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The Member Magazine of the American Society for Biochemistry and Molecular Biology CONTENTS Vol. 13 / No. 3 / March 2014 THE MEMBER MAGAZINE OF THE AMERICAN SOCIETY FOR BIOCHEMISTRY AND MOLECULAR BIOLOGY CONTENTS NEWS FEATURES PERSPECTIVES 2 24 35 PRESIDENT’S MESSAGE WHY SO BLUE? ESSAY e impact of the sequester: 1,000 A scientic look at seasonal An open letter to my younger self, an fewer funded investigators aective disorder aspiring graduate student in the sciences 5 28 37 NEWS FROM THE HILL Q&A WITH JONATHAN WEISSMAN OUTREACH When agreement isn’t enough Annual meeting plenary speaker Teaching science and social justice 6 32 40 MEMBER UPDATE MEET JOHN DENU A new associate editor of the OPEN CHANNELS 7 Journal of Biological Chemistry Reader comments JOURNAL NEWS • Effects of follistatin on brown fat 13 • Channeling pain 8 • A broader look at the proteins involved in learning and memory 10 LIPID NEWS Identication of ceramide-1-phosphate transport proteins 13 NEWS 37 NSF funds $25 million center for X-ray bioimaging 14 ANNUAL AWARDS 24 14 In our cover story, contributor Diedre Ribbens explores what we know about the underpinnings of seasonal aective disorder. MARCH 2014 ASBMB TODAY 1 PRESIDENT’S MESSAGE $1.2 billion (compared with the $1.5 show any R funding in FY13. Given the sequester may have resulted in the billion cut across the entire NIH that there have been about 180 K99/ loss of about 200 new investigators THE MEMBER MAGAZINE OF THE AMERICAN SOCIETY appropriation and $1 billion for all R00 awards per year, this indicates who normally would have received FOR BIOCHEMISTRY AND MOLECULAR BIOLOGY The impact of research project grants). is drop that more than half of the K99/R00 their rst major NIH funding and has two components: e number of awardees are not transitioning to may have interrupted funding for OFFICERS COUNCIL MEMBERS investigators decreased by 1,001, or other R funding, at least in the rst more than 400 more established Jeremy M. Berg Squire J. Booker the sequester: 3.8 percent, and the average fund- year after the completion of their investigators. President Brenda Schulman ing per investigator dropped by 5 R00 awards. Steven McKnight David Sabatini President-Elect Melissa Starovasnik percent. • Nearly 900 investigators had R series versus Karen Allen Wesley I. Sundquist 1,000 fewer funded R21 funding in FY12 but did not research project grants Secretary Gregory Gatto Jr. Year-to-year dynamics show any R funding in FY13. Given Toni Antalis Natalie Ahn that there have been about 1,800 R21 In her post, Rockey notes that the Treasurer Anjana Rao of the investigator pool awards per year, this indicates that total funding for all research proj- Daniel Leahy investigators ese trends can be analyzed further about half of the R21 awardees are ect grants, or RPGs, dropped from EX-OFFICIO MEMBERS by examining the dynamics of inves- not transitioning to other R funding $15.92 billion in FY12 to $14.92 Geeta Narlikar ASBMB TODAY By Jeremy Berg Enrique de la Cruz EDITORIAL ADVISORY tigators into and out of the system as in the next year. billion in FY13, a decrease of 6.3 Co-chairs, 2014 Annual shown in the gure. What about the more than 600 percent. e total funding going to Meeting Program BOARD Committee Charlie Brenner Of the 26,513 investigators investigators who would have been the R series awards that I examined Chair Peter J. Kennelly he Rock Talk blog recently fea- I analyzed data from NIH funded by these mechanisms in expected to be funded without the (which makes up about 85 percent Chair, Education and Carol Shoulders tured a post titled “FY2013 by RePORTER for R-series grants (2). FY11, 5,287 were no longer funded sequester but who weren’t funded? Of of the RPG pool) dropped by 8.9 Shiladitya Sengupta Professional Development the numbers: research applica- ese included all funding mecha- by these mechanisms in FY12. How- course, we do not know who these percent. Committee Yolanda Sanchez T Daniel Raben Floyd “Ski” Chilton tions, funding and awards” (1) in nisms from R01s to R56s (including ever, 5,136 investigators who were investigators are. However, based What accounts for this dierence? Chair, Meetings Committee Cristy Gelling which National Institutes of Health SBIR and STTR, or R41 to R44, not funded in FY11 were awarded on the data recently posted on Rock U01 awards comprise the largest Fred Maxeld Peter J. Kennelly Deputy Director for Extramural grants) but excluded R13 (confer- grants in FY12, with the dierence Talk, we can estimate that about remaining portion of the RPG pool Chair, Mentorship Committee Michael Bradley Research Sally Rockey noted that the ence awards) for FY11, FY12 and accounting for the small decrease 50,000 investigators competed for (4). ese are cooperative agreements Takita Felder Sumter Rajini