Overall, Reagan's budget once again reflects his support for science. It requests a 14% rise in funding for NSF, 5.3% more for NIH (including a 25% hike in AIDS research), 9% more for the space science and applications portion of the NASA budget, and 14% more for the Department of Energy's basic civilian research program (including $150 million to begin construction of the superconducting supercollider). President Bush is expected to modify portions of Reagan's total $1.15 trillion request, but not in ways that would significantly alter federal spending on basic research.
But the Reagan/Bush figures for the fiscal year that begins October 1 may not translate into more grants to individual investigators. At NSF, for example, much of the increase will be used instead to boost the average size of awards."We need to go up to $110,000 or $120,000 over time," NSF director Erich Bloch says about the size of ...
