National Academies Press: OpenBook

Advanced Research Instrumentation and Facilities (2006)

Chapter: Appendix D Summary of Researcher Survey Results

« Previous: Appendix C Summary of Institutional Survey Results
Suggested Citation:"Appendix D Summary of Researcher Survey Results." National Academy of Sciences, National Academy of Engineering, and Institute of Medicine. 2006. Advanced Research Instrumentation and Facilities. Washington, DC: The National Academies Press. doi: 10.17226/11520.
×

D
Summary of Researcher Survey Results

CONTENTS

OVERVIEW

In addition to the types of advanced research instrumentation and facilities (ARIF) at universities and the concerns of university administrators, the committee wanted a better idea of the concerns and issues, if any, for individual investigators. To find out, the committee released a survey for researchers, included at the end of this appendix, asking for their thoughts on ARIF and their assessment of the availability of and need for ARIF in their research fields.

In total, 37 researchers responded to the committee’s questions regarding ARIF. This appendix summarizes their concerns about ARIF and the types of ARIF that were mentioned to be of particular need in the researchers’ fields.

Several interesting and unique points were made concerning the nature of instrumentation that are not reflected in this summary. Montgomery Pettit, of the

Suggested Citation:"Appendix D Summary of Researcher Survey Results." National Academy of Sciences, National Academy of Engineering, and Institute of Medicine. 2006. Advanced Research Instrumentation and Facilities. Washington, DC: The National Academies Press. doi: 10.17226/11520.
×

University of Houston, for example, noted that without continued infrastructure support … we will see many young investigators changing the nature of the projects and science they do to areas that have less impact but assure better chances of success. The lack of instruments or the ability to upgrade aging local facilities simply dictates the science done in the future.

RESEARCHER CONCERNS REGARDING ARIF

In response to the first question asking for thoughts regarding ARIF, many researchers responded with particular concerns concerning policies, costs, and kinds of particular need. Figure D-1 shows the distribution of concerns of researchers regarding ARIF. Many researchers made comments in more than one category.

Below are excerpts of individual responses, grouped by the categories of concern shown in Figure D-1.

Geographic Distribution

“Such instrumentation is more often necessary for the launching of a new field than for the survival of the field. The proper distribution of such instrumentation requires careful planning.

I would hope that federal funding agencies would look at such facilities as regional resources that would meet national needs and fund them accordingly.

FIGURE D-1 Researcher concerns regarding ARIF.

Suggested Citation:"Appendix D Summary of Researcher Survey Results." National Academy of Sciences, National Academy of Engineering, and Institute of Medicine. 2006. Advanced Research Instrumentation and Facilities. Washington, DC: The National Academies Press. doi: 10.17226/11520.
×

“The nature of advanced transmission electron microscopy (TEM) is such that a successful experiment involves a very skilled operator and a very good sample, and travel to a remote ‘user’ facility with a sample of unknown characteristics is simply a nonstarter. Successful academic TEM researchers cannot operate without a state-of-the art facility in their own university. However, the cost of such instruments, say $5 to $10 million, makes their acquisition by the small number of groups (say fewer than 10 in the United States) who need and could usefully exploit such instruments very difficult.

Such instrumentation is essential for generation of new knowledge in some fields. Concentration of such instrumentation in only a few locations limits access. At the lower end of the specified range, this equipment may not require a large support infrastructure and I therefore believe it to be advantageous to distribute these resources as much as possible. At the high end of the specified range, this equipment probably requires an extensive support infrastructure dictating that it be located where such support can be found. In such cases, the equipment should become available as a remote resource to those who wish to use it but do not reside at that location. I am arguing for a balanced approach to distribution of the equipment that I believe best serves the community’s interests.

This brings the issue to the second point, namely the availability of advanced research instrumentation: making instrumentation available to all will even out the race and allow innovation rather than access to resources to drive discovery…. Advanced research instrumentation provides a technological platform to answer the hardest, unanswered questions in science. An investment on the order of magnitude of 10 or 100 million dollars will pay off many times over if it opens up opportunities to discover new sources of energy, cures for diseases, etc. Beyond potential revenue-generating applications, having access to advanced research instrumentation also opens up avenues for fundamental discoveries, the implications of which may be currently unfathomable.

Many instruments that start out appearing to be expensive and esoteric rapidly become mainstream. The good side of this is that these instruments fuel impressive scientific results. The bad side is that scientists who do not have access to these instruments tend to fall behind in terms of their results and in what experiments they can propose in grant applications.

Additionally, advanced instrumentation generally supports a large consortium of researchers, who may or may not be geographically close to the equipment. It’s not clear how use, training and scheduling can be formally addressed—currently, we essentially rely on informal arrangements.

In my experience, there are only several such instruments of a single type that should be needed by the entire national research community, in which case, such instruments should exist in regional centers that are available to investigators from

Suggested Citation:"Appendix D Summary of Researcher Survey Results." National Academy of Sciences, National Academy of Engineering, and Institute of Medicine. 2006. Advanced Research Instrumentation and Facilities. Washington, DC: The National Academies Press. doi: 10.17226/11520.
×

out of town. There should be some way to coordinate the placement of such instruments that takes into account the locality of the most need and what makes sense in terms of spreading out across the country.

