Current Status of the Budget for the NSF

Other Issues Relevant to Instrumentation

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The President's FY'00 budget for the NSF requests an increase of 5.8% overall. For the line item "Research and Research Related Activities", the requested budget is up 6.9%, while the budget for Major Research Instrumentation (MRI) remained constant at $50 million. Last fiscal year (FY '99) over 1/3 of the MRI budget went to support microscopy or microscopy related proposals. According to the NSF's budget systems office, in FY '99 the NSF spent about $250 Million on instrumentation in all categories.

The MRI budget has been relatively constant over the past few years. One of the items of concern is the lack of enough first rate proposals for instrument development. We would encourage members to consider applications for funds from this program, since only when demand increases dramatically can we hope to increase that budget.

In addition, the buzz word in Washington is "nanotechnology". It is one of eleven priority areas listed by the Administration as strategic and one of the priority new technologies for the 21st century. There is $90 Million in the President's budget for the NSF in FY '00, a significant increase over FY '99. In addition there is a proposal before Congress to double the annual budget in this field, which in FY'99 was $232 Million for all federal agencies. Given the need in this area for characterization at the nanometer scale, it is expected that a reasonable fraction of this money will go for microscopy, microananlysis and related instrumentation.

You can help by writing your local congressperson to tell them (in simple language ) on the importance of instrumentation in what you do.