© ISTOCK.COM/VECTORAARTA few years ago, David Sinclair’s lab was slipping through his fingers. With grant money running dry and the outlook for overall federal research budgets bleak, the Harvard geneticist was losing lab members because he couldn’t support them with funding from the National Institutes of Health (NIH), as he had done in years past. Sinclair says his 18-person-strong group dwindled to just four or five people. “And that was painful,” he recalls. “I had to let people go for lack of money.”
And Sinclair says he’s not alone. “Even at a place like Harvard, I know [other] labs that have downsized dramatically and even closed down,” he says. “So it’s hit across the board.”
In the face of such persistent financial stress, Sinclair was forced to reconsider his funding strategy. Rather than try to secure a few generous, but highly competitive, NIH grants, he began applying for diverse, smaller grants from private funding sources, such as foundations or corporate collaborations. “I didn’t really have a global plan,” Sinclair admits. “Really it’s just trying to get by every day. You try to keep your lab going at the same level any way possible.”
Many other scientists are similarly seeking private, rather than public, funding sources, as the federal ...