Hard to Get Federal Money

“At the present time there seems to be a tremendous amount of pressure for scarce resources. Base programs that can be directed at long-term research and development (R&D) to design future advanced research instrumentation seems to come from the same directorate and subdirectorate budgets as the large instrumentation projects in the specified cost range. This appears to make it very difficult on program officers to find the right balance between long-term and short-term goals, that is, realizing the opportunities that are timely from completed R&D while also allowing a path for the future to be established…. There is no question that the need is immediate and growing. Our field is a growing one, with many new junior faculty hires and a greater focus at some of the national laboratories (LBNL, SLAC, and Fermilab are all seeing some growth in the direction of astroparticle physics and cosmology). Yet, in the present budgetary climate, it seems that the program budgets are not able to grow in proportion to the demand. It is particularly difficult for younger researches trying to initiate programs rapidly burning through university startup funds while trying to help seed large projects, only to hear from program officers that they face very difficult choices on the horizon…. I’ve shared my perspective with the panel, but I fear that to address some of the challenges that I’ve stated will simply take a greater commitment of funds. Incumbent on all of us is to convince the administration and the congress, and the country at large, that we must commit to the scientific endeavor for the long haul. Through the development not only of advanced instrumentation but the development of the people (students, postdoctoral researchers, for example) who learn how to make these things, will we be able to meet areas of national need, including security, technology development and the economic growth it triggers. Admittedly, some tension and competition for funds is appropriate and desirable, but the current budgetary environment is much tighter than ideal.

Impossible for single researchers to commit the time to obtain.

I would urge the members of this committee to recommend most strongly that the Congress avoid the mistake of reducing the funds for scientific instrumentation of this sort, in spite of the current fiscal climate. Doing so would have severely adverse effects on US scientific research at a time when US government support is already weak and inadequate to keep pace with inflation, and would mortgage the future growth and competitiveness of both the US research and industrial communities.

Suggested Citation:"Appendix D Summary of Researcher Survey Results." National Academy of Sciences, National Academy of Engineering, and Institute of Medicine. 2006. Advanced Research Instrumentation and Facilities. Washington, DC: The National Academies Press. doi: 10.17226/11520.
×

“Successful academic TEM researchers cannot operate without a state-of-the art facility in their own university. However, the cost of such instruments, say $5 to 10 million, makes their acquisition by the small number of groups (say fewer than 10 in the United States) who need and could usefully exploit such instruments very difficult. There appears not to be a current program that addresses this need. An interagency program, probably administered by the NSF and focusing on physical rather than biological science applications, and for which academic researchers could compete for the sums involved, say to fund six $5-$10 million instruments, would be most welcome indeed.

It is difficult to get a major instrument funded now, and the trend is toward even more difficult times in the future.

From over 1 million to tens of millions of dollars the prospect of obtaining infrastructure for structural biology, biotechnology, or computational facilities is bleak. The current sources with the largest percentage for funding success are charitable foundations. Even here the percentages are very small. Building clean rooms and associated facilities for wet/dry projects, infrastructure for structural biology and computational facilities are critical for progress in a variety of areas, yet other than ‘pork’ no ongoing federal programs with reasonable funding percentages can support this range. When you make it through the sieve it is a one-time hit, whether foundation or government. The prospect of continued maintenance and upgrades is almost nil… Without continued infrastructure support in structural biology, biotechnology and computational science at the non-nationalcenter level, we will see many young investigators changing the nature of the projects and science they do to areas that have less impact but assure better chances of success. The lack of instruments or the ability to upgrade aging local facilities simply dictates the science done in the future.

All I know is that it is extremely difficult now to get anything approaching the kind of support we need.

It is imperative that NIH continue to fund new instrumentation grants. In order for PIs and institutions to keep up with the changing trends in instrumentation, particularly as it relates to their ongoing NIH research, funds are needed to purchase such equipment. Unfortunately, public institutions have been seeing a downward trend in funding from the State, and the first place that is cut is funds for instrumentation. It would also be advantageous if NIH comes up with another instrumentation grant to cover bundled instruments (i.e., a number of lower-cost items, e.g., centrifuges, fluorescence spectroscopy, or microscopy). The higher-cost instrument grants program was also not activated this year, equipment over $750,000. This needs to be reinstated. In order for investigators to continue quality research they need access to state-of-the-art equipment…. We are a growing institution adding new faculty. New instrumentation is not only needed

Suggested Citation:"Appendix D Summary of Researcher Survey Results." National Academy of Sciences, National Academy of Engineering, and Institute of Medicine. 2006. Advanced Research Instrumentation and Facilities. Washington, DC: The National Academies Press. doi: 10.17226/11520.
×

but essential to attract the best and most promising scientists. As stated above, we are a public institution experiencing a downward trend in state support. Access to funds to purchase new instrumentation is critical to our success. Advances in instrumentation for biology and applied life sciences have been extensive and we need to be able to take advantage of this new technology. Advanced instrumentation for research is important to the progress of science and medicine. We have faculty who are also developing new instrumentation for examining protein-protein interactions and utilizing more in depth methods of tracking proteins. These techniques and instrumentation are essential for understanding cell signaling and choices cells make in aging and dying…. Recommend that NIH consider another level of funding instrumentation for bundled or grouped instruments that cost under $100K but are difficult to purchase in the current economic status of public institutions.

Hard to Get Institutional Money

“There is absolutely no institutional support available. [refers particularly to O&M]

Acquisition of advanced research instrumentation with these capital costs must be part of a strategic plan that encompasses the academic, research, and economic development missions of the university. Acquisition with institutional funds of such large instruments is beyond the capability of this institution. Significant federal, state, and/or philanthropic funding would be required for the capital outlay.

Increasing Need

“My purview is all the sciences, so the needs are similarly broad. The only common thread is need for more expensive and sophisticated equipment that has shorter usable lifetimes and therefore needs replacing or upgrading more often. We need more equipment that is more expensive, and we need to replace it sooner. However, the federal programs for research equipment are shrinking so we are falling behind by all measures. The universities will never be able to handle the shortfall, so our science will be constrained…. At the same time that everyone asserts that science and engineering research is the key to our economic growth and competitiveness, the reality is we are funding less and less. This is very disheartening and frustrating. We are also facing stronger competition from the higher ed systems in other countries for the best faculty and students, so we have to have a competative edge. Our research facilities can be part of that edge. It’s ironic

Suggested Citation:"Appendix D Summary of Researcher Survey Results." National Academy of Sciences, National Academy of Engineering, and Institute of Medicine. 2006. Advanced Research Instrumentation and Facilities. Washington, DC: The National Academies Press. doi: 10.17226/11520.
×

that the entire budget of NSF is less than the cost of two of our most advanced planes.

