THE NEXT GENERATION OF
BIOMEDICAL AND BEHAVIORAL
SCIENCES RESEARCHERS
Breaking Through
Ronald Daniels and Lida Beninson, Editors
Committee on the Next Generation Initiative
Board on Higher Education and Workforce
Policy and Global Affairs
A Consensus Study Report of
THE NATIONAL ACADEMIES PRESS
Washington, DC
www.nap.edu
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This activity was supported by contracts between the National Academy of Sciences and The National Institutes of Health (#HHSN263201200074I, Order No. HHSN26300107) and the Bloomberg Philanthropies. Any opinions, findings, conclusions, or recommendations expressed in this publication do not necessarily reflect the views of any organization or agency that provided support for the project.
International Standard Book Number-13: 978-0-309-47137-4
International Standard Book Number-10: 0-309-47137-0
Library of Congress Control Number 2018941722
Digital Object Identifier: https://doi.org/10.17226/25008
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Suggested citation: National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine. 2018. The Next Generation of Biomedical and Behavioral Sciences Researchers: Breaking Through. Washington, DC: The National Academies Press. doi: https://doi.org/10.17226/25008.
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COMMITTEE ON THE NEXT GENERATION INITIATIVE
Members
RONALD J. DANIELS (Chair), President, Johns Hopkins University
NANCY C. ANDREWS (NAS/NAM), Dean and Vice Chancellor for Academic Affairs (Emerita), Duke University School of Medicine
W. TRAVIS BERGGREN, Founding Director for the Stem Cell Research Core Facility, Salk Institute
SUE BIGGINS (NAS), Associate Director in the Division of Basic Sciences, Fred Hutchinson Cancer Research Center, Investigator, Howard Hughes Medical Institute
JOHN BOOTHROYD (NAS), Burt and Marion Avery Professor, Department of Microbiology and Immunology, Associate Vice Provost for Graduate Education, Stanford University
DAVID R. BURGESS, Professor of Biology, Boston College
KAFUI DZIRASA, Assistant Professor of Psychiatry and Behavioral Sciences, Duke University
GIOVANNA GUERRERO-MEDINA, Executive Director, Ciencia Puerto Rico; Director, Yale Ciencia Initiative, Yale University
JUDITH KIMBLE (NAS), Vilas Professor in the Department of Biochemistry, University of Wisconsin-Madison, Investigator, Howard Hughes Medical Institute
STORY LANDIS (NAM), Former Director of the National Institute of Neurological Disorders and Stroke, National Institutes of Health
KENNETH MAYNARD, Head, Global Patient Safety Evaluation (GPSE) Compliance, Standards and Training and GPSE Business Partners Relations, Takeda Pharmaceuticals International Co.
GARY S. MCDOWELL, Executive Director, The Future of Research, Inc.
JESSICA POLKA, Visiting Scholar, Whitehead Institute
JOAN Y. REEDE (NAM), Dean for Diversity and Community Partnership and Professor of Medicine, Harvard Medical School
LANA R. SKIRBOLL, Vice President of Science Policy, Sanofi
PAULA STEPHAN, Professor of Economics, Georgia State University
MARIA ELENA ZAVALA, Professor of Biology, California State University, Northridge
Study Staff
LIDA BENINSON, Study Director and Program Officer, Board on Higher Education and Workforce
MARIA LUND DAHLBERG, Program Officer
YASMEEN HUSSAIN, Associate Program Officer (Until July 2017)
ELIZABETH GARBEE, Christine Mirzayan Science and Technology Policy Graduate Fellow (Until April 2018)
AUSTEN APPLEGATE, Senior Program Assistant
LAYNE SCHERER, Program Officer
JAY LABOV, Senior Advisor for Education and Communication
IRENE NGUN, Research Associate
ADRIANA COUREMBIS, Finance Officer
ALLISON BERGER, Senior Program Assistant
FREDRICK LESTINA, Senior Program Assistant
JAIME COLMAN, Senior Program Assistant (Until December 2017)
THOMAS RUDIN, Director, Board on Higher Education and Workforce
Consultants
JOE ALPER, Writer
JEREMY BERG, Consultant
PHILLIP SPECTOR, Consultant
BOARD ON HIGHER EDUCATION AND WORKFORCE
