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The SSTI Weekly Digest will take its annual spring vacation next week. Publication of the Digest and Funding Supplement will resume with the April 18 issue.

On the final day of March, Gov. Brad Henry signed legislation establishing a $475 million bond issue for a slate of higher education projects, much of which targets research and laboratory facilities. The Oklahoma Higher Education Promise of Excellence Act of 2005, which the governor called "desperately needed," was one of his top legislative priorities for the year (see the Feb. 7, 2005, issue of the Digest).

The U.S. Department of Commerce announced Friday that President Bush intends to nominate David Sampson as Deputy Secretary for the agency. If confirmed, Dr. Sampson will succeed Theodore Kassinger, who will resign effective April 30, 2005.

Prior to becoming Deputy Secretary, Mr. Kassinger served as General Counsel from 2001 to 2004. Mr. Kassinger has served as Deputy Secretary since July 2004.

The results of Tuesday's primary election in Maine reveal the state's voters continue to be committed to improving their economy through technology-based economic development. Winning approval at the ballot was Question 2, allocating $35 million in bond revenues for 11 specific projects - a majority of which were tied directly to research and technology-based economic development.

The Illinois General Assembly has passed legislation to encourage venture capital investment in technology businesses across the state. HB3212 creates the Technology Development Fund, which permits the State Treasurer to use up to 1 percent of the state's total investment portfolio for equity investments through Illinois venture capital firms.

Canada already has seen its number of biotech firms grow from 227 in 1997 to 400 in 2000, second only to the U.S. in biotech concentration. Last week's announcement of a $51 million (Canadian) biotechnology strategy is intended to further strengthen the Ontario's position in health research and commercialization.

Nine metropolitan areas have been identified as the nation's possessing the greatest concentration of the U.S. biotechnology industry in a new Brookings Institution report entitled Signs of Life: The Growth of Biotechnology Centers in the U.S.

Few private foundations across the country have made a comparable commitment in size or duration toward improving a single state's ability to participate in a knowledge-based economy as the Lilly Foundation has for Indiana. The latest round, reported in this week's online Chronicle of Higher Education, promises a total of $138 million to match donations received by Indiana's accredited colleges and universities.

One of the most widely used barometers of states' relative positions in technology-based economies has been updated and expanded. The 2002 State New Economy Index: Benchmarking Economic Transformation in the States, published by the Progressive Policy Institute's Technology and New Economy Project (PPI) and released online this week, offers an innovation-oriented public policy framework for the states to foster success in the New Economy.

Nearly every university and community seeks to cultivate a niche in new technologies ­ nurturing venture capital, technology transfer and knowledge networks. Many policies have focused on biotechnology as the kernel of future economic development. Meanwhile, budding nanotechnology has started to show its first blooms in the commercial sector.

To encourage investment in high tech companies, the Hawaii Senate recently passed Senate Bill 1695, authorizing $120 million for the State Private Investment Fund (SPIF) and Senate Bill 1696 to allow fiduciaries to make equity investments.

Arizona must begin viewing medical and educational institutions as a major economic driver of the state economy in order to become a leader in the biosciences industry, according to a new report from the Arizona Board of Regents.

While some regional assessments attempt to benchmark economic indicators of smaller regions to those of notable accomplishment such as Silicon Valley or Research Triangle Park, a new study from the Center for Regional Strategies at Virginia Tech compares regions with similar economic and demographic characteristics, a potentially more useful model for other metro areas.

The National Science Foundation (NSF) has released Graduate Students and Postdoctorates in Science and Engineering: Fall 2002, a collection of 54 statistical tables presenting the distribution of graduate students in science and engineering (S&E) across population segments, fields of science or engineering, and by college and state. Overall long-term trends for S&E graduate students from 1975 to 2002 and short-term trends from 1995 to 2002 by detailed fields are presented as well.

Jerry Lonergan, president of Kansas, Inc., is resigning effective April 1. A bill to dissolve the state's policy and planning organization passed the Kansas Senate last week.

The U.S. Department of Education's National Center for Education Statistics (NCES) has released its annual progress report on education, The Condition of Education 2002, presenting 44 indicators on the conditions and trends in elementary, secondary and postsecondary education. In one of two special analyses, the report focuses on the experience of nontraditional college students, who comprise the majority of college students today.

Besides supporting life science research in universities, one of the other key areas states and communities are using to encourage the growth of a local biotech industry is by supporting an increase in the availability of wet lab and other biotech facilities. Biotech space, however, is extremely expensive compared to other traditional tech incubator facilities for a variety of reasons (design, HVAC, environmental, security, regulatory, etc.)

Christmas or Hanukkah for state coffers usually comes in April as taxpayers rush to meet the deadline for filing personal tax returns. Unfortunately, according to the latest survey released by the National Conference of State Legislatures this week, State Fiscal Update-June 2002, states collected $8.6 billion less in individual tax collections this April than a year ago. Much of the drop — 21 percent overall — came in final income tax payments, which fell nearly 29 percent compared to last year.

Comprising a majority of the U.S. workforce, women make up only 8.5 percent of the nation's engineers. A number of programs have been launched over the past decade to recruit more women into the field, and while women now represent 20 percent of all engineering students, women remain more likely than men to switch out of the field, particularly in the first two years of college, concludes a recently released study.

The National Science Foundation has released Graduate Students and Postdoctorates in Science and Engineering: Fall 2000, a collection of 54 detailed statistical tables present the distribution of graduate students in science and engineering (S&E) across population segments, fields of science or engineering and by college and state.

Economic downturns have a way of encouraging states, universities and communities to assess, refine and re-invigorate their strategies to promote growth and prosperity. The current recession is no exception. With the widely recognized roles played by science and technology in economic success, the news of changes and additions to tech-based economic development strategies from across the country is not too surprising. Here are some recent highlights:

The fate of the Advanced Technology Program and the Administration's entire reorganization of federal economic development efforts also took hits, as parts of a series of Congressional votes on the budget. However, these votes are only the first step in a along budget process.

Senate Saves CDBG with Coleman Amendment

With Opening Day less than two weeks away, a baseball analogy is only fitting to suggest NIST's Advanced Technology Program (ATP) is in for a long season. Since 1990, ATP has provided early-stage funding for 768 projects to accelerate the development of innovative technologies that promise significant commercial payoffs and widespread benefits.

Sometimes a little money is all that may be required to discover that an innovation in the lab is worth millions in the marketplace. At least that's the goal of a small grant program launched this afternoon by the Massachusetts Technology Transfer Center (MTTC). The MTTC Tech Commercialization Awards will provide $5,000 mini-grants for technology assessments and investigations by academic and industrial researchers within the Commonwealth.

As trends in federal funding priorities shift from domestic R&D to defense-related R&D, universities are scrambling to get their piece of the pie. The president's fiscal year 2006 budget request for the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) includes increased funding of 6.6 percent over the fiscal year 2005 appropriation (see the Feb. 14 issue of the Digest).