There is an increasing need for advanced research instrumentation in many fields.

This is a very definite need for the community, especially at national (possibly regional) user facilities.

As Chair of the Chemistry Department, I believe that the need for high-end instrumentation will only increase in the next five years, as the sophistication of the research increases. The number of users is expected to increase in areas such as biology, chemical biology, nanoscience, supercomputing, etc.

The need for advanced instrumentation will only increase, as history clearly shows.

O&M, Including Personnel

“To obtain such instruments is way beyond the time single researchers can commit for the cause of common good. The maintenance fees will represent the second level of unforeseen difficulties. We do not have any means/mechanism to raise, in addition to the purchase and maintenance costs, running and operating budgets and resources to provide for well-trained personnel to run such instruments and provide service to multiple investigators. There is absolutely no institutional support available.

To be effective, an ‘Advanced Instrumentation’ program for transmission electron microscopy should not only address the costs for the actual instrumentation. Is equally important to ascertain that researchers are thoroughly trained on these sophisticated instruments. As the complexity of transmission electron microscopes increases significantly with the addition of advanced electron-optical components and specimen manipulators, the availability of highly trained operators will be increasingly important for the productivity of the instrument. Maintaining sufficient availability of well-trained operators may generate additional costs for appropriate personnel and/or regular user training—perhaps by the manufacturer…. Moreover, a good technical condition of a transmission electron microscope with the field-emission gun, corrector for spherical aberration, electron monochromator, and an advanced specimens stage will be very difficult to maintain without intense support from the manufacturer. Therefore, a program for “Advanced Instrumentation” in the field of transmission electron microscopy can only be effective if it also addresses the (often very high) costs that will necessarily arise from service contracts with the instrument manufacturer over the lifetime of the instrument.

Perhaps more problematic is support for the operation of such equipment. We would need to develop a business plan that rendered the operation self-

Suggested Citation:"Appendix D Summary of Researcher Survey Results." National Academy of Sciences, National Academy of Engineering, and Institute of Medicine. 2006. Advanced Research Instrumentation and Facilities. Washington, DC: The National Academies Press. doi: 10.17226/11520.
×

supporting after a defined period. Even so, support for the startup period would be a problem.

This is a very definite need for the community, especially at national (possibly regional) user facilities, which also must be funded for support personnel, local administration, supplies, and (ideally) travel and housing for US users. In the latter respect, the policies of ESRF and ILL for users from the European Community are significantly better than those at US facilities.

When you make it through the sieve it is a one-time hit, whether foundation or government. The prospect of continued maintenance and upgrades is almost nil.

Funding should include infrastructure support such as technical personnel and service contracts. Institutions should be required to contribute to such support. Otherwise, long-term usability of the equipment would be compromised. A recharge plan for users should be included in each application, as well as a plan how to deal with future upgrades…. The initial cost of the equipment is only a portion of the total cost associated with the equipment—significant funds are required for maintenance, support, consumable supplies, and the like. It’s not clear how these costs are addressed in the current grant environment.

Smaller Institutions Face Problems with Access

“Inaccessible to most small universities, except in collaborations.

There are many instances of this sort of need, however, I feel that too large of a percentage of funds are routed to the same institutions without any attempt to nurture smaller institutions into participating in such large projects. This prevents students at the smaller schools from gaining research experience.

Now it seems that those institutions with large research facilities typically are the ones that obtain grants for major additions to their facilities.

The need now, and in the future, is incompletely satisfied. To say nothing is available is as wrong as saying that everyone can access everything they need. Although this may be interpreted as self-serving, I believe that distribution of, access to, advanced instrumentation at institutions other than the few ‘leaders in the field’ limits the preparation of tomorrow’s investigators as well as limiting today’s advancement of knowledge. I therefore think more opportunities need to be made available to the ‘middle’; institutions with a research mission and are still in the process of building their programs as opposed to the recent emphasis on large grants to large entities…. Many advances come from the big places. Many advances come from the smaller places. Many of tomorrow’s contributions come from both places. Don’t forget the ‘middle’ and the ‘little’ when resources are being made available to serve the public good.

Suggested Citation:"Appendix D Summary of Researcher Survey Results." National Academy of Sciences, National Academy of Engineering, and Institute of Medicine. 2006. Advanced Research Instrumentation and Facilities. Washington, DC: The National Academies Press. doi: 10.17226/11520.
×

Such instrumentation needs to become more generally available than it currently is. Particularly, I am concerned that facilities like that which I have described be located at places like NIST and the National Labs, and that dormitories with eating facilities be set up for long-term visits (up to six months) by graduate students and postdocs who wish to work there. Grant funds to support such visits should be included in the facility budgets…. I would be strongly opposed to setting up such facilities at academic institutions, because they will create “super” universities that will operate to the detriment of all other institutions, including our outstanding four-year liberal arts colleges.