Members
RICHARD K. MILLER (Chair) (NAE), President, Olin College of Engineering
LAWRENCE D. BOBO (NAS), W.E.B. Du Bois Professor of the Social Sciences, Department of Sociology, Harvard University
ANGELA BYARS-WINSTON, Professor of Medicine, University of Wisconsin–Madison
JAIME CURTIS-FISK, Scientist and STEM Education Program Leader, The Dow Chemical Company
APRILLE ERICSSON, Capture–Mission Manager, NASA Goddard Space Flight Center
RICHARD FREEMAN, Herbert Ascherman Professor of Economics, Harvard University
PAUL J. LEBLANC, President, Southern New Hampshire University
SALLY F. MASON, President Emerita, University of Iowa
FRANCISCO RODRIGUEZ, Chancellor, Los Angeles Community College District
SUBHASH SINGHAL (NAE), Battelle Fellow Emeritus, Pacific Northwest National Laboratory
KUMBLE R. SUBBASWAMY, Chancellor, University of Massachusetts, Amherst
SHELLEY WESTMAN, Principal/Partner, Ernst & Young, LLP
MARY WOOLLEY (NAM), President and CEO, Research! America
Staff
AUSTEN APPLEGATE, Senior Program Assistant
ASHLEY BEAR, Program Officer
LIDA BENINSON, Program Officer
ALLISON BERGER, Senior Program Assistant
JAIME COLMAN, Senior Program Assistant (Until December, 2017)
MARIA LUND DAHLBERG, Program Officer
YASMEEN HUSSAIN, Associate Program Officer (Until July 2017)
LEIGH JACKSON, Senior Program Officer
FREDRICK LESTINA, Senior Program Assistant
BARBARA NATALIZIO, Program Officer
IRENE NGUN, Research Associate
LAYNE SCHERER, Program Officer
THOMAS RUDIN, Director
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Preface
The U.S. biomedical research ecosystem is one of the great engines of innovation in modern history. It is a wellspring of discovery and cures that has expanded the domain of human knowledge, improved and saved countless lives, and catalyzed job growth and economic prosperity in communities across the nation. The United States’ model for training and funding the biomedical workforce is widely credited with making it a global leader in scientific research, one that is emulated around the world. But there is nothing inevitable about the success of this enterprise. It requires constant vigilance and stewardship, to ensure that we are setting the optimal conditions and incentives for our scientists and the science they imagine, now and into the future.
There have been warning signs for years that the enterprise may be calcifying—in ways that create barriers, in particular for the incoming generation of researchers. Multiple national reports have been penned about these warning signs, and they have proposed countless recommendations for reform. But many of the recommendations have gone unaddressed. And the problems have endured.
Of late, the vulnerabilities in the biomedical enterprise have grown more evident, leading to renewed concern on the part of science policy leaders, professional organizations, funding agencies, and, above all, the U.S. Congress, which called on the National Academy of Sciences to conduct a comprehensive study of the policies affecting the next generation of researchers in the United States. This report is the outcome of that study. In developing it, we saw our task as two-fold: First, to identify reforms that are tailored to the evolving barriers facing the next generation of researchers. But, second, to do so in a manner that responds to the failure of many of the earlier recommendations to gain traction.
The pages that follow chronicle a biomedical research landscape of remarkable promise, yet characterized by fissures and areas of stress. This report offers a set of recommendations that seek to engage those vulnerabilities and to build an ecosystem that is dynamic and fair, while setting in place the structures and conditions for sustained change, so that episodic reports start to fall away and policy change across the enterprise is ongoing and enduring, to benefit the next generation of researchers, as well as the generations of researchers yet to come.
