NSF Org:	SMA SBE Office of Multidisciplinary Activities
Recipient:	THE REGENTS OF THE UNIVERSITY OF COLORADO
Initial Amendment Date:	July 30, 2019
Latest Amendment Date:	July 30, 2019
Award Number:	1934875
Award Instrument:	Standard Grant
Program Manager:	Georgia Kosmopoulou SMA  SBE Office of Multidisciplinary Activities SBE  Directorate for Social, Behavioral and Economic Sciences
Start Date:	December 15, 2019
End Date:	November 30, 2024 (Estimated)
Total Intended Award Amount:	$169,639.00
Total Awarded Amount to Date:	$169,639.00
Funds Obligated to Date:	FY 2019 = $169,639.00
History of Investigator:	Janet Bercovitz (Principal Investigator) janet.bercovitz@colorado.edu
Recipient Sponsored Research Office:	University of Colorado at Boulder 3100 MARINE ST Boulder CO  US  80309-0001 (303)492-6221
Sponsor Congressional District:	02
Primary Place of Performance:	University of Colorado at Boulder 3100 Marine St Rm 481 572 UCB Boulder CO  US  80303-1058
Primary Place of Performance Congressional District:	02
Unique Entity Identifier (UEI):	SPVKK1RC2MZ3
Parent UEI:
NSF Program(s):	SciSIP-Sci of Sci Innov Policy
Primary Program Source:	01001920DB NSF RESEARCH & RELATED ACTIVIT
Program Reference Code(s):
Program Element Code(s):	762600
Award Agency Code:	4900
Fund Agency Code:	4900
Assistance Listing Number(s):	47.075

ABSTRACT

The scientific workforce is at the core of the biomedical industry and their research provides the basis for public benefits in the identification of diseases and in the discovery of treatments and cures. Realizing these life-saving benefits involves investment and collaboration between pharmaceutical and biotech companies, government funding agencies, and nonprofit organizations. Yet each funder has varying objectives that reflect their changing priorities and have the potential to affect the research conducted. While the federal government has traditionally funded basic research, the National Institutes of Health (NIH), the largest federal funder of academic biomedical research, has increasingly emphasized translational research. Industry funding of academic research, while remaining at steady levels, often comes with secrecy requirements that have the potential to impede broad technological advances. Further, both federal and industry funders have become more risk averse in their investments, exacerbating a funding gap between invention and commercialization. In response, philanthropic funding--donations and investments made by nonprofit organizations such as private foundations--is increasing. Philanthropic funders are experimenting with new models to catalyze collaborations across players at different points in the drug development process. This project assesses how these different funders and their varying strategies spur biomedical innovation so that future investments can be optimized for society's benefit. In addition, this project examines how a funder's strategy impacts the type of research conducted between basic, translational, and applied, as well as how it affects a scientist's career path.

The funding landscape of biomedical research is changing with federal funding in flux, industry funding growing more risk-averse, and nonprofit funding on the rise but employing different terms of sponsored research agreements. To better understand the differences in how these funding strategies are implemented and their subsequent impact on innovation, this project builds an extensive scientist-level database of biomedical projects and outcomes. The database uses university administrative records to merge together individual data with sponsored-research proposals and awards, as well as scientific outcomes. Outcomes include peer-reviewed publication activity and technology transfer data on inventions, disclosures, and spin-out firms. Using econometric analysis, these data are used to assess how different funder's strategies impact biomedical innovation, the pipeline of science studied by academics, and the impacts of these choices on the scientists' careers.

This award reflects NSF's statutory mission and has been deemed worthy of support through evaluation using the Foundation's intellectual merit and broader impacts review criteria.

Please report errors in award information by writing to: awardsearch@nsf.gov.