Panchanathan Presses Case for New Programs to Appropriators
National Science Foundation Director Sethuraman Panchanathan testified before Senate appropriators last week at a
hearing on the Biden administration’s proposal to increase NSF’s budget by nearly 20% to $10.5 billion for fiscal year 2023. Commerce, Justice, and Science Appropriations Subcommittee Chair Jeanne Shaheen (D-NH) noted in her opening statement that the 4% increase Congress provided the agency for fiscal year 2022 represents the “largest increase to NSF in more than a decade” and described the latest proposal as “an increase that can be put to good use.” Shaheen asked how NSF plans to broaden the geographic distribution of its grant awards, noting she supports a provision in the U.S. Innovation and Competition Act that would require NSF to allocate at least
20% of its budget to the Established Program to Stimulate Competitive Research (EPSCoR), which sets aside funds for states that have historically received a small share of agency funds. Panchanathan described the 20% figure as an “aspirational goal” that could eventually be exceeded through a combination of initiatives, including a proposed program called GRANTED that would provide research-administration support to
minority-serving institutions. Subcommittee Ranking Member Jerry Moran (R-KS) used his questions to probe NSF’s vision for the Directorate for Technology, Innovation, and Partnerships (TIP), inquiring whether TIP might “undermine” the agency’s mission in basic research and asking how it will avoid duplicating private-sector research. He later clarified that his questioning was “not intended to be critical, but to garner an understanding of how we can more rapidly advance the outcomes that we need, economically and in national security in a time in which an adversary has seemingly unlimited public funds.” In response, Panchanathan highlighted his emphasis on building partnerships through the Regional Innovation Engines program and NSF’s AI institutes program, the latter of which he noted has
attracted co-funding from companies such as Amazon, Google, and Intel. (
American Institute of Physics - May 9, 2022)