Thread by @MartinBJensen

Something is changing about how scientific research is funded.

@Jasonmmast @endpts covers a growing set of science funding experiments: endpts.com/inside-the-mul…

These include high-throughput grants (e.g. #Fast, #Impetus), new institutes (@ArcadiaScience, @AltosLabs, @arcinstitute... I guess A is for new beginnings?), and new structures like 'nonprofit startups' (@Convergent_FROs) & @newscienceorg.

https://twitter.com/MartinBJensen/status/1475512784217538565?s=20

As with all experiments, I expect that some of these will disappear and that others will be a central part of science in ten years.
But them happening at all is enough to renew a conversation about how science is funded and conducted.

COVID has been very rough on #Academia, with limited access to labs, loss of animal cohorts and experiments, and sometimes limited institutional support.
Now some researchers are choosing to try out alternatives (stay tuned for lots of announcements...)

The article ends with a quote from Paula Stephan that even $650M is "... kind of peanuts in science funding.”, which I want to push back on:
It's not untrue, but also assumes that all dollars are spent equally.

Here's the NIA budget (in $1000s), ostensibly $3.5B of grants per year. Big 💰 for #AgingBiology! But looking closer, $2.3B is earmarked for 🧠, largely Alzheimer's, rather than aging biology. And another $0.6B is for social studies. Only ~11% is for root causes of disease...

I'd postulate that targeted support can have outsized impact.

Just as #Aging research attempts to address multiple diseases efficiently by targeting root causes instead of separate symptoms, grants can have greater/lesser probability of accelerating progress.

Some of this new funding, including the Longevity Impetus Grants, is focused on areas that aren't popular for NIH funding, as well as tools and common goods that could help an entire field.

Grateful for the individuals who are committing their wealth to this purpose!

PS: Worth noting that this isn't all new, more like a reboot. Arc is in many ways a smaller, more focused Howard Hughes Medical Institute (est. 1953). And some European institutions have similar models.