Assessing the U.S. research picture

The National Science Board has released its 2008 Science and Engineering Indicators report and it looks like the U.S. has some work to do.

According to a Computing Research Policy Blog review of the report,  Asia is drawing away science and engineeering activities from the U.S., the feds are leaving two thirds of U.S. R&D funding to industry and 40% of the public thinks there is not enough federal funding of basic research. On the bright side, most foreign-born Ph.D. candidates in the U.S. plan to stay here and the U.S. is maintaining its share of high tech manufacturing.

The board made three broad recommendations:

* The feds need to step up their level of funding for basic research

* Industry and academia need to communicate better

* The government needs to get a handle on what the globalization of tech research means to the U.S.

Here's a summary of the indicators from the NSF and a link to the looong report itself.

• basic research
• National Science Board
• NSF
• R&D