recent research is novel, and less ethically fraught than some other genome-editing research.</p>
<p>Research labs around the world are using CRISPR to selectively insert, delete or replace DNA with far greater precision and at a lower cost than other genome-editing techniques. Since 2015, five reports have detailed its use in human embryos to correct disease-causing mutations or create resistance to infectious disease. </p>
<p>Scientists have <a href="https://link.springer.com/article/10.1007%2Fs13238-015-0153-5">modified the genes responsible for β-thalassemia</a> (an inherited blood disorder), <a href="https://link.springer.com/article/10.1007%2Fs00438-017-1299-z">favism</a> (a reaction to eating fava beans), and a <a href="https://www.nature.com/nature/journal/v548/n7668/full/nature23305.html">type of heart disease</a>. Another experiment used CRISPR to introduce a mutation into a protein called CCR5 in an effort to <a href="http://europepmc.org/articles/pmc4870449">prevent HIV infection</a>.</p>
<h2>A striking difference</h2>
<p>The project led by Niakan had a starkly different aim. It used CRISPR to peek at the earliest stages of human embryonic development by targeting a gene called OCT4, which is active in the cells that go on to form the embryo. </p>
<p>Niakan’s immediate objective was to better understand the early aspects of human development. But her research eventually may help reveal why some pregnancies end in miscarriages and may improve the success of <em>in vitro</em> fertilization. </p>
<p>Much of the global discussion over the ethics of modifying human embryos has focused on whether the technique might be unsafe or used for non-medical purposes. Niakan’s recent project brings other aspects of this debate to light. How do scientists acquire the embryos they use in their research, and how are their projects approved? </p>
<p>So far, these types of experiments have been done in China, the United Kingdom and the United States. With only limited data available on the experiments conducted in China, it makes sense to focus the discussion on the experiments based in the United States and in the United Kingdom. </p>
<h2>Who’s taking the risk - and why?</h2>
<p>Earlier this year, <a href="http://www.ohsu.edu/people/shoukhrat-mitalipov/2D760207FF014335B07EC30F3818652F">Shoukhrat Mitalipov</a>, a reproductive biologist at Oregon Health and Science University (OHSU), and his colleagues used CRISPR in human embryos to repair a mutation that causes heart disease. From an ethics standpoint, Mitalipov’s research is more controversial than Niakan’s. The goal of his experiments was to make changes to the human embryo that could be passed on to future generations. Niakan’s research, on the other hand, aimed to develop our understanding of human embryology. </p>
<p>To do the experiments, Mitalipov’s team had to create human embryos from donated eggs and sperm. In contrast, Niakan’s project used embryos that were left over from fertility treatments. This is an important difference. </p>
<p>For Mitalipov’s study, the women who donated their eggs for research were exposed to the risks associated with hormonal stimulation and egg retrieval. These risks include abdominal pain, vomiting, rapid weight gain, shortness of breath, and damage to the organs that are close to the ovaries. A particularly serious risk is ovarian hyperstimulation syndrome that can require hospitalization.</p>
<p>With Niakan’s study, women assumed these risks in connection with their IVF treatment, not their participation in research. These women weighed the potential harms of hormonal stimulation and egg retrieval against the potential benefits of having a child using assisted human reproduction. Embryos remaining after fertility treatment were donated to research.</p>
<h2>Looking ahead</h2>
<p>It’s also worth examining how these studies were approved. Several committees, panels and review boards from OHSU provided input and guidance prior to granting Mitalipov permission to do his experiments. OHSU is Mitalipov’s home institution. This raises the spectre of institutional conflict of interest because OHSU stands to benefit from Mitalipov’s research if his work attracts more research funding or enhances the university’s reputation. </p>
<p>In the United Kingdom, the governance and oversight of human embryo research lies in the hands of authorities that are legally regulated and are at arms length to the institutions conducting the research. Ethics review of human embryo research occurs at both the national and regional level. The Human Fertilisation and Embryology Authority and the regional research ethics committee <a href="https://www.crick.ac.uk/news/science-news/2016/02/01/hfea-decision/">reviewed Niakan’s proposal</a> before she could begin her experiments. </p>
<p>As genome editing of human embryos becomes more widespread, it is important to understand the differences between one project and the next so that we can meaningfully discuss the range of ethical, social, political and regulatory issues associated with the research.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/84888/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Françoise Baylis does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>A new gene editing experiment explores human development. With this comes new ethical questions: How do scientists acquire embryos and how are their projects approved?Françoise Baylis, Research Professor, Philosophy, Dalhousie UniversityLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/821982017-08-10T18:01:08Z2017-08-10T18:01:08ZTracing the links between basic research and real-world applications<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/181616/original/file-20170810-32165-1b0tt.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&rect=136%2C243%2C3564%2C2488&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">Basic research and applications coexist in a tangled two-way ecosystem.</span> <span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.shutterstock.com/image-photo/many-root-mangrove-forestintertidal-forest-685094056">lenggirl/Shutterstock.com</a></span></figcaption></figure><p>What does hailing a ride with <a href="https://www.uber.com/">Uber</a> have to do with 19th-century geometry and Einstein’s theory of relativity? Quite a bit, it turns out.</p>
<p>Uber and other location-based mobile applications rely on GPS to link users with available cars nearby. GPS technology requires a network of satellites that transmit data to and from Earth; but satellites wouldn’t relay information correctly if their clocks failed to account for the fact that time is different in space – a tenet of Einstein’s general theory of relativity. And Einstein’s famous theory relies on Riemannian geometry, which was proposed in the 19th century to explain how spaces and curves interact – but <a href="https://global.oup.com/academic/product/the-symbolic-universe-9780198500889">dismissed as derivative</a> and effectively useless in its time.</p>
<p>The point is not just that mathematicians don’t always get their due. This example highlights an ongoing controversy about the value of basic science and scholarship. How much are marketplace innovations, which drive broad economic prosperity, actually linked to basic scientific research?</p>
<p>It’s an important question. Plenty of <a href="https://doi.org/10.1126/science.aal0890">tax dollars and other funds go toward the research</a> performed in academic centers, government labs and other facilities. But what kind of return are we as a society recouping on this large investment in new discoveries? Does scientific research reliably lead to usable practical advances?</p>
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<p>Not surprisingly, there are strongly opposing viewpoints on the value of basic research. For example, after World War II the founder of the National Science Foundation characterized scientific research as a valuable fund of <a href="https://www.nsf.gov/od/lpa/nsf50/vbush1945.htm#ch3.3">new knowledge from which applications could be drawn</a>. In contrast, the “ivory tower” view of academic endeavors suggests that science is an isolated activity that rarely pays off in practical application. Related is the idea that <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Project_Hindsight">marketplace innovation rarely relies on</a> the work of universities or government labs.</p>
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<p>If one perspective is more accurate than the other, it has major implications for policy – specifically, the extent to which governments fund scientific research. In the meantime, federal spending on basic research (as a share of GDP or a share of the federal budget) has been in decline over the last several decades.</p>
<p>So we <a href="http://science.sciencemag.org/cgi/doi/10.1126/science.aam9527">designed a study to investigate</a> the links between patentable inventions and scientific research.</p>
<h2>How many degrees of separation?</h2>
<p>Past research on this topic often studied whether scientists themselves at universities and other research institutions produced patents or started businesses; that would support a <a href="https://doi.org/10.17226/13001">direct link between scientists and application</a>. The problem with such studies is that scientists’ discoveries, like those of Riemann described above, can be applied by anyone who comes to know about them, even at a much later date – not only by the original investigators. Moreover, a given discovery may lead to other research that is ultimately applied, meaning there can be a highly indirect link between research and the innovations that it supports in the end.</p>
<p>To account for direct and indirect links between basic research and related applications, we looked for connections between all 4.8 million patents granted between 1976 and 2015 by the <a href="https://www.uspto.gov/">United States Patent and Trademark Office</a> and all 32 million journal articles published since World War II, as indexed by the <a href="https://clarivate.com/products/web-of-science/">Web of Science</a> database.</p>
<p>Most patents are filed by businesses, representing potentially marketable innovations. And most research articles flow from universities and other research settings. So these measures help trace not only links from science to invention, but also the flows of knowledge from nonprofit research institutions to firms. (Only in the past decade has the large volume of data required to run such a study been available in accessible form; our research has benefited directly from the Big Data era.)</p>
<p>To find connections, we created a “social network” style map, which connects patents and science papers using the citations in each. This method harnesses the fact that both papers and patents provide references to work on which they are based. We wrote an algorithm that found the shortest distance between any two items – based on the number of intermediary papers or patents cited – effectively identifying the “scientific pedigree” of a given patent/invention, if any.</p>
<h2>Science doesn’t stay in the ivory tower</h2>
<p>We found remarkably widespread linkages between scientific research and future practical applications.</p>
<p>While some scientific papers are never cited by any future work, among research articles that receive at least one citation, a full 80 percent could be linked forward to a future patent. Meanwhile, 61 percent of patents linked backward to at least one research article. In fact, most papers and patents across scientific fields were at a distance of only two to four items from the other domain, on average.</p>
<p>Not surprisingly, the average distance from patents of scientific works in more abstract fields like mathematics was higher than that in more naturally applicable domains like computer science, where the average distance was closer to one, suggesting more direct links between research and application. Importantly, the patents with the most impact (by measures connected to market valuation) tended to be the most science-intensive, relying more directly on scientific advances than other patents did.</p>
<p>Overall, our findings suggest that basic research matters. Scientific advances are not like the proverbial tree falling in the forest with no one around to hear. Rather, looking across the corpus of science, we find widespread connections to future patents – especially to the most valuable patents.</p>
<h2>Aim for Pasteur’s Quadrant</h2>
<p>Our study also has important implications for how to maximize the potential impact of scientific research. That is, how can scientists best choose what to study in the first place?</p>
<p>The romantic view of science is that it’s driven mainly by curiosity: A scholar chooses a line of research because he or she happens to find it fascinating, regardless of its applicability – in fact, a focus on application may be seen by some as at odds with “real” science.</p>