Ronald Daniels, Chair
Committee on the Next Generation Initiative
Acknowledgments
The committee would like to acknowledge the National Institutes of Health (NIH) and Bloomberg Philanthropies for their generous support of this study. In particular, the committee would like to acknowledge Phillip Spector, Yasmeen Hussain, and Amanda Field for their support to this project. The committee also acknowledges the contributions from Walter Schaffer, Jennifer Sutton, Silda Nikaj, Katrina Pearson, Deepshikha Roychowdhury, and Robert Moore of NIH for their support and responses to data requests. The committee would also like to acknowledge the University of California, San Francisco, The Johns Hopkins University, and Sanofi in Cambridge, Massachusetts, for hosting the committee’s meetings. We are also grateful for the contributions of James Burke, Gilbert S. Omenn Fellow at the National Academy of Medicine; Rona Briere, for her careful editing of the report; and Rebecca Morgan of the National Academies Research Center, for her assistance with fact-checking.
ACKNOWLEDGMENT OF PRESENTERS
The committee gratefully acknowledges the contributions of the following individuals:
DAVID ASAI, Senior Director for Science Education, Howard Hughes Medical Institute
ELIZABETH BACA, Senior Health Advisor, California Governor’s Office of Planning and Research
SUSAN BASERGA, Professor of Molecular Biophysics and Biochemistry, Yale University
MARC BONNEFOI, Head, R&D France, Sanofi
GWYNETH CARD, Group Leader, Howard Hughes Medical Institute, Janelia Research Center
DENNIS DEAN, II, R&D Scientist, Seven Bridges Genomics
DEBORAH DUNSIRE, CEO, XTuit Pharmaceuticals
KENNETH GIBBS, Program Director, Division of Training, Workforce Development, and Diversity, National Institute of General Medicine, National Institutes of Health
RORY GOODWIN, Neurosurgery Resident, The Johns Hopkins University Hospital
EVA GUINAN, Director of Translational Research, Radiation Oncology, Dana-Farber Cancer Institute
STEPHEN HAGGARTY, Associate Professor of Neurology, Harvard Medical School, Director, Chemical Neurobiology Laboratory, Center for Genomic Medicine, Massachusetts General Hospital
MISTY HEGGENESS, Chief of Longitudinal Research, Evaluation, and Outreach, U.S. Census Bureau
SAMANTHA HINDLE, Assistant Professional Researcher, University of California, San Francisco
STEVEN HYMAN, Distinguished Service Professor, Harvard University, Director, Stanley Center for Psychiatric Research, Core Member, Broad Institute
BAHIJA JALLAL, Executive Vice President, MedImmune
MARC KIRSCHNER, John Franklin Enders University Professor, Chair, Department of Systems Biology, Harvard Medical School
MICHAEL LAUER, Director, Office of Extramural Research, National Institutes of Health
ALAN LESHNER, CEO Emeritus, American Association for the Advancement of Science
KAY LUND, Director of the Division of Biomedical Research Workforce, Office of Extramural Research, National Institutes of Health
TERRY MAGNUSON, Vice Chancellor for Research, University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill
SEAN MCCONNELL, Postdoctoral Scholar, University of Chicago
PAUL MCGONIGLE, Director, Interdisciplinary & Career-Oriented Programs, Co-Director, Drug Discovery & Development Program, Drexel University
JIM MULLEN, CEO, Patheon
MARINA RAMON, Board of Directors, National Postdoctoral Association
MICHAEL RICHEY, Associate Technical Fellow, Learning Sciences and Engineering Education Research, The Boeing Company
LAWRENCE ROTHBLUM, Chair of the Department of Cell Biology, University of Oklahoma, President, Association of Anatomy, Cell Biology and Neurobiology Chairpersons
NANCY SCHWARTZ, Professor, Department of Biomedical Sciences, University of Chicago
SHIRLEY TILGHMAN, President of the University, Emeritus, Professor of Molecular Biology and Public Affairs, Princeton University
DANIEL WILSON, Research Advisor, Economic Research Department, Federal Reserve Bank of San Francisco
ACKNOWLEDGMENT OF REVIEWERS
This Consensus Study Report was reviewed in draft form by individuals chosen for their diverse perspectives and technical expertise. The purpose of this independent review is to provide candid and critical comments that will assist the National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine in making its published report as sound as possible and to ensure that the report meets institutional standards for objectivity, evidence, and responsiveness to the study charge. The review comments and draft manuscript remain confidential to protect the integrity of the process.