Too Much Is Spent on Instrumentation Already

“Between the national laboratories and other centers of excellence established e.g., at universities, there does not appear to be a lack of access to major instrumentation in my field (materials science). However, looking at instrumentation in general, much of the major instrumentation is highly specialized to specific disciplines (e.g., high-energy physics), which decreases its utility for broad use, especially for interdisciplinary research, e.g., at the interface between the biological and physical sciences…. In the physical sciences and engineering, I am concerned that too much federal funding is already dedicated to instrumentation, and not enough on our human resources (undergraduate students, graduate students, postdoctoral researchers, and faculty). After all, what is the value of instrumentation without a large pool of researchers to use it? This is especially a concern when the federal budget for medical research is several times greater than that for all other nonmedical fields combined…. I feel that ‘advanced research instrumentation’ as defined in this forum is a less pressing priority than a national recommitment to the physical sciences and to human resources in science and engineering. If an initiative for new instrumentation is pursued, it should give priority to flexibility of application by researchers from a variety of disciplines, perhaps envisioning new concepts of instrumentation that do not yet exist. Such efforts would call for a commitment of funds from several agencies…. It is paradoxical and perverse that it is often easier to get funding for million-dollar pieces of equipment than hundred-thousand-dollar projects to support graduate students. It is also not evident that major instrumentation is what is needed to address the world’s most pressing problems: hunger, poverty, energy technology, and wise use of resources. ‘Instrumentation with capital costs between $2M and $100M’ sounds to me like science at the service of scientists, not science at the service of humanity.

There are a number of specific, interesting problems that naturally require instrumentation of large scale. In most the cases I am aware of, either casually or in some detail, these projects yield good science, but not of the caliber that justifies

Suggested Citation:"Appendix D Summary of Researcher Survey Results." National Academy of Sciences, National Academy of Engineering, and Institute of Medicine. 2006. Advanced Research Instrumentation and Facilities. Washington, DC: The National Academies Press. doi: 10.17226/11520.
×

their cost. The other complaint I have is that when project goes over budget, the usual move is to allow for overruns, to justify the money already spent. This is a dangerous cycle. With strict limits on budgets, and well-justified science goals, I have no fundamental problem with large programs; unfortunately, I do not often see that these simple criteria are met…. I see little calling in AMO for large-scale, advanced research instrumentation projects. Small-scale projects deliver the bulk of the cutting-edge research in my field.

In my field I think the instrumentation is better invested in individual investigator grants. The NSF budget for individual investigator grants and instrumentation is woefully inadequate. Major new instrumentation facilities should have a considerably lower priority than individual investigator grants.

Waste of money to support only a few in that range. In our field, we’ll never need instrumentation (computers) that costs more than $2M at a time. So, provide programs that’d fund different varieties of worthy proposals, not just those either very ‘large’ (astronomy) or very ‘small’ (cells) areas.

EXAMPLES OF ARIF AND FIELDS REQUIRING ARIF

Figure D-2 outlines the types of ARIF or fields requiring ARIF that were mentioned in survey responses. Excerpts from the survey responses related to individual research fields or instruments follow.

Particle Physics

“Advanced research instrumentation is becoming ever more important to the US scientific community as science becomes increasingly specialized, and as new

FIGURE D-2 Examples of ARIF or fields requiring ARIF mentioned in the researcher survey.

Suggested Citation:"Appendix D Summary of Researcher Survey Results." National Academy of Sciences, National Academy of Engineering, and Institute of Medicine. 2006. Advanced Research Instrumentation and Facilities. Washington, DC: The National Academies Press. doi: 10.17226/11520.
×

advances are being made on all fronts of science, particularly in nanotechnology, biology, and engineering. As US industry evolves into a new paradigm in which basic R&D is outsourced, its reliance on advanced research instrumentation for materials characterization will increase. The same is true for the individual university researcher for whom access to advanced instrumentation located at neutron or synchrotron-based research facilities, once considered off-limits to all save for a few experts, is now viewed as an essential component of any research program, as is evident by the dramatic growth in the numbers of university users at such facilities over the past five years. For example, the utility of neutron imaging techniques are only now being realized by industry in their efforts to develop useful hydrogen fuel cells, as neutrons can image the water by-product of the cell directly and in real time as it operates. Similarly, neutron scattering methods such as neutron reflectometry and small-angle scattering are now being extensively applied to characterize model biological systems such as cell membranes, for example the process of membrane fusion, which occurs whenever a virus attacks a cell, or when cells secrete packages of hormones…. There is not nearly enough neutron scattering instrumentation to satisfy current needs. A 2002 report from the Office of Science and Technology Policy (OSTP) on neutron facilities concluded that there was no chance of satisfying demand for neutron measurement capability in the United States, even with all US neutron research facilities fully instrumented and fully operated—including both the NCNR and the soon-to-be-constructed Spallation Neutron Source. The OSTP report found that Western Europe, a region with a research community similar in size to that of the United States, has over five times the neutron measurement capability of the United States, and that all of that capacity is heavily over-subscribed. Five years from now the SNS will have ramped up its operations. Yet rather than helping to satisfy US researcher demand, experience actually shows that the emergence of the SNS will most likely have the opposite effect, i.e., the SNS will attract and educate new researchers in the use of neutron techniques, and they will be drawn to the complementary capability at the NCNR. Thus demand for neutron instrumentation will most likely go up. This can easily be understood when one realizes that there is an enormous latent demand for neutron scattering and other types of neutron-based research, which will only get bigger as the US research community is given greater access and becomes better educated in the area of neutron science.