<p>In contrast, our results showed that research that was closest to application was more likely to have impact within science itself. In particular, research articles that are directly cited by patents tend to become “home runs” within science – those rare, exceptionally highly cited papers that other scientists draw upon. So a focus on real-world problems may boost not only direct applications but also new science, bringing potentially profound advances in our understanding of the world.</p>
<figure class="align-center zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/181576/original/file-20170809-32177-5mrlcs.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/181576/original/file-20170809-32177-5mrlcs.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/181576/original/file-20170809-32177-5mrlcs.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=464&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/181576/original/file-20170809-32177-5mrlcs.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=464&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/181576/original/file-20170809-32177-5mrlcs.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=464&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/181576/original/file-20170809-32177-5mrlcs.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=584&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/181576/original/file-20170809-32177-5mrlcs.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=584&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/181576/original/file-20170809-32177-5mrlcs.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=584&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Research exists along two continua: How much is it driven by curiosity and how much by a search for real-world solutions?</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://judithcurry.com/2013/05/15/pasteurs-quadrant/">Climate Etc.</a>, <a class="license" href="http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/">CC BY-SA</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>This type of application-oriented research is said to fall into “<a href="https://www.brookings.edu/book/pasteurs-quadrant/">Pasteur’s Quadrant</a>,” named for the famous 19th-century scientist. As a researcher, <a href="https://www.chemheritage.org/historical-profile/louis-pasteur">Louis Pasteur</a> focused substantially on practical issues such as food safety. Yet his efforts to remove harmful germs from milk, for example, led him simultaneously toward one of the most important insights of modern biology: that <a href="http://ocp.hul.harvard.edu/contagion/germtheory.html">germs cause specific diseases</a>.</p>
<p>So it’s ultimately not just about basic versus applied research. Both are important, but it appears especially fruitful to do work that straddles the line, as Pasteur did: science-driven inquiry framed by and aimed at real-world problems.</p>
<p>In short, we found that a remarkably high share of scientific research links forward to usable practical advances. Most of the linkages are indirect, showing the manifold and unexpected ways in which basic research can pay off in ultimate practical applications. Yet the science most directly linked to application turns out to have a major impact within science itself. Following Pasteur’s example may be an especially reliable way to hit the ball out of the park.</p>
<hr>
<p><em>Sachin Waikar assisted in the writing of this article.</em></p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/82198/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Benjamin F. Jones receives funding from Alfred P. Sloan Foundation. </span></em></p><p class="fine-print"><em><span>Mohammad Ahmadpoor does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organization that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>A new study connects the dots between published science and patented innovations, mapping just how society benefits from basic scientific research.Benjamin F. Jones, Professor of Entrepreneurship and Strategy, J. L. Kellogg School of Management, Northwestern UniversityMohammad Ahmadpoor, Postdoctoral Fellow of Strategy, J. L. Kellogg School of Management, Northwestern UniversityLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/806512017-07-27T02:01:11Z2017-07-27T02:01:11ZWhen the federal budget funds scientific research, it’s the economy that benefits<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/179810/original/file-20170726-27705-12b4ng0.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&rect=298%2C502%2C2708%2C1823&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">Impacts of federal research funding can be felt region-wide.</span> <span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.shutterstock.com/image-photo/view-downtown-seattle-skyline-washington-usa-510934489">f11photo/Shutterstock.com</a></span></figcaption></figure><p>Emergency: You need more <a href="https://www.washington.edu/alumni/columns/june97/mills.html">disposable diapers</a>, right away. You hop into your car and trust your ride will be a safe one. Thanks to your phone’s GPS and the <a href="http://www.longviewinstitute.org/projects/marketfundamentalism/microchip/">microchips that run it</a>, you map out how to get to the store fast. Once there, the <a href="https://www.nsf.gov/about/history/sensational60.pdf">barcode on the package</a> lets you accurately check out your purchase and run. Each step in this process owes a debt to the universities, researchers, students and the federal funding support that got these products and technologies rolling in the first place.</p>
<p>By some tallies, almost two-thirds of the technologies with the most far-reaching impact over the last 50 years <a href="http://www.bu.edu/research/articles/funding-for-scientific-research/">stemmed from federally funded R&D</a> at national laboratories and research universities.</p>
<p>The benefits from this investment have trickled down into countless <a href="http://money.cnn.com/galleries/2011/technology/1110/gallery.government_inventions/index.html">aspects of our everyday lives</a>. Even the internet that allows you to read this article online has its roots in federal dollars: The U.S. Department of Defense supported installation of the first node of a <a href="https://www.darpa.mil/about-us/timeline/arpanet">communications network called ARPANET</a> at UCLA back in 1969.</p>
<p>As Congress debates the upcoming budget, its members might remember the economic impacts and improved quality of life that past <a href="https://nsf.gov/about/history/nifty50/index.jsp">congressional support of basic and applied research</a> has created.</p>
<h2>Federal dollars do more than fund labs</h2>
<p>Here in the state of Washington, federally funded research at both my employer, Washington State University, and the University of Washington has led to transformational innovations. It’s helped spawn not only new products that save and improve lives, but productivity growth through new businesses and services.</p>
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<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/179521/original/file-20170724-11166-1s8eb5f.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/179521/original/file-20170724-11166-1s8eb5f.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/179521/original/file-20170724-11166-1s8eb5f.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=382&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/179521/original/file-20170724-11166-1s8eb5f.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=382&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/179521/original/file-20170724-11166-1s8eb5f.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=382&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/179521/original/file-20170724-11166-1s8eb5f.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=480&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/179521/original/file-20170724-11166-1s8eb5f.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=480&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/179521/original/file-20170724-11166-1s8eb5f.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=480&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">The Zhang lab at WSU works on recycling carbon composite fiber materials.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">Robert Hubner, WSU</span>, <a class="license" href="http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nd/4.0/">CC BY-ND</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>Just a few examples include new kinds of <a href="https://cmec.wsu.edu/documents/2015/04/wmel-history.pdf">composite-based lumber</a>, <a href="https://www.geekwire.com/2015/these-researchers-are-building-extra-brainy-smart-homes-to-monitor-aging-adults/">smart home technology for the aged</a>, <a href="https://nephrology.uw.edu/about/history-innovation">kidney dialysis machines</a>, <a href="https://magazine.wsu.edu/2015/08/16/the-ion-investigators/">airport explosive detectors</a> and new varieties of wheat, <a href="https://news.wsu.edu/2016/11/21/mcdonalds-chooses-wsu-potatoes/">potatoes</a> and other <a href="http://www.seattletimes.com/pacific-nw-magazine/quinoa-comes-to-the-northwest/">agricultural crops</a> that we enjoy at our tables and in numerous products.</p>
<p>All these inventions relied on federal investment combined with university research lab expertise. The important final step was commercialization. Together it all led to positive economic impacts.</p>
<p>We see this pattern again and again.</p>
<p>For instance, next time you’re on Google, remember it was founded by two Stanford University doctoral students who were funded in part by <a href="https://www.nsf.gov/discoveries/disc_summ.jsp?cntn_id=100660">National Science Foundation Graduate Fellowships</a>. Fast forward 20 years and here in my backyard, the company is busy building a new campus in downtown Seattle that may house <a href="https://www.geekwire.com/2016/paul-allens-vulcan-develop-huge-complex-google-amazons-backyard/">3,000-4,000 workers</a> by 2019. Many of those hired will likely be <a href="http://www.seattletimes.com/business/technology/google-plans-big-expansion-to-south-lake-union/">graduates from both WSU and UW</a>.</p>
<p>The fact is that <a href="http://www.sciencecoalition.org/downloads/AMI_v3_4-17-17.pdf">thousands of companies</a> can trace their roots to federally funded university research. And since the majority of federally funded research takes place <a href="https://www.cbo.gov/sites/default/files/cbofiles/ftpdocs/82xx/doc8221/06-18-research.pdf">at America’s research universities</a> – often in concert with federal labs and private research partners – these spinoff companies are often located in their local communities all across the country.</p>
<p>Just one of these firms, headquartered in Broomfield, Colorado, employs over 2,800 workers and started with researchers at the University of Colorado who create instruments, data exploitation solutions and technologies for civil, commercial, <a href="http://www.sciencecoalition.org/successstories/company/ball-aerospace-technologies-corp">aerospace and defense applications</a>. Another in Audubon, Pennsylvania develops rapid, noninvasive <a href="http://www.sciencecoalition.org/successstories/company/liquid-biotech-usa-inc">“liquid biopsy” tests</a> for cancer screening and early detection based on research from the University of Pennsylvania. And another company with 85 employees in Madison develops high-density <a href="http://www.sciencecoalition.org/successstories/company/nimblegen-systems-inc">DNA microarrays</a> for pharmaceutical research based on research from the University of Wisconsin.</p>
<p>The list goes on and on.</p>
<h2>A Washington state case study</h2>
<p>Focusing federal research funding on research universities who enjoy strong corporate and business partners has <a href="https://www.rdmag.com/article/2015/04/how-academic-institutions-partner-private-industry">strategic value</a>. There is little doubt that the state of <a href="http://247wallst.com/special-report/2016/06/16/states-with-the-fastest-and-slowest-growing-economies-2/2/">Washington’s recent economic successes</a>, for example, comes down to a cycle of innovation and discovery that feeds additional economic growth and private-public-university relationships. Federal R&D funding is a key ingredient.</p>
<p>Our two public research universities have strong relationships with federal funding agencies. Together Washington State University and the University of Washington – the largest recipient of federal research funding in the nation among public universities – form the technological and intellectual pillar around which many of our state’s successful businesses are built and sustained. Both universities graduate thousands of undergraduate and graduate students who provide a constant supply of educated, trained workers. In turn, the universities and federal R&D investment benefit from the active engagement and monetary support of business leaders and professionals. Innovative ideas and knowledge percolate back and forth between federally funded research and the private sector.</p>