Rao number of competing R01 awards of 151 investigators. e number these mechanisms in FY13. rather than grants for which NIH Chair, Minority Aairs FY13. Data for other mechanisms, dropped from 5,436 in scal year of investigators for whom funding Also, based on previous years (3), sta members are involved in guiding Committee ASBMB TODAY such as P01s, DP1s (Pioneer awards) 2012 to 4,902 in FY13 and that the omas Baldwin Angela Hopp and larger mechanisms, were not ended and was not renewed in FY12 we can reason that about 30 per- the research. e funds devoted to Chair, Outreach Committee Editor, [email protected] number of competing R21 awards fell included. grew by 219 to 5,506. More strik- cent of those who would have been U01 awards remained essentially con- Bob Matthews Rajendrani Mukhopadhyay from 1,932 to 1,771. ese results For each year, data for about ingly, the number of investigators funded without the sequester would stant from FY12 to FY13 at $1.57 Chair, Public Affairs Sr. Science Writer, reect the impact of the sequester, 35,000 awards were downloaded. who were not funded in FY12 but have been new investigators. us, billion. Advisory Committee [email protected] which resulted in a $1.5 billion, or who were awarded grants in FY13 Jerey Benovic Marnay Harris e number of awards is made up of Chair, Publications Designer, [email protected] 5 percent, decrease in the NIH about 75 percent R01s, 10 percent dropped by more than 600 to 4,505, Committee Characteristics of funding through R mechanisms Andrew Harmon appropriation. R21s, 5 percent SBIR/STTR awards a decrease of more than 12 percent Martha J. Fedor Science and Technology While these data capture one and all research project grants (RPGs) for FY11 through FY13 Editor-in-chief, JBC and 10 percent other mechanisms, from the previous year. Publishing Manager, important aspect of the sequester’s Herbert Tabor [email protected] with R01s accounting for approxi- impact, they do not reect a more Co-editor, JBC Nancy J. Rodnan mately 80 percent of the funds. e Who are the unfunded FY11 FY12 FY13 Sources A. L. Burlingame Director of Publications, integrated evaluation of the eect on awards for each investigator were Editor, MCP [email protected] investigators? investigators. As I detail below, such aggregated for each year. Some of the Total funding for R mechanisms $13.38B $13.51B $12.31B This study Edward A. Dennis Barbara Gordon an evaluation reveals that the number key parameters from this analysis, Examination of the parameters for Joseph L. Witztum Executive Director, Number of investigators with R [email protected] of funded investigators dropped by the applicants who received funding 26,513 26,362 Co-editors, JLR together with those reported on Rock funding 25,361 This study about 1,000 from FY12 to FY13, Talk, are summarized in the table. in FY12 but not in FY13 revealed the substantially more than the drop of Average R mechanism funding Examination of these data reveals following: $505K $512K $486K This study 150 from FY11 to FY12. Given the per investigator that from FY11 to FY12 the total • More than 2,900 investigators investments these investigators and Total funding for all research amount of funding going to the of the 5,506 who lost R funding had $15.82B $15.92B $14.92B (1) and (2) society have made in developing their project grants (RPGs) For information on advertising, contact Fox Associates Inc. R mechanisms increased slightly R01 grants in FY12. e median scientic skills, these data provide a Average size of a research project at 800-440-0231 or [email protected]. while the number of investigators duration of these R01 grants was ve $450K $455K $441K (1) and (2) quantitative measure of the inecien- grant decreased by 151, resulting in a slight years, with more than 750 having cies created by erratic support for increase in the average funding per durations of eight years or more and Number of research project grants 35,173 35,029 33,796 (1) and (2) biomedical research. investigator. with more than 180 with durations www.asbmb.org/asbmbtoday of 20 years or more. Examining R grants held In contrast, from FY12 to FY13 SOURCES: 1. HTTP://1.USA.GOV/1HT40KY 2. HTTP://1.USA.GOV/1ET5MQQ the total amount of funding going • More than 110 investigators had CONTINUED ON PAGE 4 by each investigator to these mechanisms decreased by R00 funding in FY12 but did not 2 ASBMB TODAY MARCH 2014 MARCH 2014 ASBMB TODAY 3 NEWS FROM THE HILL INVESTIGATOR POOL DYMANICS When agreement isn’t enough now unfunded now unfunded investigators 5,287 investigators 5,506 By Benjamin Corb 5,136 newly funded newly funded he U.S. Congress is now enter- was championed successfully by con- grams, such as the nonprot Planned investigators investigators 4,505 ing appropriations season — servative House members.
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