We wish to thank the following individuals for their review of this report: Bruce Alberts, University of California, San Francisco; Georges Benjamin, American Public Health Association; Sherilynn Black, Duke University; Gregory Burke, Wake Forest University; John Burris, Burroughs Wellcome Fund; Deborah Dunsire, Xtuit Pharmaceuticals; Samantha Hindle, University of California, San Francisco; Timothy Ley, Washington University, St. Louis; Ross McKinney, Association of American Medical Colleges; Christopher Pickett, Rescuing Biomedical Research; Therese Richmond, University of Pennsylvania; Sally Rockey, Foundation for Food and Agriculture Research; Lawrence Rothblum, University of Oklahoma; Henry Sauermann, European School of Management and Technology, Berlin; Geoffrey Smith, Digitalis Ventures; and Wayne Yokoyama, Washington University, St. Louis.
Although the reviewers listed above have provided many constructive comments and suggestions, they were not asked to endorse the conclusions or recommendations, nor did they see the final draft of the report before its release. The review of this report was overseen by Olufunmilayo (Funmi) Olopade, University of Chicago and Charles Phelps, University of Rochester. They were responsible for making certain that an independent examination of this report was carried out in accordance with the standards of the National Academies and that all review comments were carefully considered. Responsibility for the final content rests entirely with the authoring committee and the National Academies.
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Contents
2 THE LANDSCAPE FOR THE NEXT GENERATION OF RESEARCHERS
Doctoral and Medical Training in Biomedical Research
The Postdoctoral Research Experience
Transition to Independent Research Postitions
Funding for an Independent Research Career
Other Challenges in Pursuing Research Careers
4 TRANSITIONING TO INDEPENDENCE
Training and Support for All Postdoctoral Researchers
Optimizing the Duration and Support Mechanisms for Postdoctoral Training
Create Opportunities for Entrepreneurial Activity
5 BUILDING A BETTER ECOSYSTEM FOR INDEPENDENCE
6 EXPERIMENTATION AND INNOVATION
7 FINAL THOUGHTS AND SUMMARY OF RECOMMENDATIONS BY ACTOR
The Recommendations—By Stakeholder
A Definitions Used in the Report
B Responses to Recommendations in Previous Reports on Biomedical and Behavioral Researchers
Boxes and Figures
BOXES
2-1 Postdoctoral Researcher: 2018 Definitions and Characterizations
FIGURES
2-2 Proportion of NIH research project grant direct cost dollars awarded by age group
2-3 NIH appropriations in current and constant dollars, 1995-2017
2-4 Success rates for competing type 1 R01 success rates for new and established investigators
2-5 Individual applicants, awardees, and funding rates of NIH research project grants
2-6 Number of investigators supported by NIH R01-equivalent awards by career stage
2-7 Age at first-R01 equivalent by degree type
2-8 Years to first R01-equivalent award since last degree award
2-9 Average age over time to first R01, new (type 1) second R01, and renewal (type 2) second R01
2-11 First competing research project grant award received by investigators
2-12 Academic science and engineering research and development expenditures, by source of funding
2-13 Dropout of first-time R01-funded NIH investigators
B-2 Trends in F32 awards: The success rate for F32 applications by degree between 2011 and 2016
B-5 Trends in T32 awards: Number of awards between 2007 and 2016
B-7 Survey of health benefits for postdoctoral researchers
B-8 Success rates for new (type1) R01-equivalent grants, by career stage of investigator
Acronyms and Abbreviations
AAAS | American Association for the Advancement of Science |
AAMC | Association of American Medical Colleges |
AAU | Association of American Universities |
ACD | Advisory Committee to the NIH Director |
AMGDB | Association of Medical and Graduate Departments of Biochemistry |
ARRA | American Recovery Reinvestment Act |
ASBMB | American Society for Biochemistry and Molecular Biology |
ASCB | American Society for Cell Biology |
B.A. | Bachelor of Arts |
BEST | Broadening Experiences in Scientific Training |