<p>A recent milestone provides an example.</p>
<figure class="align-center zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/179516/original/file-20170724-11666-199zx5g.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/179516/original/file-20170724-11666-199zx5g.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/179516/original/file-20170724-11666-199zx5g.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=399&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/179516/original/file-20170724-11666-199zx5g.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=399&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/179516/original/file-20170724-11666-199zx5g.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=399&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/179516/original/file-20170724-11666-199zx5g.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=502&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/179516/original/file-20170724-11666-199zx5g.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=502&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/179516/original/file-20170724-11666-199zx5g.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=502&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Gassing up with renewable, affordable jet fuel – thanks to a public/private research collaboration.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">Robert Hubner, WSU</span>, <a class="license" href="http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nd/4.0/">CC BY-ND</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>Federal research dollars helped solidify a collaboration aimed at solving a big problem: the high carbon emissions from air travel, a contributor to climate change. WSU worked together with the UW and a host of other regional public research institutions, the U.S. Department of Agriculture, Alaska Airlines, Weyerhaeuser Corp., Gevo, Inc. and a large alliance of private industry to develop a <a href="https://nararenewables.org/">renewable, affordable source of jet fuel</a>.</p>
<p>Each collaborator brought unique expertise to the innovation table. USDA provided the funding and the policy commitment to the development of biofuels that spurred matching investment from private partners. Alaska Airlines brought the need to reduce its carbon emissions and its leadership in applying clean technologies to improve its environmental performance. WSU contributed decades of pertinent experience in both basic science and applied research. UW researchers demonstrated the fuel’s potential reduction in life cycle greenhouse gas emissions. And, Gevo, Inc. brought its private-sector skills and patented technology in developing bio-based alternatives to petroleum-based products. The sum of these parts created a strong, successful partnership that took a big step toward sustainable aviation.</p>
<p>Individual researchers with their deep expertise remain the bedrock of the research enterprise. But teams of scientists – drawn from research universities, government and the private sector – all <a href="http://commons.erau.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=1116&context=publication">working on multidisciplinary problems</a> are having an increasing impact.</p>
<h2>Recipe for amplifying R&D investment</h2>
<p>Importantly, this phenomenon is not unique to the state of Washington. The <a href="https://www.nerdwallet.com/blog/studies/americas-most-innovative-tech-hubs/">nation’s most active innovation hubs</a> and successful regional economies have similar factors that drive economic growth and resiliency, including:</p>
<ul>
<li><p>Top-tier research institutions supported by federal, state and private funding;</p></li>
<li><p>A concentration of talented and diverse workers;</p></li>
<li><p>An ecosystem of firms, entrepreneurs and intermediaries;</p></li>
<li><p>Accessible pools of risk capital;</p></li>
<li><p>A global orientation; and</p></li>
<li><p>Communities that take advantage of the area’s unique assets and advantages in creating a desirable quality of life.</p></li>
</ul>
<p>We see these conditions <a href="http://www.businessinsider.com/the-20-most-innovative-cities-in-the-us-2013-2#4-corvallis-oregon-17">coming together around the country</a>: in Silicon Valley, the Raleigh-Durham Research Triangle Park, Boston’s metro area and other innovation hubs in cities like Boulder, Colorado; Madison, Wisconsin; Austin, Texas; and Gainesville, Florida.</p>
<p>It’s this <a href="https://itif.org/publications/2008/07/09/where-do-innovations-come-transformations-us-national-innovation-system-1970">cooperative model</a> and leveraging of federal R&D dollars that have long been this <a href="https://www.brookings.edu/research/localizing-the-economic-impact-of-research-and-development/">nation’s competitive advantage</a>. With fewer federal dollars allocated to scientific R&D, the next Silicon Valley – with its potential for an economic renaissance for a new area not even on our innovation map yet – may not emerge as quickly.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/80651/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>In his position as VP of Research for WSU, Christopher Keane oversees projects that receive grants from DOE, USDA, NIH, NSF and DOD.</span></em></p>Research dollars don’t stay locked up in academia and government labs. R&D collaborations with the private sector are common – and grow the innovation economy.Christopher Keane, Vice President for Research and Professor of Physics, Washington State UniversityLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/723352017-04-24T01:45:24Z2017-04-24T01:45:24ZScientist at work: Bio-prospecting for better enzymes<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/165958/original/file-20170419-2395-dq4ryc.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">Polysaccharide molecules such as cellulose, seen here, are long chains of sugars that are very hard to break apart. Enzymes – proteins that can degrade polysaccharides – have many industrial uses.</span> <span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cellulose#/media/File:Cellulose_spacefilling_model.jpg">CeresVesta/Wikipedia</a></span></figcaption></figure><p>When people hear about prospecting, they might imagine old forty-niners (miners) with pickaxes hunting for gold, or maybe an agent for the San Francisco 49ers (football team) scouting for new talent. In my lab we do another version, called bio-prospecting – searching for useful substances from natural sources. Bio-prospecting has produced many valuable products, including <a href="http://dx.doi.org/10.1007/s13659-014-0048-9">anti-cancer drugs derived from plants</a> and <a href="http://dx.doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0011234">extremely strong silks spun by tropical spiders</a>. </p>
<p>Our work focuses on enzymes, which are proteins that speed up chemical reactions. We are looking for new and powerful enzymes that can break apart polysaccharides – common molecules that consist of long chains of sugars. Polysaccharides are extremely abundant in the fruits and vegetables that we eat, the cotton clothes we wear and the lumber we use to build houses. </p>
<p>Enzymes that can break down polysaccharides have many uses – for example, in detergents that dissolve stains on clothes. Similar types of enzymes can also be used to release sugars found in plants, which can then be used for manufacturing <a href="https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/?term=PMID%3A+++++9634754">biodegradeable plastic</a>.</p>
<p>In my lab, we are searching for new enzymes that could improve biotechnology for making renewable fuels and chemicals.</p>
<figure>
<iframe width="440" height="260" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/UVeoXYJlBtI?wmode=transparent&start=0" frameborder="0" allowfullscreen=""></iframe>
<figcaption><span class="caption">Enzymes jump-start chemical reactions, but are not consumed by the reactions.</span></figcaption>
</figure>
<h2>Learning from microbes</h2>
<p>The plants that form a central node of the food web produce <a href="https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/9657713">billions of tons of polysaccharides every year</a>. The sugars locked away in plants are linked together in long chains. They consist of three major <a href="https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/20228730">polysaccharides</a>: cellulose, xylan and pectin. These polysaccharides give plants their structure and help protect them against insect damage. </p>
<p>When plants die, these strong polysaccharides trap large amount of sugars in the plant leaves and stems. Bacteria and fungi <a href="http://dx.doi.org/10.1038/ismej.2012.116">break this leaf litter down</a> to get to the nutrients that it contains. It takes unique microbes to produce the enzymes that will degrade plant polysaccharides, a process called <a href="http://dx.doi.org/%20%2010.1128/MMBR.66.3.506-577.2002">saccharification</a>. These microbes are called saprophytes, and they are found everywhere in nature, including the soil of your backyard. </p>
<p>By understanding how saprophytes degrade polysaccharides, we learn fundamental biological principles about this natural process, such as what happens in <a href="http://dx.doi.org/%2010.1016/j.wasman.2004.12.021">compost</a> piles and how microbes aide polysaccharide degradation in <a href="https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/2181501">your</a> <a href="https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/?term=PMID%3A+++++9562034">gut</a>. We can also adopt their methods to find <a href="http://dx.doi.org/%2010.5936/csbj.201209017">solutions</a> to real-world problems, such as creating better nutritional supplements, detergents and fuels.</p>
<h2>Discovering useful enzymes</h2>
<p>My research group studies how bacteria sense the environment and acquire energy. We work with a saprophytic bacterium called <em><a href="http://dx.doi.org/10.1128/JB.01701-07">Cellvibrio japonicus</a></em>, which produces nearly 200 enzymes specifically for degrading polysaccharides. Because this bacterium has such an arsenal of enzymes, <em>C. japonicus</em> is able to completely degrade all of the polysaccharides found in plant biomass. </p>
<figure class="align-right ">
<img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/166287/original/file-20170421-12640-5cblmy.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=237&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/166287/original/file-20170421-12640-5cblmy.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=658&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/166287/original/file-20170421-12640-5cblmy.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=658&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/166287/original/file-20170421-12640-5cblmy.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=658&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/166287/original/file-20170421-12640-5cblmy.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=826&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/166287/original/file-20170421-12640-5cblmy.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=826&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/166287/original/file-20170421-12640-5cblmy.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=826&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Atomic Force Microscopy image of individual Cellvibrio japonicus cells. These bacteria produce many enzymes to break down polysaccharides that they use as an energy source. The whip-like structure at the end of the bacterial (flagellum) cells helps them move around.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">Jeffrey Gardner</span>, <span class="license">Author provided</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>We are very interested in understanding how this bacterium can detect and then eat different polysaccharides so completely. Three key questions we want to answer are: (1) Why does <em>C. japonicus</em> have hundreds of enzymes to degrade polysaccharides? (2) What specific function does each enzyme perform? and (3) How does the bacterium integrate information about the environment and regulate the production of these enzymes? </p>
<p>To answer these questions, we study the bacterium’s physiology, genetics and biochemistry. Plant biomass is a complex mixture of different polysaccharides, so we routinely focus our research by looking at individual polysaccharides and the specific enzymes that degrade them. </p>