State-of-the-art beamlines at the APS (and other beamlines at the ALS, SSRL, and NSLS) are marginally underfunded which has prevented completion and limited operations. However, floor space is running out. Within 5 years, the United States may need to begin construction of two new third-generation synchrotrons and plan for developing new beamlines because real estate at existing facilities will have been filled and be fully used for excellent science. A particular need at the APS

Suggested Citation:"Appendix D Summary of Researcher Survey Results." National Academy of Sciences, National Academy of Engineering, and Institute of Medicine. 2006. Advanced Research Instrumentation and Facilities. Washington, DC: The National Academies Press. doi: 10.17226/11520.
×

is for undulator upgrades (funded directly through the APS), each of which will be in the advanced research instrumentation category, and support for upgrading the beamline optics owned by the CATs (which also can be in the advanced research instrumentation category)…. As much as hardware, significant instrumentation development is needed in software in some areas. A particular need is for collecting and processing diffraction data from micron- and nanosize crystals that cannot be handled by conventional four-circle techniques. Coordinated development involving many beamlines where such experiments can now be run will benefit several user communities without unnecessarily duplicating efforts…. Development of SNS including beamlines seems to be progressing well. The currently funded beamlines will have a major impact within 5 years. Further development of that facility will greatly improve the US scientific capabilities at that time and further out…. Many universities will want and can make good use of advanced computational facilities for data-intensive simulations. Whether these will fall within the advanced research instrumentation category is not clear to me. They will not be national user centers.

This is a good way for the United States to catch up with Japan and Germany on positron beams. There is a Nobel prize or two for the AMOP community in a number of antimatter projects. These include the antimatter-gravity experiment, a 511 keV laser, BEC of Ps at LN2 temperature, the creation and characterization of the dipositronium (Ps2) a diatomic molecule that is half koino-matter and half antimatter, nano-imaging, pathways to new compounds by selective annihilation, creation and characterization of mixed electron-positron systems, deep space propulsion, etc…. A small academic/government lab group now exists that is striving to get resources to construct a positron beam using a new idea for the moderation of MeV positrons created by pair-production of Bremstrahlung radiation induced by a LINAC. We need $5M, with which we could create a national users’ facility for positron studies at Argonne National Laboratory. Our plan includes several generations of enhancements that will give us a positron source that is orders of magnitude more intense than any now existing.

Proteomics

“In molecular biology we have little need for individual equipment in this price range. However, we do have needs for systems whose aggregate cost can be in this range, such as instrumentation for proteomics analysis (advanced mass spectrometers coupled to gel handling systems).

Instrumentation of this type is essential for confronting the challenges in science that lie ahead. Particularly, I am concerned with the development of new high-resolution laser and ESI mass spectrometer systems that will be needed to

Suggested Citation:"Appendix D Summary of Researcher Survey Results." National Academy of Sciences, National Academy of Engineering, and Institute of Medicine. 2006. Advanced Research Instrumentation and Facilities. Washington, DC: The National Academies Press. doi: 10.17226/11520.
×

(a) ‘decode’ the human (and other) genomes, determining the structures of the component parts, how they are linked together, and which links are the key to function, and (b) learn how to manipulate such structures with light, to form new secondary, tertiary, and quaternary structures that mimic biological function, including translation, transcription, and replication. All computer modeling of such phenomena will rely on the availability of ‘gas-phase’ data of this type.

We are a growing institution adding new faculty. New instrumentation in not only needed but essential to attract the best and most promising scientists. As stated above, we are a public institution experiencing a downward trend in state support. Access to funds to purchase new instrumentation is critical to our success. Advances in instrumentation for biology and applied life sciences have been extensive and we need to be able to take advantage of this new technology. Advanced instrumentation for research is important to the progress of science and medicine. We have faculty who are also developing new instrumentation for examining protein-protein interactions and utilizing more in-depth methods of tracking proteins. These techniques and instrumentation are essential for understanding cell signaling and choices cells make in aging and dying.

NMR

“In my field (structural biology primarily using NMR), the need for advanced research instrumentation is very great currently, and will probably continue to be great 5 years from now. Five or six years ago, few labs had access to very high field spectrometers (750 MHz or above), but now the field has been pushed ahead to where many (most?) projects require such instrumentation. A significant number of researchers have access to these machines, but many either don’t have access or must drive/fly long distances to obtain access. While on paper it sounds fine to ask a researcher to travel to a high field spectrometer, in practice this is very cumbersome and does not lead to cutting-edge results. For any particular NMR project, a dozen or more different NMR experiments must be carried out on a sample (and sometimes on several samples with slightly different conditions). Traveling back and forth to a ‘richer’ or better endowed university is not conducive to getting results. This is in contrast to x-ray crystallography where indeed one or two trips to the Advanced Photon Source could give a researcher enough data to finish a project.

The main gap is between $2M and $10M. This gap includes advanced NMR, fMRI, x-ray, laser, and electronic microscopy equipment. Much of this equipment is needed for biology and biosciences and should be included as part of core instrumentation facilities of major research universities.

In chemistry, there are limited types of instrumentation that fit this category. In my particular discipline within chemistry, only really high field NMR spectrometers

Suggested Citation:"Appendix D Summary of Researcher Survey Results." National Academy of Sciences, National Academy of Engineering, and Institute of Medicine. 2006. Advanced Research Instrumentation and Facilities. Washington, DC: The National Academies Press. doi: 10.17226/11520.
×

and very fancy and powerful mass spectrometers would come close to the minimum $2M level you are talking about. It is unlikely that individual institutions can afford to purchase such instruments for local use only. The needs for such equipment are usually very specialized, but when needed, such instruments are indispensable. The obvious answer is that there is a need now and that it will grow in the future, in part because discoveries will lead to the invention of instruments that are more powerful and expensive than we have now. For example, a 900-MHz NMR now costs about $1M. I would guess that in the future there will be spectrometers that cost $2M.

Cyberinfrastructure/Geosciences

“To date, our vision has been defined by the NSF MRI competition, so we have considered ‘major’ equipment to be in the $2 million max area. However, we have just decided institutionally that we will have to renew our supercomputer every 3-4 years at a cost to us this time of $2 million, but likely more next round, and we are planning to do this with institutional funds. So, equipment we used to think of as being attainable only through grants we are now thinking about funding ourselves. We have not heretofore ventured into the next level, the $3-$100 million domain. There is a gap between the size of equipment we pay for ourselves or via grants, and the size of major national facilities like the DOE labs, so we don’t routinely think of or do science that needs equipment in this middle range, which means we are missing some valuable science that could be done in this range. However, at OU we are now a partner in building the National Weather Radar Testbed, an approximately $25 million phased-array radar. It took immense time and effort to pull together the coalition to do this, but it will be the basis of research leading to the next generation of weather radar. My point is we should have these ambitions and programs in other discipline areas, but our vision is curtailed and we don’t think that big.