BHEW | Board on Higher Education and Workforce |
BLS | Bureau of Labor Statistics |
BRAINS | Biobehavioral Research Awards for Innovative New Scientists |
BRAINS | Brain Research through Advancing Innovative Neurotechnologies |
BRAINS | Broadening the Representation of Academic Investigators in Neuroscience |
BREC | Biomedical Research Enterprise Council |
B.S. | Bachelor of Science |
BUILD | Building Infrastructure Leading to Diversity |
CEC | Coordination and Evaluation Center |
CFR | Code of Federal Regulations |
CGS | Council of Graduate Schools |
COMPASS | Committee for Postdocs and Students |
COSEMPUP | Committee for Science, Engineering, Medicine, and Public Policy |
COSWD | Chief Officer for Scientific Workforce Diversity |
CPI | Consumer Price Index |
CSR | Center for Scientific Review |
CTSA | Clinical Translational Science Awards |
DICP | Harvard Medical School’s Office for Diversity Inclusion and Community Partnership |
DLR | Division of Loan Repayment at NIH |
DPC | NIH Diversity Program Consortium |
EEI | Early Established Investigator |
ESI | Early-Stage Investigator |
FASEB | Federation of Societies for Experimental Biology |
FLSA | Fair Labor Standards Act |
FRLC | Future Research Leaders Conference |
FY | Fiscal Year |
HHMI | Howard Hughes Medical Institute |
HHS | U.S. Department of Health and Human Services |
HMS | Harvard Medical School |
ICs | Institutes and Centers |
IDP | Individual Development Plan |
IPUMS | Integrated Public Use Microdata Series |
IRACDA | Institutional Research and Academic Career Development Award |
IRIS | Institute for Research on Innovation and Science |
LPR | Loan Repayment Program |
LRP | Loan Repayment Award |
MARC/RISE | Maximizing Access to Research Careers (MARC) and Research Initiative for Scientific Enhancement |
M.B.A. | Master’s of Business Administration |
M.D. | Medical Doctorate |
MERIT | Method to Extend Research in Time |
MIRA | Maximizing Investigators’ Research Award |
MIT | Massachusetts Institute of Technology |
M.S. | Master of Science |
NAS | National Academy of Sciences |
NCI | National Cancer Institute |
NEI | National Eye Institute |
NGRI | Next Generation Researchers Initiative |
NGRI-DS | Next Generation Researchers Initiative Diversity Supplements |
NHLBI | National Heart, Lung, and Blood Institute |
NIAID | National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases |
NIBIB | National Institute of Biomedical Imaging and Engineering |
NIDCR | National Institute of Dental and Craniofacial Research |
NIDDK | National Institute of Diabetes and Digestive and Kidney Diseases |
NIGMS | National Institute of General Medical Sciences |
NIH | National Institutes of Health |
NIMH | National Institute of Mental Health |
NINDS | National Institute for Neurological Disorders and Stroke |
NPA | National Postdoctoral Association |
NRC | National Research Council |
NRMN | National Research Mentoring Network |
NRSA | Ruth L. Kirschstein National Research Service Award |
NSCG | National Survey of College Graduates |
NSERC | National Science and Engineering Research Council |
NSF | National Science Foundation |
NSF ADVANCE | National Science Foundation Increasing the Participation and Advancement of Women in Academic Science and Engineering Careers |
NSF GRP | National Science Foundation Graduate Research Program |
NSRCG | National Survey of Recent College Graduates |
ORCID | Open Researcher and Contributor Identification |
PD/PI | Program Director/Principal Investigator |
Ph.D. | Doctorate of Philosophy |
PI | Principle Investigator |
R&D | Research and Development |
RBR | Rescuing Biomedical Research |
RPG | Research Project Grant |
RPPR | Research Performance Progress Report |
S&E | Science and Engineering |
SACNAS | Society for the Advancement of Chicanos/Hispanics and Native Americans in Science |
SBIR | Small Business Innovation Research |
SDR | Survey on Doctoral Recipients |
STEM | Science, Technology, Engineering, and Mathematics |
STTR | Small Business Technology Transfer |
SWD | Scientific Workforce Diversity |
UCSF | University of California, San Francisco |
UIDP | University Industry Demonstration Partnership |
UMBC | University of Maryland Baltimore County |
URM | Underrepresented Minority |