<p>For example, when we analyzed how <em>C. japonicus</em> breaks down cellulose, we found that the degradation of small soluble pieces of cellulose (oligosaccharides) controls the production of many degradation-specific enzymes. We also found that four enzymes thought to play the same role in cellulose degradation <a href="http://dx.doi.org/10.1111/mmi.13625">are not interchangeable</a>. Rather, they are very specific, and the cell uses each of them in only certain contexts and for specific polysaccharides. </p>
<p>Overall, we have found that for the degradation of cellulose, C. japonicus requires only a very small number of the polysaccharide-degrading enzymes it can produce. <a href="http://dx.doi.org/10.1074/jbc.M115.700161">These</a> <a href="http://dx.doi.org/10.1111/mmi.12821">enzymes</a> have unique properties and are potentially very useful in industrial applications. </p>
<h2>Biotechnological applications</h2>
<p>While we are very interested in what saprophytic bacteria are doing out in the environment, our work also aims to solve some biotechnologically important problems. For example, one major challenge in understanding interactions between bacteria and plant material is measuring how fast bacteria are growing as they break plant biomass down. </p>
<p>Plant biomass is completely insoluble in water, so when we combine bacteria with plant material in a flask, it quickly becomes clouded with bits of plant material. This makes it hard to measure bacterial growth in the solution. </p>
<figure class="align-right ">
<img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/166289/original/file-20170421-12658-pek8tu.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=237&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/166289/original/file-20170421-12658-pek8tu.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=1097&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/166289/original/file-20170421-12658-pek8tu.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=1097&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/166289/original/file-20170421-12658-pek8tu.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=1097&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/166289/original/file-20170421-12658-pek8tu.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=1379&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/166289/original/file-20170421-12658-pek8tu.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=1379&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/166289/original/file-20170421-12658-pek8tu.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=1379&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Dried stems and leaves from a corn plant in a solution of bacterial growth medium. The plant material is insoluble, so it swirls around the flask during the experiment.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">Jeffrey Gardner</span>, <span class="license">Author provided</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>To solve this problem, we used <a href="http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.mimet.2016.09.013">3-D printing</a> to construct a filter device very similar to a tea strainer that you might use at a cafe. This device allows us to separate plant material from the bacteria in the surrounding solution. </p>
<p>Using it, we can pack the filter device with some plant leaves and stems and put it into a liquid growth medium. After adding some bacteria to the flask, we can measure bacterial growth rates very quickly and accurately because we do not have to continually remove small bits of digested plants. The filter device keeps all of the plant pieces contained. At the end of the experiment we can easily recover any plant material that is left over to determine what remains after bacterial digestion. </p>
<h2>Basic research is key to solving real-world problems</h2>
<p>I often am asked why my group spends time doing basic research instead of focusing exclusively on applied work for creating improved detergents or chemicals, since applied work might seem “better” in terms of human benefit. I believe that scientists need to be very conscientious in answering this question, because the justifications and benefits of basic research are not instantly recognizable. </p>
<p>One response is that many important discoveries, including the initial study of <a href="http://www.nobelprize.org/educational/physics/x-rays/">X-rays</a>, <a href="https://www.nobelprize.org/nobel_prizes/chemistry/laureates/2008/press.html">green fluorescent protein</a> and bacterial <a href="https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/26961639">immunity to phages</a>, started off as basic research. Over time, these fundamental studies developed, respectively, into the power to image broken bones, study cancer cells and edit the genomes of many types of organisms. The real-world benefits were very much worth the early investments in basic research. </p>
<p>We are starting to identify real-world benefits from understanding polysaccharide degradation. As we continue to prospect for new enzymes, I expect that we will find solutions to many technical challenges by studying the fascinating ways microbes go about obtaining their next meal.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/72335/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Jeffrey Gardner receives funding from the US Department of Energy (DOE) and the state of Maryland Technology Development Corporation (TEDCO). </span></em></p>Bio-prospecting is the search for useful materials from natural sources. A biologist explains what we can learn from bacteria about breaking down plant material, and how we can use that knowledge.Jeffrey Gardner, Assistant Professor of Biological Sciences, University of Maryland, Baltimore CountyLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/636912016-10-13T01:27:47Z2016-10-13T01:27:47ZIs it time for a new model to fund science research in higher education?<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/141293/original/image-20161011-15652-2jyru0.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">Academic researchers need funding – especially as the federal government devotes less to basic research.</span> <span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="http://www.shutterstock.com/pic.mhtml?id=1773236">Check image via www.shutterstock.com</a></span></figcaption></figure><p>The United States is at a crossroads with respect to many societal issues – think about the challenges of improving human health, eradicating hunger, protecting human rights. At the same time, federal support for higher education research and development – a primary venue to generate innovative new solutions for these kinds of vexing problems – is decreasing. America’s institutions of higher education are still considered by many <a href="http://www.shanghairanking.com/ARWU-Statistics-2016.html">the best in the world</a>, but they exist on a precipice.</p>
<p>Continued eroding support for American academic research will not only allow other countries to outpace the U.S. in innovation. A significant source of research capacity, both in talent and in facilities, that could be used to help address global challenges will also go untapped. International collaboration is increasingly common; because U.S. universities make up a <a href="http://www.shanghairanking.com/ARWU-Statistics-2016.html">large percentage of the world’s leading research enterprises</a>, if their capacity diminishes, other countries’ institutions will be affected too. </p>
<p>The hard fact is that there’s just not enough R&D money available to support the higher ed research capabilities our country has built. As <a href="http://www.research.umn.edu/about/vp.html">vice president</a> and <a href="http://research.umn.edu/umii/people/neuhauser.html">associate vice president for research</a> at the University of Minnesota, a top 10 U.S. public research university, we see the consequences of this shortfall every day. The long-term investment in academic research made by federal, state and local governments in the United States in the second half of the 20th century is <a href="http://www.uncpress.unc.edu/browse/book_detail?title_id=3467">at the heart of its current success</a>. We in American academia will continue to remind reluctant policymakers that long-term public investment in higher education R&D is needed to <a href="http://doi.org/10.1056/NEJMsb071774">keep the U.S. at the forefront of innovation</a>. The alternative is identifying other sources of funds – perhaps disrupting business as usual in the academic research enterprise by rethinking the role of industry.</p>
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<h2>The very cold hard numbers</h2>
<p><a href="https://www.nsf.gov/statistics/2016/nsb20161/#/figures">Federal support for research and development in the U.S. has declined</a> over the past 50 years, and languished at pre-Sputnik era levels for most of the recent past: 0.71 percent of GDP in 1953; a max of 1.86 percent of GDP in 1964; and back to 0.77 percent of GDP in 2012 (that’s US$124.6 billion). Thanks to business and industry stepping in to fill the funding gap, overall R&D expenditures are pretty close to what they had been (2.79 percent of GDP in 1964; 2.69 percent of GDP, or $435.3 billion, in 2012). </p>
<p>As long as the total expenditure is fairly constant for the nation as a whole, what’s the difference if it’s the federal government or industry holding more of the purse strings? The problem is that basic research takes a disproportionate hit. About <a href="http://dx.doi.org/10.1787/data-00193-en">half of all basic research is done within academia</a>, which relies heavily on the federal government. Business and industry tend to focus on applied research and development. Because of the need to find solutions to today’s grand challenges, funding agencies, too, emphasize translational research that advances fundamental biomedical findings into new disease treatments and cures that can be delivered to patients faster. </p>
<p>However, we know that basic research provides the necessary foundation for many of the products and services that contribute to the nation’s wealth. For instance, data suggest <a href="http://dx.doi.org/10.1056/NEJM197605272942205">two-thirds of the key contributions</a> to the diagnosis, treatment and prevention of disease derive from basic research. But in a tough funding climate, there are increasing external pressures to focus on research that provides quick rewards at the expense of the search for essential, basic knowledge that has a much longer lead time before any economic impact.</p>
<figure class="align-center zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/141519/original/image-20161012-16200-qgodm0.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/141519/original/image-20161012-16200-qgodm0.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/141519/original/image-20161012-16200-qgodm0.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=545&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/141519/original/image-20161012-16200-qgodm0.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=545&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/141519/original/image-20161012-16200-qgodm0.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=545&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/141519/original/image-20161012-16200-qgodm0.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=684&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/141519/original/image-20161012-16200-qgodm0.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=684&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/141519/original/image-20161012-16200-qgodm0.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=684&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Academic research was a different enterprise in the 1950s.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.flickr.com/photos/statelibrarync/6127014050">Government & Heritage Library, State Library of North Carolina</a>, <a class="license" href="http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/">CC BY</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<h2>Higher ed is eating its seed corn</h2>
<p><a href="http://www.hopkinsmedicine.org/institute_basic_biomedical_sciences/news_events/articles_and_stories/funding_science/200704_diversified_portfolios.html">Diversification of funding sources</a> is widely touted as a solution to declining or flat federal investment in higher education research. Potential sources to tap include business and industry, philanthropy, foundations and other nonprofits, and an institution’s own funds.</p>
<p>In 2014, <a href="https://ncsesdata.nsf.gov/herd/2014/html/HERD2014_DST_01.html">industry supported 5.7 percent of higher education R&D</a> in the U.S. But, absent a change in approach or philosophy, current and longer-term trends don’t suggest business or other private sources will assume the mantle as a major funder of basic research. </p>