Detectors

“We are underinvesting in AMO instrumentation at a time that this branch of science is undergoing a major revolution. One area that is particularly in need of resources is detectors. We are losing out to the Europeans and the Japanese in detectors with temporal and/or spatial resolution, such as streak cameras and fast CCDs…. The area of terahertz science needs much more support and attention. Coherent synchrotron radiation in this range of the electomagnetic spectrum is ripe for major breakthroughs.

Suggested Citation:"Appendix D Summary of Researcher Survey Results." National Academy of Sciences, National Academy of Engineering, and Institute of Medicine. 2006. Advanced Research Instrumentation and Facilities. Washington, DC: The National Academies Press. doi: 10.17226/11520.
×
Materials Science

“In Materials Science and Engineering, the major type of research instrumentation that falls into the plus $2,000,000 category are aberration-corrected subatomic-level-resolution transmission electron microscopes (TEMs). There is a BES/DOE program involving the major national labs (Oak Ridge, Lawrence Berkeley, and Argonne) to acquire one or more such instruments as ‘user facilities.’ The BES program at DOE has been funding acquisition of TEMs for at least two decades, and possibly longer, arguing that an advanced TEM can be compared to a synchrotron source, and that ‘if you build them, they will come.’ The truth is otherwise. As user facilities, their usage by rank and file academic electron microscopists is in most cases minimal; instead, the users are researchers who have no skills in advanced TEM (arguably the most difficult skill to acquire) and establish a collaboration with staff at one or the other National labs (it is actually a stretch for DOE to show ‘success’ of these TEM-based user facilities). There is nothing wrong with such an arrangement but it doesn’t satisfy the needs of academic materials science electron microscopists, as will be discussed in question 13.”

POLICY RECOMMENDATIONS

Policy recommendations made by researchers included the following:

  • “ARI development budgets come from the same directorate and division budgets as large projects. It is necessary (though difficult) to find the right balance between long-term and short-term goals.

  • There should be a recommitment to the physical sciences and to human resources in science and engineering, more so than to more support for instrumentation. If a new instrumentation initiative is put into effect, it should give priority to flexibility of application, perhaps looking into new categories of instrumentation that do not yet exist.

  • Agencies should treat ARI facilities as regional resources that meet national needs.

  • An interagency program supported by the NSF focusing on TEM for physical, not biological applications, which would fund six $5-$10M instruments. (Heuer)

  • An NIH instrumentation grant to support bundled instruments under $100K—an ensemble of low-cost items. NIH should also reactivate the ‘high cost instrument grants program.’

Suggested Citation:"Appendix D Summary of Researcher Survey Results." National Academy of Sciences, National Academy of Engineering, and Institute of Medicine. 2006. Advanced Research Instrumentation and Facilities. Washington, DC: The National Academies Press. doi: 10.17226/11520.
×
  • ‘Funding should include infrastructure support such as technical personnel and service contracts. Institutions should be required to contribute to such support. A recharge plan for users should be included in each application, as well as a plan how to deal with future upgrades.’

  • Facilities should be centralized at placed like NIST and the National Labs, with the inclusion of housing for long-term visitors.”

Suggested Citation:"Appendix D Summary of Researcher Survey Results." National Academy of Sciences, National Academy of Engineering, and Institute of Medicine. 2006. Advanced Research Instrumentation and Facilities. Washington, DC: The National Academies Press. doi: 10.17226/11520.
×

RESEARCHER SURVEY ON ADVANCED RESEARCH INSTRUMENTATION

Today, instrumentation plays a critical role in scientific and engineering research and exploration. We would like to get your help in gaining a better understanding of the issues related to instrumentation in your field and your thoughts on federal policies. This survey is part of a study being conducted by the National Academies Committee on Advanced Research Instrumentation in response to Section 13(b) of the NSF Authorization Act of 2002. The Instrumentation Committee is under the aegis of the Committee on Science, Engineering, and Public Policy (COSEPUP). COSEPUP, chaired by Dr. Maxine Singer, is the only joint committee of the three honorific academies: the National Academy of Sciences, the National Academy of Engineering, and the Institute of Medicine. Its overall charge is to address cross-cutting issues in science and technology policy that affect the health of the national research enterprise.

The study is examining federal programs and policies related to advanced research instrumentation used for interdisciplinary, multidisciplinary, and disciplinary research. If needed, the committee will propose policies to make the most effective use of federal agency resources to fund such instruments. Advanced research instrumentation, for the purposes of this survey, is defined as instrumentation that is not categorized by NSF as Major Research Instrumentation ($100,000 to $2 million in capital cost) or as Major Research Equipment (more than several tens of millions of dollars), but instead falls in between these two designations.

To respond to its charge from Congress and NSF, the Committee is interested hearing your thoughts on instrumentation in your field, as well as your opinions concerning current and possible future federal programs and policies for advanced research instrumentation.

We hope you will be willing to participate in this important information-gathering effort. We recognize that answering all the questions in this survey may be challenging. We only ask that you do the best you can in providing the information requested. If another person at your institution is better suited to answer this survey, please forward it to them, but please let us know to whom you sent it. We also encourage you to send this survey to any researchers at your institution who may have additional thoughts. Their comments may be sent either to you for compilation or directly to instrumentation@nas.edu.

