A petition insisting that EU governments live up to their promises to significantly increase research funding has garnered almost 17,000 signatories since Frank Gannon, the director of the European Molecular Biology Organization, began to circulate it last month.
"We, the undersigned scientists, call on the political leaders in Europe to match their words on research, the knowledge-based economy and the Lisbon Agreement by ensuring a very significant increase in the budget for the Seventh Framework Programme," the online petition says. "For the economic future of European citizens, investment in research cannot be relegated to an option that can be discarded."
The European Molecular Biology Organization (EMBO) and the European Life Sciences Forum (ELSF) organized the petition after talks on the EU science budget for the period from 2007 to 2013 collapsed in June, sparking fears of stagnating research budgets.
"The governments keep saying that they support research efforts in Europe, ...
