SSTI Digest

Leadership in Congress has developed a plan to move all the FY 2026 budget appropriations bills before the end of the month. First up in a “compromise” package that includes, among other agencies, appropriations for the Departments of Commerce, NASA and the National Science Foundation. 1/8/26 UPDATE: The House passed the package on the afternoon of Jan 8. Instructions accompanying the bill provide insights into how Congress would like to see the agencies use the funding. Selected highlights for the TBED community are provided below.

The new year begins with a layer of both fiscal and political uncertainty. For at least 18 states, it will be a year of change in political leadership. After several years of continuous revenue growth, states are crafting their Fiscal Year (FY) 2027 budgets amid slower growth, rising costs, and heightened unease. At the same time, the 2026 gubernatorial campaign season also begins in earnest. More than three dozen governorships are on the November ballot, and at least 18 states (see map below) expect to elect a new governor due to an incumbent either being term-limited or choosing not to run for re-election.

The Maine Technology Institute’s core mission is to use innovation to spur the development of new products, processes, and companies that strengthen the state’s economy. Finishing its 25th year of operations, MTI solidly illustrates how a sustained, focused yet flexible and creative strategy can deliver this mission. MTI has disbursed $387 million across 4,350 distinct projects throughout Maine since its founding, and that funding has leveraged over $2.2 billion in private sector matching investment.

State R&D incentive programs such as tax credits are widely used to stimulate innovation, attract investment, and support long-term economic growth. But how do we know which programs truly increase R&D activity rather than simply subsidizing what companies would have done anyway? A recent article by Elizabeth Gray and Alison Wakefield of The Pew Charitable Trusts discusses the role that rigorous evaluation plays in assessing program performance, refining incentive design, and informing better policy decisions.

Higher Education R&D expenditures jumped 8%, or nearly $9 billion, from fiscal year (FY) 2023 to 2024, reaching an all-time high of over $117 billion, reveals new Higher Education R&D (HERD) survey data. The funding sources of HERD expenditures remain proportionally unchanged from the prior year, with all sources increasing, and the federal government ($5 billion) and institution funds ($2.5 billion) accounting for the largest dollar increases.

Adjusted for inflation, overall HERD expenditures increased by 5%—the second largest year-over-year increase in the past decade—while all sources of funds except business increased.

The proposed Biomanufacturing Excellence Act of 2025 would establish a single National Biopharmaceutical Manufacturing Center of Excellence within the U.S. Department of Commerce’s National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST). H.R. 6089 was introduced by Rep. Chrissy Houlahan (D-PA) with bipartisan cosponsors and paired with a Senate companion bill (S. 3188) led by Senators Chris Coons (D-DE) and Ted Budd (R-NC). It authorizes $120 million in FY 2026 for NIST to conduct a competitive process to select one non-federal entity to build and operate the center. Eligible applicants include public-private partnerships, institutions of higher education, and multi-institution consortia. Because only a single awardee will be chosen, the proposed legislation likely sets up what is likely to be a stiff competition among many states which have made life sciences and manufacturing key elements of their innovation strategies.

Serious birdwatchers know one finds the most variety in species where habitats collide, on the edges of domains. This also holds true for innovation, discovery, and scientific disciplines. Recent research shows that institutions that support interdisciplinary teams with strategic investments, institutional alignment, and collaborative ecosystems are more likely to create innovations that lead to patents, products, and companies.

Long-time readers may recall the SSTI Weekly Digest article included in its May 30, 2005, edition, two decades ago, titled "China's Goal: Quadruple 2000 GDP by 2020." China made it by the way, growing 428 percent from 2000 to 2020, measured with purchasing power parity (PPP) in constant 2021 international dollars. The United States, for comparison, grew only 44 percent in the same period and has trailed China in GDP PPP on the international scale ever since sometime in 2021. As the chart using Word Bank data shows below, China has never looked back.

Canada's Prime Minister Mark Carney released his first federal budget on Nov. 4. The budget signaled the nation's commitment to research and innovation, while also revealing its readiness to meet the challenges of U.S. trade policies to Canada’s potential benefit. Research and innovation play key roles in its plans.

A recent executive order from the White House establishes a “Genesis Mission” that aims to “mobilize the Department of Energy’s 17 National Laboratories, industry, and academia to build an integrated discovery platform,” according to a press release from the U.S. Department of Energy. The announcement builds on President Trump’s executive order, Removing Barriers to American Leadership In Artificial Intelligence, and his America’s AI Action Plan, released earlier this year. 

When Daniel Pelaez took a job with the Town of Southbury, Connecticut Public Works Department after his first year at Worcester Polytechnic Institute, he learned lessons that, a few years later, would become the basis for his startup, Cyvl. Daniel spent a season on the public works road crew fixing issues flagged by residents or found by the road foreman. He asked the public works director how they kept track of road conditions, and the director explained that they conventionally paid civil engineering consultants to capture the data by hand by walking and driving the streets with clipboards.

States invest heavily in academic research with the expectation that these efforts will advance scientific knowledge, support innovative industries, and strengthen local talent pipelines. Comparing research performance across state lines is difficult due to differences in academic landscapes: some may have large medical schools with high-cost labs, while others have research-active public universities in lower-cost fields or are more pedagogically focused. Article output is one way of measuring academic research. This edition of Useful Stats standardizes science and engineering (S&E) article output for peer-reviewed documents (e.g., articles, reviews, and conference proceedings) published in refereed scientific journals at the state level by two complementary numerators. These numerators showcase different facets of academic research productivity: output per million dollars of academic S&E R&D spending, and per 1,000 science, engineering, and health (SEH) doctorate holders employed in academia. Although similar, each highlights a distinct part of the research ecosystem, with one reflecting the intensity of research spending and the other the publishing activity of academic researchers themselves.