<p>Universities are increasingly using their own internal funds to finance research expenses that were once supported by external sources. Schools funded about 12 percent of research on campus in the 1950s. By 2014, almost a quarter of research dollars came not from outside funders but <a href="https://ncsesdata.nsf.gov/herd/2014/html/HERD2014_DST_01.html">from university coffers</a>. This so-called institutional funding has served as a backfill, making up the difference for higher education when federal funding is flat. </p>
<p>But this trend is not sustainable. The indirect costs reimbursed by granting agencies have been crucial to building and maintaining the infrastructure needed to undertake academic research. Institutional funding does not provide for these overhead costs, and the shortfall is compounded for public universities; when they do recover indirect costs, they’re generally reimbursed at lower rates than their private peers. For example, here at the University of Minnesota, increasing investment of institutional funds from $237.3 million to $287.3 million (2013-2015) resulted in a loss of 1.5 percent in indirect cost recovery. That’s about $500,000 we don’t have to spend on research, tuition assistance or the campus’ physical plant.</p>
<h2>Less money, more competition</h2>
<p>Out of the over 4,500 colleges and universities in the U.S., the top 115 research universities garner 85 percent of <a href="https://ncsesdata.nsf.gov/profiles/site?method=rankingBySource&ds=herd">all federal research funding for higher education</a>. The next group of 107 schools share another 11 percent. These top institutions are locked in a fierce battle for resources.</p>
<p>When an agency increases funding substantially, such as when the National Institutes of Health <a href="https://www.fas.org/sgp/crs/misc/R43341.pdf">budget doubled between 1998 and 2003</a>, the top institutions scramble to capture a proportional share of the increase in order not to lose relative standing among their peers. Many institutions <a href="http://doi.org/10.1056/NEJMsb071774">expanded their infrastructure during this time</a> with the expectation that federal support for higher ed research would continue to increase. But now the top research institutions are fighting over a diminishing pool of resources. The result is increased competition.</p>
<figure class="align-center zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/141520/original/image-20161012-16238-knsoul.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/141520/original/image-20161012-16238-knsoul.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/141520/original/image-20161012-16238-knsoul.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=217&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/141520/original/image-20161012-16238-knsoul.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=217&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/141520/original/image-20161012-16238-knsoul.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=217&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/141520/original/image-20161012-16238-knsoul.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=273&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/141520/original/image-20161012-16238-knsoul.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=273&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/141520/original/image-20161012-16238-knsoul.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=273&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Money must keep flowing after the fancy building is up.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.flickr.com/photos/denverjeffrey/5303528963">Jeffrey Beall</a>, <a class="license" href="http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/">CC BY-SA</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>Most of these competing universities are locked into long-term debt to pay off the infrastructure they built in the expectation of increased research funding – things like new buildings, expensive equipment and enhanced faculty recruitment. To fill the space with rainmakers, universities use the promise of high salaries and plentiful resources to try to poach one another’s already successful scientists. While this approach may help some universities, it works against the development of a robust talent pipeline as short-term goals trump longer-term ones.</p>
<h2>Collateral damage</h2>
<p>The tough funding environment influences many aspects of the research life and academia itself.</p>
<p>Younger researchers now find that pursuing a career in higher education is increasingly risky for the return on many years of hard work. They <a href="http://doi.org/10.1073/pnas.1404402111">look toward other careers</a> that are more personally and financially rewarding.</p>
<p>The battle for funding increases the pressure on scientists to produce, leading to still lower success rates on grant submissions, and publication inflation. In the worst cases, it leads to <a href="http://www.nature.com/news/reproducibility-1.17552">less reproducible science</a> and perhaps even the cutting of ethical corners to survive. Today, a National Academies-sponsored survey finds that faculty members spend over <a href="http://sites.nationalacademies.org/cs/groups/pgasite/documents/webpage/pga_087667.pdf">40 percent of their time on administrative aspects</a> related to obtaining research funding – essentially halving the effective productivity of our research engines.</p>
<p>As institutions rely more on their own funding, tensions between the desire for research excellence and the needs of the local and regional community intensify. Universities have increasingly tried to align themselves with funder priorities for translational and collaborative research by choosing a few areas of excellence; they then let other areas of study recede.</p>
<p>While appealing on its surface, this approach runs counter to universities’ unique mission. Traditionally they’ve provided broad access to higher education for the economic benefit of their communities (local, state, national, international) through training and educating the workforce. And a broad research mission has spurred overall innovation. A laser-like focus on a handful of research programs ignores much of the broader societal expectations for higher education – particularly for our public universities. </p>
<figure class="align-center zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/141524/original/image-20161012-16233-13jk00v.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/141524/original/image-20161012-16233-13jk00v.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/141524/original/image-20161012-16233-13jk00v.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=399&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/141524/original/image-20161012-16233-13jk00v.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=399&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/141524/original/image-20161012-16233-13jk00v.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=399&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/141524/original/image-20161012-16233-13jk00v.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=501&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/141524/original/image-20161012-16233-13jk00v.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=501&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/141524/original/image-20161012-16233-13jk00v.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=501&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Envisioning a path forward for on-campus research takes some ingenuity.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">Photo by Andria Waclawski. Courtesy of the Office of the Vice President for Research at University of Minnesota.</span>, <a class="license" href="http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/">CC BY</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<h2>What’s to be done?</h2>
<p>Are there potential short and long-term solutions worth considering?</p>
<p>It’s possible <a href="http://doi.org/10.1056/NEJMsb071774">more coordination and collaboration</a> between institutions could help. By sharing resources, materials, data and infrastructure, schools could utilize economies of scale. Cutting down on the duplicative nature of some of these enterprises could result in significant cost savings that could be reinvested in the research enterprise. For instance, <a href="https://www.nsf.gov/about/transformative_research/">NSF</a> and <a href="http://grants.nih.gov/aboutoer/oer_offices/oep.htm">NIH</a> have programs that support research equipment and capabilities to be shared between multiple investigators and research institutions. </p>
<p>Harvard economist Michael Porter posits a bolder solution. He argues that historically there’s been a trade-off between social and economic performance – business can actually make a profit by causing a social problem. Increasingly, business leaders and entrepreneurs recognize that private sector solutions can help scale up enterprises to solve societal problems in ways that the public sector cannot, and they see that these ventures can also turn a profit. Porter cites the example of pollution: Businesses initially resisted reductions, but later on, some learned how to generate profits from cutting pollution. Business is increasingly realizing the need for a “<a href="https://www.ted.com/talks/michael_porter_why_business_can_be_good_at_solving_social_problems?language=en">shared value: addressing social issues with a business model</a>,” Porter argues.</p>
<p>How would this help higher education R&D? The concept of shared value means that we could create social and economic value at the same time. Aligning industry and academic interests would mean providing incentive for businesses to invest more resources in higher education R&D to tap into what research universities do best: arriving at innovative solutions that are then transferred to industry for scaling up and turning into economic value.</p>
<p>Partnering up certainly doesn’t look like a losing business proposition. One estimate puts the <a href="http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.respol.2011.06.004">return on investment for publicly funded basic research at 43 percent</a>. The NIH <a href="https://www.nigms.nih.gov/education/Documents/curiosity.pdf">places the value at $10 to $80</a> for every dollar spent on basic research. </p>
<p>Yes, this needs to be done carefully to avoid inappropriate conflicts of mission. But the promise of business placing a value on solving societal grand challenges in partnership with higher education would represent a strong alliance, leading to a reinvigoration of the creation of new knowledge that simultaneously serves the needs of society and business.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/63691/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>The authors do not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organization that would benefit from this article, and have disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>With federal support for on-campus R&D dwindling as a percentage of GDP, keeping basic research afloat is a challenge. Schools and researchers are left to try to fill in the funding gaps.Brian Herman, Vice President for Research, University of MinnesotaClaudia Neuhauser, Associate Vice President for Research, University of MinnesotaLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/622322016-07-13T20:56:54Z2016-07-13T20:56:54ZWant to do your PhD in Africa? Here’s what you need to know<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/129845/original/image-20160708-24067-lrhpc7.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">Embarking on the path to a PhD is a scary business.</span> <span class="attribution"><span class="source">Shutterstock</span></span></figcaption></figure><p>A Doctor of Philosophy, which most people know as a PhD, is the highest academic accolade. It demands a substantial investment of time, equipment, meticulous supervision and conscientiousness.</p>
<p><a href="http://www.scidev.net/global/education/multimedia/map-phd-enrolment-africa.html">More and more students</a> are registering for doctoral studies across Africa. They’re doing so in pursuit of higher qualifications and better future career opportunities. But many are left floundering when they try to actually get working on their PhDs. Masters’ programmes simply don’t equip students with the research skills they need, nor the conceptual thinking and critical analysis that’s so important for PhD study.</p>