We would appreciate receiving your response by Friday, April 1, 2005. Please return the completed survey via e-mail as an attachment to instrumentation@nas.edu or by fax to 202-334-1667. If you have any questions, please contact the study director, Dr. Deborah Stine, at dstine@nas.edu or 202-334-3239.

Thank you for your time and participation. For more information on the study, please visit our website at http://www7.nationalacademies.org/instrumentation/.”

Suggested Citation:"Appendix D Summary of Researcher Survey Results." National Academy of Sciences, National Academy of Engineering, and Institute of Medicine. 2006. Advanced Research Instrumentation and Facilities. Washington, DC: The National Academies Press. doi: 10.17226/11520.
×
National Academies Committee on Advanced Research Instrumentation

MARTHA KREBS (Chair), President, Science Strategies

DAVID BISHOP, VP Nanotechnology Research, President, NJNC, Bell Labs

MARVIN CASSMAN, Independent Consultant

ULRICH DAHMAN, Director, National Center for Electron Microscopy, Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory

THOM H. DUNNING, Jr., Director, National Center for Supercomputing Applications, University of Illinois, Urbana-Champaign

FRANK FERNANDEZ, Distinguished Instititute Technical Advisor, Stevens Institute of Technology

MARILYN L. FOGEL, Staff Member, Geophysical Laboratory, Carnegie Institution of Washington

LESLIE KOLODZIEJSKI, Professor, Electrical Engineering and Computer Science, Massachusetts Institute of Technology

ALVIN KWIRAM, Professor of Chemistry, University of Washington, Vice Provost for Research Emeritus

WARREN S. WARREN, Professor of Chemistry, Director, NJ Center for Ultrafast Laser Applications, Princeton University

DANIEL WEILL, Professor (by courtesy), University of Oregon, Department of Geological Sciences

National Academies Committee on Advanced Research Instrumentation Researcher Survey of Instrumentation Funding and Support

Please answer the following general questions:

  1. Name:

  2. Title:

  3. Institution Name:

  4. Daytime Phone:

  5. E-mail:

  6. Research Field(s)?

  7. Type of Institution (Public, Private, Independent Research Institute, etc….):

  8. Do you hold or have you held any administrative positions that involve instrumentation decision-making (Y/N)?

  9. If so, what?

Suggested Citation:"Appendix D Summary of Researcher Survey Results." National Academy of Sciences, National Academy of Engineering, and Institute of Medicine. 2006. Advanced Research Instrumentation and Facilities. Washington, DC: The National Academies Press. doi: 10.17226/11520.
×

Unless permission is otherwise given, the responses provided in this survey will only be used in an aggregated fashion in the Committee report.

  1. May we use the comments you have provided verbatim in the report (Y/N)?

  2. May we attribute these comments to you (Y/N)?

Please share your perspective on instrumentation:

  1. What are you thoughts on advanced research instrumentation (instrumentation with capital costs between $2M and $100M)?

  2. In your discipline, what is your assessment of the availability of and need for advanced research instrumentation, now and five years in the future?

  3. Do you have any additional comments?

LIST OF RESPONDING RESEARCHERS

Akerib, Daniel

Bland, Paul

Cipolla, Sam

Csiszar, Katalin

DeGraffenreid, William

DeGuire, Mark

Duerk, Jeffrey

Ernst, Frank

Esembeson, Bweh

Fertig, Chad

Field, Robert

Fujita, Hilzu

Gallagher, Patrick

Habicht, Gail

Heuer, Arthur

Hochstein, John

Holmes, Richard

Kirz, Janos

Knothe Tate, Melissa

LiWang, Patricia

Miner, Steve

Nicol, Malcolm

Suggested Citation:"Appendix D Summary of Researcher Survey Results." National Academy of Sciences, National Academy of Engineering, and Institute of Medicine. 2006. Advanced Research Instrumentation and Facilities. Washington, DC: The National Academies Press. doi: 10.17226/11520.
×

