Nautilus

Noam Y. Harel of Yale University writes in Nature's Correspondence page (Nature 452, 409; 2008):

Writing grant proposals is difficult enough; keeping track of different deadlines makes for an endless cycle of procrastination and frantic preparation. The added stack of bureaucratic forms, with arcane variations from agency to agency, can tip one over the edge as a deadline nears.
Is it almost too obvious to wish for a centralized proposal repository? Investigators could submit proposals at any time, in a common format that highlights the science rather than obliterates it with red tape. Funding agencies could search the repository for proposals matching their interests. A minimum of bureaucratic information would be required up front. Budget details could be worked out between funding agencies and investigators as necessary.
Ideally, all proposals would be publicly accessible. However, most of the scientific community has not yet accepted the inevitable dawn of truly open science. Submissions to a central repository could therefore be made accessible only to funding agencies that agree to keep proposals private (unless a submitting investigator indicates a willingness to share his or her proposal publicly).
The repository would make life easier for scientists by eliminating the hassle of searching for suitable grant mechanisms and the stress of meeting various deadlines. It would make life easier for funding agencies by expanding the pool of applications from which to choose. Of course, the best proposals could attract offers from multiple agencies. Rather than forcing investigators to choose non-overlapping sources of funding for each project, why not use the repository to mediate shared funding agreements that could benefit everyone involved? In effect, it would serve as the mediator between grant-seekers and grant-providers.
In a world where eBay, Facebook and Google powerfully demonstrate the communal nature of the Web, it is a pity that scientists and funding agencies don’t have a similarly modern forum for matching their interests and offers.

Posted by Maxine Clarke on March 26, 2008
Categories: Access, Communication, Data availability, Support | Permalink | Comments (4)

In an editorial in Molecular Systems Biology (3, 158; 2008), Synthetic biology: promises and challenges,
Luis Serrano of the Centro de Regulación Genomica in Barcelona addresses wide-ranging and fascinating aspects of this nasent field. He asks why Europe is "lagging behind the US? Perhaps it is due to a general problem in Biology research and the way Europe has structured its research. In particular, Europe will need to take more and bolder initiatives in funding and building new institutes to create the necessary critical mass, and should raise its ambition for starting novel research areas. Competitive European groups in areas related to Synthetic Biology definitely exist, mainly amongst the very top EU institutes, where the system is more flexible and excellence is actively pursued. But these few world-class laboratories are usually small, scattered and in many cases have just entered into the field of Systems Biology and, therefore, do not have the capacity to fully embark into Synthetic Biology. As in many other fields, if Europe wants to stay competitive, we will need a major overhauling of the system, promoting excellence, flexibility and young investigators with new crazy projects. In this sense the European Research Council (ERC) initiative may represent a decisive step forward."

Posted by Maxine Clarke on March 11, 2008
Categories: Careers, Disciplines, Support | Permalink | Comments (0)

Fundamental research can yield unforeseen benefits of great value for society, but often this happens only many years after the initial breakthroughs have been made. Can society find a way to pay back this debt?
In a Commentary in this month's issue of Nature Physics (3, 824-825; 2007), Leon N. Cooper of Brown University, writes that "Money is required to do science and as systems become more complex, more people, equipment, and therefore more money is required for each new result. Naturally, people hark back with sentimentality to the good old days when results could be obtained on a tabletop. In fact, some results are still obtained on tabletops, but the tables are getting larger and the tops more expensive. More and more results come from huge collaborations demanding enormous resources. And this brings us inevitably to the questions of who pays, how and why."
After outlining some of the problems in supporting the fundamental research necessary for science to progress, Professor Cooper suggests three measures to improve the current system, involving investment, distribution, and a clear distinction between fundamental and applied research. Referring to the breakthroughs in superconductivity research, he writes: "No single method can solve all of our problems, but the measures outlined above would substantially improve our present system. I would hope that they would make it easier for some current gifted program officer to reach as wise a decision as was made in the Army Ordnance Office fifty years ago."
Read the full article, entitled "The unpaid debt", in the December issue of Nature Physics.

Posted by Maxine Clarke on December 05, 2007
Categories: Careers, Publishing, Support | Permalink | Comments (0)