<p>So what is holding Africa’s PhD candidates back and what can be done differently? To answer these questions, I’ve drawn from lessons learnt while working with a group of fellows in the <a href="http://cartafrica.org/">Consortium for Advanced Research Training in Africa</a> (CARTA). This is a consortium of nine African public universities that supports 140 fellows who are pursuing PhDs in population and public health. Their experiences and concerns may help others who are embarking on the tough, sometimes lonely journey to obtaining a PhD.</p>
<h2>The dark alleys of research</h2>
<p>The CARTA fellows are mostly full-time faculty members, usually assistant lecturers or lecturers. They are talented, well respected and have the potential to be developed into research leaders. But evaluations conducted with the latest cohort reveal that none of these factors keep them from battling with even the basics of starting their PhD work.</p>
<p>One of the problems lies with the structure of masters’ programmes in Africa. These tend to last for two or three years. They’re traditionally assumed to be the foundation for career advancement in academia. But their focus tends to be on a strong component of course work, with limited opportunities for serious research. And research, of course, is the backbone of any PhD degree.</p>
<p>When research is included in masters’ programmes, the scope of the work is narrow and the quality of supervision is poor. Candidates are left to flounder in the dark alleys of research. In Kenya, where I am based, it is very rare for masters’ students to produce work that’s good enough to publish in peer-reviewed journals. Their work doesn’t influence policy- and decision-making. Masters’ graduates get a feather in their cap, but that’s really all.</p>
<p>During their evaluations, the fellows said they were struggling to comprehend the philosophical underpinnings of their research topics. They seem not to know that research methodologies are informed by diverse paradigms. Those from “hard” sciences backgrounds indicated that they didn’t understand philosophy nor see its value to research.</p>
<p>Most have difficulty in identifying the research gap in their topic of interest and insist that the topic has not been studied in the geographical area they’re focusing on. They fail to appreciate that the essence of PhD research is to generate new knowledge and that one cannot contribute to this without a clear understanding about the current state of affairs in their subject.</p>
<p>Our work has found that many PhD students are apathetic about searching for and reading relevant articles. They don’t have the basic software skills needed to search databases and often haven’t heard of open-source software that might make their task easier and cheaper.</p>
<p>Without reading and a critical appraisal of sources, the students really battle to develop a workable research question. A good number end up joining sentences derived from various journals conveniently to create what is submitted as the literature review. The write-up lacks logic and coherence, and is marked by high levels of plagiarism.</p>
<p>One problem leads to another: most students struggle to understand and develop theoretical and conceptual frameworks for their proposed study.</p>
<p>Some of the approaches we’re trying through CARTA might really improve people’s experiences of their PhDs. They have certainly boosted the fellows’ experience of this challenging academic journey.</p>
<h2>Jump-starting the journey</h2>
<p>CARTA has developed a month-long residential seminar during which new students are equipped with the necessary skills and competencies to jump-start their doctoral journey.</p>
<p>Topics in the curriculum include knowledge philosophy; reading, writing and referencing; and how to develop a good research question and a conceptual framework. The seminars are learner-centred, with space for group work and one-on-one consultations. Since the seminars are residential, the fellows also get to spend lots of time with each other, sharing ideas and advice, and with mentors.</p>
<p>Feedback from previous seminars has suggested that this approach is really working. Fellows say that they find the sessions very helpful and this is obvious in the quality of their work. Some have even changed their PhD topics because of the seminars and are comfortable defending their new ideas when they return to their institutions.</p>
<p>Of course, PhD students must bear a great deal of the responsibility for bringing their research to life. They ought to know that one cannot lead a pedestrian life and expect to receive the highest possible academic accolade. It requires hard work, commitment and developing the skills I’ve outlined here.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/62232/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Peter Ngure is the Programme Manager of the Consortium for Advanced Research Training in Africa (CARTA) at the Africa Population and Health Research Center (APHRC) in Nairobi.</span></em></p>Many people are left floundering when they try to get working on their PhDs. In Africa, this is often because the skills they need haven’t been developed earlier in their academic careers.Peter Ngure, Associate Professor of Parasitology and Entomology, African Population and Health Research CenterLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/433712015-07-29T10:21:09Z2015-07-29T10:21:09ZCRISPR/Cas gene-editing technique holds great promise, but research moratorium makes sense pending further study<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/89724/original/image-20150726-8461-st71yb.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">The red Cas9 nuclease protein uses a blue guide RNA sequence to cut yellow DNA at a complementary site.</span> <span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="http://www.shutterstock.com/pic-213287815/stock-photo-crispr-cas-gene-editing-complex-from-streptococcus-pyogenes-the-cas-nuclease-protein-uses-a.html">CRISPR-Cas9 via www.shutterstock.com</a></span></figcaption></figure><p>CRISPR/Cas is a new technology that allows unprecedented control over the DNA code. It’s sparked a revolution in the fields of genetics and cell biology, becoming the scientific equivalent of a household name by raising hopes about new ways to cure diseases including cancer and to unlock the remaining mysteries of our cells.</p>
<p>The gene editing technique also raises concerns. Could the new tools allow parents to order “designer babies”? Could premature use in patients lead to unforeseen and potentially dangerous consequences? This potential for abuse or misuse led prominent scientists to <a href="http://dx.doi.org/10.1126/science.aab1028">call for a halt</a> on some types of new research until ethical issues can be discussed – a voluntary ban that was <a href="http://www.nature.com/news/chinese-scientists-genetically-modify-human-embryos-1.17378">swiftly ignored</a> in some quarters.</p>
<p>The moratorium is a positive step toward preserving the public’s trust and safety, while the promising new technology can be further studied.</p>
<h2>Editing DNA to cure disease</h2>
<p>While most human <a href="http://www.nature.com/scitable/topic/genes-and-disease-17">diseases</a> are caused, at least partially, by mutations in our DNA, current therapies treat the symptoms of these mutations but not the genetic root cause. For example, <a href="http://www.mayoclinic.org/diseases-conditions/cystic-fibrosis/basics/definition/con-20013731">cystic fibrosis</a>, which causes the lungs to fill with excess mucus, is caused by a single DNA mutation. However, cystic fibrosis treatments focus on the symptoms – working to reduce mucus in the lungs and fight off infections – rather than correcting the mutation itself. That’s because making precise changes to the three-billion-letter DNA code remains a challenge even in a Petri dish, and it is unprecedented in living patients. (The only current example of gene therapy, called <a href="http://www.uniqure.com/products/glybera/">Glybera</a>, does not involve modifying the patient’s DNA, and has been approved for limited use in Europe to treat patients with a <a href="http://www.nlm.nih.gov/medlineplus/ency/article/000408.htm">digestive disorder</a>.)</p>
<p>That all changed in 2012, when <a href="http://rna.berkeley.edu/">several</a> <a href="http://arep.med.harvard.edu/">research</a> <a href="http://zlab.mit.edu/">groups</a> demonstrated that a DNA-cutting technology called <a href="http://www.nytimes.com/2014/03/04/health/a-powerful-new-way-to-edit-dna.html?_r=0">CRISPR/Cas</a> could operate on human DNA. Compared to previous, inefficient methods for editing DNA, CRISPR/Cas offers a shortcut. It acts like a pair of DNA scissors that cut where prompted by a special strand of RNA (a close chemical relative of DNA). Snipping DNA turns on the cell’s DNA repair process, which can be hijacked to either disable a gene – say, one that allows tumor cells to grow uncontrollably – or to fix a broken gene, such as the mutation that causes cystic fibrosis. The advantages of the Cas9 system over its predecessor genome-editing technologies – its <a href="http://link.springer.com/article/10.1007%2Fs40484-014-0030-x">high specificity</a> and the ease of navigating to a specific DNA sequence with the “guide RNA” – have contributed to its rapid adoption in the scientific community.</p>
<p>The barrier to fixing the DNA of diseased cells appears to have evaporated. </p>
<h2>Playing with fire</h2>
<figure class="align-right zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/89726/original/image-20150726-8446-1uic8j6.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/89726/original/image-20150726-8446-1uic8j6.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=237&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/89726/original/image-20150726-8446-1uic8j6.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=600&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/89726/original/image-20150726-8446-1uic8j6.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=600&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/89726/original/image-20150726-8446-1uic8j6.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=600&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/89726/original/image-20150726-8446-1uic8j6.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=754&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/89726/original/image-20150726-8446-1uic8j6.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=754&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/89726/original/image-20150726-8446-1uic8j6.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=754&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Just the baby I ordered?</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.flickr.com/photos/jar0d/10194703106">Sander van der Wel</a>, <a class="license" href="http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/">CC BY-SA</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>With the advance of this technique, the obstacles to altering genes in embryos are falling away, opening the door to so-called “designer babies” with altered appearance or intelligence. Ethicists have long feared the <a href="http://www.technologyreview.com/featuredstory/535661/engineering-the-perfect-baby/">consequences</a> of allowing parents to choose the traits of their babies. Further, there is a wide gap between our understanding of disease and the genes that might cause them. Even if we were capable of performing flawless genetic surgery, we don’t yet know how specific changes to the DNA will manifest in a living human. Finally, the editing of germ line cells such as embryos could permanently introduce altered DNA into the gene pool to be inherited by descendants.</p>
<p>And making cuts in one’s DNA is not without risks. Cas9 – the scissor protein – is known to cleave DNA at <a href="https://www.genomeweb.com/sequencing-technology/new-sequencing-methods-reveal-target-effects-crisprcas9">unintended</a> or “off-target” sites in the genome. Were Cas9 to inappropriately chop an important gene and inactivate it, the therapy could cause cancer instead of curing it. </p>
<figure class="align-center zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/89727/original/image-20150726-8478-58yrxx.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/89727/original/image-20150726-8478-58yrxx.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/89727/original/image-20150726-8478-58yrxx.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/89727/original/image-20150726-8478-58yrxx.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/89727/original/image-20150726-8478-58yrxx.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/89727/original/image-20150726-8478-58yrxx.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=502&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/89727/original/image-20150726-8478-58yrxx.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=502&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/89727/original/image-20150726-8478-58yrxx.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=502&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Not so fast….</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.flickr.com/photos/fazen/489667079">Stefano Mortellaro</a>, <a class="license" href="http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nd/4.0/">CC BY-ND</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<h2>Take it slow</h2>