Paule, Marv

Pettitt, Montgomery

Pratt, Daniel

Reinhardt, William

Reisler, Hanna

Resnick, Andrew

Rybicki, Edmund

Sayre, Lawrence

Schrader, David

Storey, Dan

Stwalley, William

Sun, Jiayang

Surko, Clifford

William, Lee

Yorio, Thomas

Suggested Citation:"Appendix D Summary of Researcher Survey Results." National Academy of Sciences, National Academy of Engineering, and Institute of Medicine. 2006. Advanced Research Instrumentation and Facilities. Washington, DC: The National Academies Press. doi: 10.17226/11520.
×
Page 128
Suggested Citation:"Appendix D Summary of Researcher Survey Results." National Academy of Sciences, National Academy of Engineering, and Institute of Medicine. 2006. Advanced Research Instrumentation and Facilities. Washington, DC: The National Academies Press. doi: 10.17226/11520.
×
Page 129
Suggested Citation:"Appendix D Summary of Researcher Survey Results." National Academy of Sciences, National Academy of Engineering, and Institute of Medicine. 2006. Advanced Research Instrumentation and Facilities. Washington, DC: The National Academies Press. doi: 10.17226/11520.
×
Page 130
Suggested Citation:"Appendix D Summary of Researcher Survey Results." National Academy of Sciences, National Academy of Engineering, and Institute of Medicine. 2006. Advanced Research Instrumentation and Facilities. Washington, DC: The National Academies Press. doi: 10.17226/11520.
×
Page 131
Suggested Citation:"Appendix D Summary of Researcher Survey Results." National Academy of Sciences, National Academy of Engineering, and Institute of Medicine. 2006. Advanced Research Instrumentation and Facilities. Washington, DC: The National Academies Press. doi: 10.17226/11520.
×
Page 132
Suggested Citation:"Appendix D Summary of Researcher Survey Results." National Academy of Sciences, National Academy of Engineering, and Institute of Medicine. 2006. Advanced Research Instrumentation and Facilities. Washington, DC: The National Academies Press. doi: 10.17226/11520.
×
Page 133
Suggested Citation:"Appendix D Summary of Researcher Survey Results." National Academy of Sciences, National Academy of Engineering, and Institute of Medicine. 2006. Advanced Research Instrumentation and Facilities. Washington, DC: The National Academies Press. doi: 10.17226/11520.
×
Page 134
Suggested Citation:"Appendix D Summary of Researcher Survey Results." National Academy of Sciences, National Academy of Engineering, and Institute of Medicine. 2006. Advanced Research Instrumentation and Facilities. Washington, DC: The National Academies Press. doi: 10.17226/11520.
×
Page 135
Suggested Citation:"Appendix D Summary of Researcher Survey Results." National Academy of Sciences, National Academy of Engineering, and Institute of Medicine. 2006. Advanced Research Instrumentation and Facilities. Washington, DC: The National Academies Press. doi: 10.17226/11520.
×
Page 136
Suggested Citation:"Appendix D Summary of Researcher Survey Results." National Academy of Sciences, National Academy of Engineering, and Institute of Medicine. 2006. Advanced Research Instrumentation and Facilities. Washington, DC: The National Academies Press. doi: 10.17226/11520.
×
Page 137
Suggested Citation:"Appendix D Summary of Researcher Survey Results." National Academy of Sciences, National Academy of Engineering, and Institute of Medicine. 2006. Advanced Research Instrumentation and Facilities. Washington, DC: The National Academies Press. doi: 10.17226/11520.
×
Page 138
Suggested Citation:"Appendix D Summary of Researcher Survey Results." National Academy of Sciences, National Academy of Engineering, and Institute of Medicine. 2006. Advanced Research Instrumentation and Facilities. Washington, DC: The National Academies Press. doi: 10.17226/11520.
×
Page 139
Suggested Citation:"Appendix D Summary of Researcher Survey Results." National Academy of Sciences, National Academy of Engineering, and Institute of Medicine. 2006. Advanced Research Instrumentation and Facilities. Washington, DC: The National Academies Press. doi: 10.17226/11520.
×
Page 140
Suggested Citation:"Appendix D Summary of Researcher Survey Results." National Academy of Sciences, National Academy of Engineering, and Institute of Medicine. 2006. Advanced Research Instrumentation and Facilities. Washington, DC: The National Academies Press. doi: 10.17226/11520.
×
Page 141
Suggested Citation:"Appendix D Summary of Researcher Survey Results." National Academy of Sciences, National Academy of Engineering, and Institute of Medicine. 2006. Advanced Research Instrumentation and Facilities. Washington, DC: The National Academies Press. doi: 10.17226/11520.
×
Page 142
Suggested Citation:"Appendix D Summary of Researcher Survey Results." National Academy of Sciences, National Academy of Engineering, and Institute of Medicine. 2006. Advanced Research Instrumentation and Facilities. Washington, DC: The National Academies Press. doi: 10.17226/11520.
×
Page 143
Suggested Citation:"Appendix D Summary of Researcher Survey Results." National Academy of Sciences, National Academy of Engineering, and Institute of Medicine. 2006. Advanced Research Instrumentation and Facilities. Washington, DC: The National Academies Press. doi: 10.17226/11520.
×
Page 144
Suggested Citation:"Appendix D Summary of Researcher Survey Results." National Academy of Sciences, National Academy of Engineering, and Institute of Medicine. 2006. Advanced Research Instrumentation and Facilities. Washington, DC: The National Academies Press. doi: 10.17226/11520.
×
Page 145
Suggested Citation:"Appendix D Summary of Researcher Survey Results." National Academy of Sciences, National Academy of Engineering, and Institute of Medicine. 2006. Advanced Research Instrumentation and Facilities. Washington, DC: The National Academies Press. doi: 10.17226/11520.
×
Page 146
Suggested Citation:"Appendix D Summary of Researcher Survey Results." National Academy of Sciences, National Academy of Engineering, and Institute of Medicine. 2006. Advanced Research Instrumentation and Facilities. Washington, DC: The National Academies Press. doi: 10.17226/11520.
×
Page 147
Next: Appendix E Summary of Disciplinary Society Survey Results »
Advanced Research Instrumentation and Facilities Get This Book
×
Buy Paperback | $70.00 Buy Ebook | $54.99
MyNAP members save 10% online.
Login or Register to save!
Download Free PDF
  1. ×

    Welcome to OpenBook!

    You're looking at OpenBook, NAP.edu's online reading room since 1999. Based on feedback from you, our users, we've made some improvements that make it easier than ever to read thousands of publications on our website.

    Do you want to take a quick tour of the OpenBook's features?

    No Thanks Take a Tour »
  2. ×

    Show this book's table of contents, where you can jump to any chapter by name.

    « Back Next »
  3. ×

    ...or use these buttons to go back to the previous chapter or skip to the next one.

    « Back Next »
  4. ×

    Jump up to the previous page or down to the next one. Also, you can type in a page number and press Enter to go directly to that page in the book.

    « Back Next »
  5. ×

    Switch between the Original Pages, where you can read the report as it appeared in print, and Text Pages for the web version, where you can highlight and search the text.

    « Back Next »
  6. ×

    To search the entire text of this book, type in your search term here and press Enter.

    « Back Next »
  7. ×

    Share a link to this book page on your preferred social network or via email.

    « Back Next »
  8. ×

    View our suggested citation for this chapter.

    « Back Next »
  9. ×

    Ready to take your reading offline? Click here to buy this book in print or download it as a free PDF, if available.

    « Back Next »
Stay Connected!