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University R&D Funding Sources Shift While Overall Level Grows

November 30, 2016
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University research and development expenditures reached $68.8 billion in FY 2015, an increase of 2.2 percent from FY 2014, according to recently released data from the Higher Education Research and Development (HERD) Survey by the National Center for Science and Engineering Statistics within the National Science Foundation.  While the bulk of the funding (55.2 percent of total R&D expenditures) comes from federal expenditures, in current dollars, federally funded R&D at universities dropped 0.2 percent from $37.96 billion to $37.88 billion in FY 2015.  Meanwhile, nonfederal R&D expenditures accounted for 44.8 percent of the total in FY 2015 compared to 43.5 percent in FY 2014 growing from $29.24 billion in FY 2014 to $30.79 billion in FY 2015. The greatest increase came from the business community (which increased their funding by 7.5 percent to top $4 billion for the first time), followed by nonprofit organizations and institution funds. Universities’ own funding of R&D comprises the largest source of non-federal R&D funding, or $16.7 billion in FY 2015.

Medical sciences ($21.3 billion), biological sciences ($11.7 billion) and engineering ($11.1 billion) account for the lion’s share (64.3 percent) of the total spent in FY 2015, with medical sciences showing the highest percentage of growth (3.1 percent increase) over the previous year.

The top 30 institutions in R&D funding remained nearly the same as the previous year, with only four reporting declines compared to 12 in FY 2014. Together, the top 30 institutions accounted for 41.3 percent of the total spent on R&D within the higher education sector in 2015.

 

Higher education R&D expenditures, ranked by FY 2015 R&D expenditures:

FYs 2013–15
(Millions of current dollars)

 

Rank

Institution

2013

2014

2015

% change
2014–15
 

All institutions

67,013

67,200

68,668

2.2
 

Leading 30 institutions in FY 2015

27,504

27,651

28,391

2.7

1

Johns Hopkins U.a

2,169

2,242

2,306

2.9

2

U. Michigan, Ann Arbor

1,375

1,349

1,369

1.5

3

U. Washington, Seattle

1,193

1,176

1,181

0.4

4

U. California, San Francisco

1,043

1,084

1,127

4.0

5

U. California, San Diego

1,076

1,067

1,101

3.2

6

U. Wisconsin-Madison

1,124

1,109

1,069

-3.6

7

Duke U.

993

1,037

1,037

0.0

8

Stanford U.

945

959

1,023

6.7

9

U. California, Los Angeles

967

948

1,021

7.7

10

Harvard U.

1,013

934

1,014

8.6

11

U. North Carolina, Chapel Hill

973

990

967

-2.3

12

Cornell U.

845

883

954

8.0

13

Massachusetts Institute of Technology

901

908

931

2.5

14

U. Minnesota, Twin Cities

858

877

881

0.5

15

Columbia U. in the City of New York

889

891

868

-2.6

16

Texas A&M U., College Station and Health Science Center

820

854

867

1.5

17

U. Pennsylvania

828

828

864

4.3

18

U. Pittsburgh, Pittsburgh

873

857

861

0.5

19

U. Texas M

718

795

833

4.8

20

Ohio State U.

793

815

818

0.4

21

Yale U.

789

773

803

3.9

22

Pennsylvania State U., University Park and Hershey Medical Center

838

801

791

-1.2

23

U. California, Berkeley

727

744

789

6.0

24

Georgia Institute of Technology

730

726

765

5.4

25

U. Florida

695

709

740

4.4

26

U. California, Davis

726

712

721

1.3

27

Washington U., Saint Louis

685

665

694

4.4

28

U. Southern California

646

687

691

0.6

29

Northwestern U.

640

645

656

1.7

30

U. Texas, Austin

634

585

651

11.3
           

 

 

 

 

 

 

aJohns Hopkins University includes Applied Physics Laboratory, with $1,328 million in total R&D expenditures in FY 2015.

NOTES: Because of rounding, detail may not add to total. Institutions ranked are geographically separate campuses headed by a campus-level president or chancellor.

SOURCES: National Science Foundation, National Center for Science and Engineering Statistics, Higher Education Research and Development Survey.

(Source National Science Foundation https://www.nsf.gov/statistics/2017/nsf17303/)

Find the date for all 640 institutions, ranked by all R&D expenditures and by source of funds here.

SSTI will be exploring the data in more depth in coming weeks.  Check back with the Digest for future stories.