<p>All the concerns around Cas9 triggered a very unusual event: a call from prominent scientists to halt some of this research. In March of 2015, a group of researchers and lawyers <a href="http://dx.doi.org/10.1126/science.aab1028">called for</a> a voluntary pause on further using CRISPR technology in germ line cells until ethical guidelines could be decided.</p>
<p>Writing in the journal Science, the group – including two <a href="http://www.nobelprize.org/nobel_prizes/medicine/laureates/1975/baltimore-bio.html">Nobel</a> <a href="http://www.nobelprize.org/nobel_prizes/chemistry/laureates/1980/berg-bio.html">laureates</a> and the inventors of the CRISPR technology – noted that we don’t yet understand enough about the link between our health and our DNA sequence. Even if a perfectly accurate DNA-editing system existed – and Cas9 surely doesn’t yet qualify – it would still be premature to treat patients with genetic surgery. The authors disavowed genome editing only in specific cell types such as embryos, while encouraging the basic research that would put future therapeutic editing on a firmer foundation of evidence.</p>
<figure class="align-center zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/89725/original/image-20150726-8461-7343pa.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/89725/original/image-20150726-8461-7343pa.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/89725/original/image-20150726-8461-7343pa.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/89725/original/image-20150726-8461-7343pa.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/89725/original/image-20150726-8461-7343pa.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/89725/original/image-20150726-8461-7343pa.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/89725/original/image-20150726-8461-7343pa.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/89725/original/image-20150726-8461-7343pa.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">The basic research isn’t ready for deployment in human embryos yet.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="http://www.shutterstock.com/pic-19115449/stock-photo-cancer-research.html">Petri dishes image via www.shutterstock.com</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<h2>Pushing ahead</h2>
<p>Despite this call for CRISPR/Cas research to be halted, a Chinese research group <a href="http://dx.doi.org/10.1007/s13238-015-0153-5">reported</a> on their attempts at editing human embryos only two months later. Described in the journal Protein & Cell, the authors treated nonviable embryos to fix a gene mutation that causes a blood disease called <a href="http://ghr.nlm.nih.gov/condition/beta-thalassemia">β-thalassemia</a>.</p>
<p>The study results proved the concerns of the Science group to be well-founded. The treatment killed nearly one in five embryos, and only half of the surviving cells had their DNA modified. Of the cells that were even modified, only a fraction had the disease mutation repaired. The study also revealed off-target DNA cutting and incomplete editing among all the cells of a single embryo. Obviously these kinds of errors are problematic in embryos meant to mature into fully grown human beings.</p>
<p>George Daley, a Harvard biologist and member of the group that called for the moratorium, <a href="http://dx.doi.org/10.1038/nature.2015.17378">concluded that</a> “their study should be a stern warning to any practitioner who thinks the technology is ready for testing to eradicate disease genes.” </p>
<p>In the enthusiasm and hype surrounding Cas9, it is easy to forget that the technology has been in wide use for barely three years.</p>
<h2>Role of a moratorium</h2>
<p>Despite the publication of the Protein & Cell study – whose experiments likely took place at least months earlier – the Science plea for a moratorium can already be considered a success. The request from such a respected group has brought visibility to the topic and put pressure on universities, regulatory boards and the editors of scientific journals to discourage such research. (As evidence of this pressure, the Chinese authors were <a href="http://www.reuters.com/article/2015/04/23/us-science-embryos-idUSKBN0NE2A320150423">rejected</a> from at least two top science journals before getting their paper accepted.) And the response to the voluntary ban has thus far not included accusations of “stifling academic freedom,” possibly due to the scientific credibility of the organizers.</p>
<figure class="align-right zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/89728/original/image-20150726-8453-b1qrae.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/89728/original/image-20150726-8453-b1qrae.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=237&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/89728/original/image-20150726-8453-b1qrae.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=741&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/89728/original/image-20150726-8453-b1qrae.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=741&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/89728/original/image-20150726-8453-b1qrae.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=741&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/89728/original/image-20150726-8453-b1qrae.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=931&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/89728/original/image-20150726-8453-b1qrae.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=931&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/89728/original/image-20150726-8453-b1qrae.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=931&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Recombinant DNA researcher Paul Berg organized the conference and later shared the Nobel Prize in chemistry. He also signed the call to slow CRISPR research.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Paul_Berg_in_1980.jpg">National Library of Medicine</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>While rare, the call for a moratorium on research for ethical reasons can be traced to an earlier controversy over DNA technology. In 1975, a group that came to be known as the <a href="http://dx.doi.org/10.1073/pnas.72.6.1981">Asilomar Conference</a> called for caution with an emerging technology called recombinant DNA until its safety could be evaluated and ethical guidelines could be published. The similarity between the two approaches is no coincidence: several authors of the Science essay were also members of the Asilomar team.</p>
<p>The Asilomar guidelines are now <a href="http://www.the-scientist.com/?articles.view/articleNo/12781/title/The-Asilomar-Process--Is-It-Valid-/">widely viewed</a> as having been a proportionate and responsible measure, placing the right emphasis on safety and ethics without hampering research progress. It turns out recombinant DNA technology was much less dangerous than originally feared; existing evidence already shows that we might not be so lucky with Cas9. Another important legacy of the Asilomar conference was the promotion of an open discussion involving experts as well as the general public. By heeding the lessons of caution and public engagement, hopefully the saga of CRISPR/Cas will unfold in a similarly responsible – yet exciting – way.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/43371/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Jeff Bessen receives funding from the NIH and DARPA for research into genome editing technologies, including Cas9.</span></em></p>Until more is understood, it’s sensible to limit experimentation that would make changes to germ line cells that would be passed on to future generations.Jeff Bessen, PhD Candidate in Chemical Biology, Harvard UniversityLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/384652015-03-30T05:55:15Z2015-03-30T05:55:15ZOde to the fruit fly: tiny lab subject crucial to basic research<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/76357/original/image-20150328-16090-539qbj.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">Decreasing funding for fruit-fly research will hurt people, not flies.</span> <span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.flickr.com/photos/31031835@N08/14412343468/in/photolist-5Nb7B-hHaJsB-hW5oCj-5yvEJN-o3WH4k-6GAxjj-pSg72t-bpHmpx-5wtva2-hW5nMJ-dt3aSH-inJCit-5yrjT8-dt3gC5-5YTxdF-dx1bDt-dt3c2V-7F4rSm-inJ2Hu-inJ1Yd-inJ4Mh-fs2gTX-of4gy4-od2mdm-nXz2Au-g6516s-7gReVr-5yvEe9-dr9FzR-5yrmya-etGhcN-fsXmjY-fsXmhw-nDXMkr-dr9LK7-5yrmBx-fMdZ2P-exp7So-p9LTYD-oSxy8o-dwv7h6-gwvpmz-45Mj9U-daDjoy-7ULyVX-gwvpoP-9RepFj-pfLzfa-axnovX-imKRT/">John Tann</a>, <a class="license" href="http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/">CC BY</a></span></figcaption></figure><p>The world around us is full of amazing creatures. My favorite is an animal the size of a pinhead, that can fly and land on the ceiling, that stages an elaborate (if not beautiful) courtship ritual, that can learn and remember… I am talking about the humble fruit fly, <em>Drosophila melanogaster</em>. By day, a tiny bug content to live on our food scraps. By night, the superhero that contributes to saving millions of human lives as one of the key model systems of modern biomedical research. </p>
<figure class="align-left zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/76177/original/image-20150326-8716-me0at8.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/76177/original/image-20150326-8716-me0at8.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=237&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/76177/original/image-20150326-8716-me0at8.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=900&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/76177/original/image-20150326-8716-me0at8.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=900&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/76177/original/image-20150326-8716-me0at8.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=900&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/76177/original/image-20150326-8716-me0at8.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=1130&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/76177/original/image-20150326-8716-me0at8.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=1130&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/76177/original/image-20150326-8716-me0at8.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=1130&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Here I am, ready to answer many of your biological questions.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.flickr.com/photos/alfredoperalta/15355275147">Alfredo Peralta García</a>, <a class="license" href="http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-sa/4.0/">CC BY-NC-SA</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>Fruit flies entered the laboratory almost through the back window a little more than 100 years ago. The excitement was still fresh after rediscovery of <a href="http://www.nature.com/scitable/topicpage/Gregor-Mendel-and-the-Principles-of-Inheritance-593">Gregor Mendel</a>’s work on the genetics of peas in 1900. It was an outlandish notion at the time that Mendel’s simple laws of inheritance could apply even to animals. To test this revolutionary idea, scientists were looking for an animal they could keep easily in the lab and reproduce in large numbers.</p>
