US gov't hands out $1 billion

ARLINGTON, VA—The federal government will make more than $1 billion available for biological and environmental research and development activities in fiscal year 2004, more than a dozen government officials said at an Infocast conference held here on November 20. Research opportunities run the gamut from the very small (molecular structures) to the extremely large (ecosystems), and virtually everything in between. “Environmental issues are so complex that a single agency cannot handle them all,” said Will Focht, director of the Environmental Institute at Oklahoma State University. “There is a trend, actually an avalanche, moving from 'unidisciplinary' research to what we might describe as 'metadisciplinary' research,” added David Thomassen, program coordinator of the Office of Biological and Environmental Research at the Department of Energy's (DOE's) Office of Science. “That is a key development in science and science planning these days.” At the National Institutes of Health (NIH), environmental and biological research is concentrated in the National Institute of Environmental Health Sciences (NIEHS). NIEHS is funding a variety of research efforts this year, including $60 million for the Environmental Genome Project (EGP) and $60 million for the National Center for Toxicogenomics (NCT). The EGP studies how individuals differ in their susceptibility to environmental agents and how these susceptibilities change over time, while the NCT coordinates a nationwide effort to develop a toxicogenomics knowledge base. One expected result will be development of signature patterns for every class of toxic chemical based on 15 to 30 unique markers. “We will have a database in a couple of years that's every bit as robust as the FBI fingerprint database,” said NIEHS Director Kenneth Olden. “We could tell you in a matter of days whether a chemical that's been newly synthesized is going to be toxic or not.” With a $3.3 billion budget, the DOE's Office of Science primarily funds research and facility construction in the physical sciences, including nuclear energy research and development and high-performance computing at national laboratories, universities, and major user facilities. But more than $460 million of this is dedicated to biological and environmental research in genomics, systems biology, radiation biology, climate change, and environmental remediation. One of the major ongoing research areas is the Genomes to Life program, which is offering about $70 million to explore interactions among microbial systems. “We want to understand how microbes characterize proteins, regulate networks that control proteins, and to also understand the workings of complex microbial communities,” Thomassen said. While information resulting from these studies will be valuable across a range of disciplines, the choice of which microbes to study is limited to those of interest to DOE, such as Prochlorococcus and Synechococcus, which the agency believes will have applications in producing energy, sequestering carbon dioxide, and cleaning up the environment. Other life sciences DOE programs include developing new synchrotron and neutron sources facilities for structural biology research and enhancing high-throughput gene sequencing resources at federal and academic institutions. “Almost all the money we give out is in response to specific target solicitations,” Thomassen said. “But you can call us to see if we're interested in your project. We are willing to receive applications, review them, and fund them.” About $100 million in extramural funding is available for basic science research at the Environmental Protection Agency's (EPA's) National Center for Environmental Research, one of five labs and centers in the agency's Office of Research and Development. Research interests revolve around the biological, chemical, and physical processes affecting ecosystems. In genomics, this includes developing biomarkers of exposure, effects, and susceptibility to chemicals and developing genomic indicators of water quality. “We have about 1000 active research grants under management,” said Barbara Levinson, program manager of the Science to Achieve Results (STAR) program, EPA's extramural granting office. About 300 STAR grants are awarded each year, she said, and funding is directed at research involving particulate matter, water quality, global change, ecosystem assessment and restoration, and endocrine disrupting chemicals. The Department of Agriculture (USDA) funds about $170 million annually in peer-reviewed extramural research through its Cooperative State Research, Education, and Extension Service. Not surprisingly, the focus is on natural resources and the environment, plants, animals, nutrition, and food safety. In addition to offering research grants, USDA works with universities and private industry through a variety of cooperative research agreements and other arrangements, said Evert Byington, national program leader for rangeland, pasture, and forages research at USDA's Agricultural Research Service (ARS). An additional $100 million a year in ARS intramural research programs is directed into genomics and genetics, Byington said. “It's going to be an area of major focus for us,” he said. The National Science Foundation's (NSF's) Division of Environmental Biology (DEB) has twice-yearly standing submission dates for unsolicited research proposals, January 9 and July 9. There are two core research activities in DEB, systematic and population biology and ecological studies, said Penelope Firth, deputy NSF division director for environmental biology. Other NSF programs involve the ecology of infectious diseases, systematic biology, biocomplexity in the environment, and the Tree of Life Project, which seeks to construct a “universal tree of life for all 1.7 million named species of living organisms on the Earth.” Funding for specific research topics opens and closes at various times, but the NSF is always interested in reviewing unsolicited research projects, Firth said.

US gov't hands out $1 billion

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