<figure class="align-right zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/76382/original/image-20150329-16135-cm1n7u.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/76382/original/image-20150329-16135-cm1n7u.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=237&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/76382/original/image-20150329-16135-cm1n7u.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=860&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/76382/original/image-20150329-16135-cm1n7u.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=860&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/76382/original/image-20150329-16135-cm1n7u.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=860&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/76382/original/image-20150329-16135-cm1n7u.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=1080&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/76382/original/image-20150329-16135-cm1n7u.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=1080&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/76382/original/image-20150329-16135-cm1n7u.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=1080&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption"><em>Drosophila melanogaster</em> spend much of their time in the lab in tubes like these.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Drosophila_melanogaster_lab_cultures.jpg">Trick17</a>, <a class="license" href="http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/">CC BY</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p><a href="http://www.nature.com/scitable/topicpage/thomas-hunt-morgan-the-fruit-fly-scientist-6579789">Thomas Hunt Morgan</a> struck gold when he decided to use the fruit fly as a model. He and his students pushed this prolific little animal to great success. They furthered Mendel’s work to discover that genes are located on chromosomes, where they are arranged, in Morgan’s words, like “beads on a string” – a breakthrough that was recognized with the Nobel prize in 1933. With the success of Morgan’s “flyroom,” the humble fruit fly was set on its way to becoming one of the leading models in modern biology, contributing vast amounts of knowledge to many areas – including genetics, embryology, cell biology, neuroscience. Additional fly Nobel prizes were awarded in 1946, 1995, 2006 and 2011.</p>
<figure class="align-center zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/76175/original/image-20150326-8725-ymm6ou.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/76175/original/image-20150326-8725-ymm6ou.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/76175/original/image-20150326-8725-ymm6ou.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=471&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/76175/original/image-20150326-8725-ymm6ou.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=471&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/76175/original/image-20150326-8725-ymm6ou.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=471&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/76175/original/image-20150326-8725-ymm6ou.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=592&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/76175/original/image-20150326-8725-ymm6ou.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=592&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/76175/original/image-20150326-8725-ymm6ou.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=592&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption"><em>Drosophila</em> salivary gland chromosomes.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.flickr.com/photos/11304375@N07/2993343506">Elissa Lei, PhD, NIH</a>, <a class="license" href="http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/">CC BY</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<h2>A tiny fly stands in for us in basic research</h2>
<p>If you ask a geneticist, humans are brothers to mice and just first cousins to flies, sharing <a href="http://dx.doi.org/10.1038/420509a">99%</a> and <a href="http://dx.doi.org/10.1534/genetics.114.171785">60%</a> of protein-coding genes, respectively. Our anatomy and physiology are also related, so that we can use these laboratory animals to design powerful experiments, hoping what we find will be of significance to animals and humans alike. It’s undeniable that the research on animal models – such as nematodes, flies, fish and mice – has contributed immensely to what we know about our own body and as a result is helping us tackle the <a href="http://dx.doi.org/10.1124/pr.110.003293">diseases that plague us</a>. On this front, the services of the fruit fly will certainly be required for some time to come.</p>
<figure class="align-center zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/76374/original/image-20150329-16086-bi23sq.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/76374/original/image-20150329-16086-bi23sq.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/76374/original/image-20150329-16086-bi23sq.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=465&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/76374/original/image-20150329-16086-bi23sq.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=465&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/76374/original/image-20150329-16086-bi23sq.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=465&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/76374/original/image-20150329-16086-bi23sq.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=584&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/76374/original/image-20150329-16086-bi23sq.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=584&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/76374/original/image-20150329-16086-bi23sq.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=584&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Swarm guys, we’ve got work to do in the lab.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">Andrew Kuang, Gallio Lab, Northwestern University</span>, <a class="license" href="http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/">CC BY-NC-ND</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<h2>Studying fly brains to understand our own</h2>
<p>A recent renaissance in neuroscience is also bringing the fly to the forefront of our efforts to understand the brain. One of the things we least understand is how our own brain produces our emotions and behavior. Scientists are naturally attracted by the unknown, making this one of the most exciting open frontiers in biology. Perhaps, our brain, the ultimate Narcissus, cannot resist the temptation to study itself. Can the humble fly really contribute to our understanding of how our own brain works?</p>
<p>The fruit fly brain is a miracle of miniaturization. It deals with an incredible flow of sensory information: an obstacle approaching, the enticing smell of overripe banana, a hot windowsill to stay away from, a sexy potential mate. And it does this literally on-the-fly, as the little marvel is computing suitable trajectories around the room. Yet the fly brain is composed of only about 100,000 neurons (compared with nearly 100 billion for human beings) and can fit easily through the eye of the finest needle.</p>
<p>The relatively small number of cells is a key advantage for brain mapping, and large efforts are under way to label, trace and catalog every single neuron in the fly brain. Combine this with the unique wealth of information on the genetics of this little animal, and you will see how we are now able to design incredibly powerful experiments in which we alter the “software” (that is, introduce specific changes in the genome) to create animals with unique and predictable changes in the “hardware” (the brain circuits) to ask questions about brain function.</p>
<p>Following this playbook are recent experiments demonstrating, for example:</p>
<ul>
<li>how <a href="http://dx.doi.org/10.1126/science.1202249">sleep enhances memory formation</a> (yes, even in flies!)</li>
<li>how a few sexually dimorphic neurons in the male fly brain promote <a href="http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.cell.2013.11.045">male-vs-male fights</a></li>
<li>how specific <a href="http://dx.doi.org/10.1126/science.1249964">‘moonwalker’ neurons</a> in the brain control backward walking</li>
<li>how the brain processes simple <a href="http://dx.doi.org/10.1038/nature14284">hot and cold stimuli</a> to keep this little animal away from danger (my own area of research)</li>
<li>and many more.</li>
</ul>
<figure class="align-center zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/76377/original/image-20150329-16098-1oeghaj.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/76377/original/image-20150329-16098-1oeghaj.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/76377/original/image-20150329-16098-1oeghaj.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=414&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/76377/original/image-20150329-16098-1oeghaj.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=414&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/76377/original/image-20150329-16098-1oeghaj.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=414&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/76377/original/image-20150329-16098-1oeghaj.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=521&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/76377/original/image-20150329-16098-1oeghaj.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=521&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/76377/original/image-20150329-16098-1oeghaj.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=521&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Highlighted neural pathways processing temperature information in the fly brain.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">Marco Gallio, Northwestern University</span>, <a class="license" href="http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/">CC BY-NC-ND</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>Of course, we can do these kinds of experiments in a number of animal models. But the unique advantage of the fly is that we can pinpoint every single neuron that’s important for a particular response or behavior, precisely map how they connect to each other and silence or activate each one to figure out how the whole thing works.</p>
<h2>Don’t forget the flies</h2>
<figure class="align-right zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/76176/original/image-20150326-8713-gx26r.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/76176/original/image-20150326-8713-gx26r.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=237&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/76176/original/image-20150326-8713-gx26r.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=600&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/76176/original/image-20150326-8713-gx26r.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=600&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/76176/original/image-20150326-8713-gx26r.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=600&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/76176/original/image-20150326-8713-gx26r.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=754&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/76176/original/image-20150326-8713-gx26r.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=754&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/76176/original/image-20150326-8713-gx26r.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=754&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">I have so much to give!</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.flickr.com/photos/ajc1/6219492055">AJ Cann</a>, <a class="license" href="http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/">CC BY-SA</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>Just a few weeks back, Chicago hosted the Genetics Society of America’s annual “<a href="http://www.genetics-gsa.org/drosophila/2015/">fly meeting</a>,” bringing together thousands of fly scientists from around the world. One of the topics discussed was that, in this tough economic climate, funding cuts to public agencies are disproportionately <a href="http://dx.doi.org/10.1534/genetics.114.171785">hurting research on fruit flies</a> in favor of more “translational” approaches – that is, research that has more immediate practical applications.</p>
<p>It’s worth remembering that neither Mendel nor Morgan expected that their work could have a direct impact on medicine. Yet when, hopefully soon, we manage to “cure” cancer – a genetic disease <em>par excellence</em> – they should be among the very first people receiving a thank you note from humanity. </p>
<p>Flies still have a lot to contribute to our understanding of all aspects of biology. As with much basic research, the direct benefits from this work may be around the corner, or may take a little longer to find. It would be a big mistake to curb fruit fly research now that the flies are just getting warmed up to tackle some of the most interesting questions in biology.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/38465/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Marco Gallio receives funding from NIH, and has received support in the past from the following non-profit organizations: the Wenner-Grens Foundation, the Human Frontiers Science Program and the Howard Hughes Medical Institute.</span></em></p>These insects are so much more than just the scourge of fruit bowls everywhere. They’re a key model system for all kinds of research that teaches us about our own brain and body systems.Marco Gallio, Assistant Professor of Neurobiology, Northwestern UniversityLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.