Value of Fundamental Research
Fundamental research, supported by the federal government, underpins U.S. S&T innovation and contributes to the nation’s security, economic prosperity, and health.
Value of an Open System
The U.S. research enterprise is built on the core value of open scientific exchange. Science thrives when scientists and engineers are able to work across borders to train, collaborate, and share knowledge.
Risks of an Open System
An open research environment introduces the risk that knowledge, know-how, or research results may flow to competitors through the movement of information and people. New and enhanced research security measures have been put in place to protect federally funded academic research.
Balancing Openness and Security
Some research security initiatives, such as the China Initiative launched in 2018, created an unwelcoming atmosphere for foreign talent. It is important to foster open scientific exchange by creating an environment that does not discourage the best and the brightest from participating in the U.S. research enterprise.
Growing Global Competition
Other countries have emulated U.S. success in creating a world-class learning environment by investing in research institutions, developing and attracting talent, and supporting technology development. Maintaining U.S. preeminence in science and technology will require continued U.S. investment.
Workshop Highlights
Assessing Research Security Efforts in Higher Education: Proceedings of a Workshop
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Value of the U.S. Research Enterprise
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Vulnerabilities of the U.S. Research Enterprise
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Progress Has Been Made in Research Security
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Need to Balance Security and Openness
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Need to Measure Impact
BOX 1
Workshop Participants’ Suggestions of Areas for Measures to Assess Research Security Efforts in Higher Education
People and Talent Flows
- Mobility and retention, including people flows between countries and among STEM areas; where principal investigators, postdocs, and graduate students go when funding ends; whether researchers remain in the United States or move abroad
- Demographics and participation, including who is applying for funding (nationality, career stage, discipline) and participation in and withdrawal from foreign talent programs
- Security incidents involving people, including disclosures of affiliations or conflicts of interest, investigations, self-reported concerns, or “near misses”
Research Activity and Behavior
- Proposal and funding trends, including changes in submission rates to federal agencies, shifts in collaboration patterns, and funding streams
- Collaboration dynamics, such as institutional tracking of international engagements, contracts, memoranda of understanding
- Compliance indicators, such as timeliness and accuracy of disclosure forms and number of faculty-initiated consultations
Institutional Practices and Culture
- Training and awareness, including completion rates of security training, culture assessments, and number of queries about research security issues
- Administrative capacity, including staffing levels in research security offices and rates of engagement with faculty or administrators
- Policy integration, such as implementation of risk-tiered frameworks and use of tools like risk matrices, export control flags, and vetting procedures
Outcomes and Impact on Innovation
- Research outputs and spillovers, such as changes in publication rates, citation impacts, and patent filings; migration of research to the private sector or foreign institutions; and research areas where the United States is not in the lead
- Loss prevention and detection, including FBI, DOD, Central Intelligence Agency reports of known leaks, intellectual property theft, or foreign exploitation and faculty reporting suspected knowledge misappropriation
- Innovation health indicators, such as retention of global talent in sensitive fields and comparative metrics versus competitors (e.g., China, European Union)
National Science, Technology, and Security Roundtable Capstone: Proceedings of a Workshop
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Value of the U.S. Research Enterprise
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Threats from a Changing Global Landscape
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Progress In Protecting Research Security
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Next Steps in Balancing Openness and Security
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Call for a Risk-Based Approach to Research Security
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Call for a Whole-of-Nation S&T Vision
Consensus Study Highlights
International Talent Programs in The Changing Global Environment (2024)
This report reviews and compares foreign and domestic talent and incentive programs and recommends ways to improve the effectiveness of U.S. mechanisms for attracting and retaining the best and brightest scholars, relative to programs and incentives used by the U.S.’s strategic competitors.
Key Findings
- While the United States has been the destination of choice for the world’s best and brightest students and scholars since World War II, the market for top scientific talent at all levels has become increasingly competitive.
- Some foreign talent recruitment programs have objectives beyond solely recruiting talent and operate with malign intent.
- The United States also is failing to fully leverage opportunities to develop domestic STEM talent at all educational and career levels, from K–12 through advanced degrees.
- The U.S. immigration system is outmoded and rigid, providing limited and highly unpredictable pathways to permanent residency or citizenship.
- Evidence suggests the benefits posed by foreign talent, open research environments, and international research collaborations and partnerships greatly outweigh the risks
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View Report Recommendations
- RECOMMENDATION 1: The U.S. Government, specifically the Office of Science and Technology Policy (OSTP), should oversee the coordination of a whole-of-government talent strategy including national talent recruitment and retention approaches for international researchers at all levels of experience to be implemented by federal departments and agencies.
- RECOMMENDATION 3: The U.S. Government’s approaches for maximizing talent attraction and research collaboration should address national security concerns and risks present in the geopolitical environment.
- RECOMMENDATION 4: All levels of government— federal, state, local, and tribal—and key parties in the private sector should take a forward-looking, proactive approach to developing the nation’s domestic STEM talent.
- RECOMMENDATION 5: The U.S. Government should build on its relationships with its trusted allies and develop stronger collaborative partnerships to ensure the resilience of international talent capacity in areas of strategic interest.
- RECOMMENDATION 6: To facilitate the development and flow of global talent, ensure the robust exchange of ideas, and support the U.S. innovation ecosystem, the U.S. Government should support universities, foundations, and industry in forging strong international research partnerships and building educational and research capacity, including in low and middle-income countries and less developed countries in the Global South.
- RECOMMENDATION 7: The Legislative Branch should create easily navigable pathways to permanent residency and citizenship for qualified foreign-born STEM talent. As an immediate priority, Congress should empower government agencies to identify critical areas of science, technology, and engineering vital to their mission. Congress should then authorize additional green card numbers for qualified foreign-born experts who work in such areas, subject to normal due diligence. The corresponding legislation should create a new category for permanent residents and should not carry any per-country caps or be subject to existing numerical limitations. Explicit eligibility for international STEM graduates of U.S. institutions should be included.
- RECOMMENDATION 8: The Executive Branch should maximize the use of all existing authorities to retain foreign-born STEM experts who are already in the U.S.
- RECOMMENDATION 9: The U.S. Government, specifically OSTP and the Departments of Commerce, Homeland Security, Justice, and State, should continue to take measures to address lingering chilling effects of the China Initiative and create an attractive and welcoming environment for domestic and international talent of all races and ethnicities. All efforts should be taken to ensure that programs and policies intended to protect critical research from malign foreign influence do not target or inadvertently discriminate against people on the basis of national origin or ethnicity.
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RECOMMENDATION 10: To assist Congress and the White House with developing immigration-related policies that support recruiting and retaining international talent, the U.S. Government should fund a public-facing national dashboard, potentially run by a Federally Funded Research and Development Center, that collects and aggregates information and showcases important metrics on international talent.
Show Details
Some of the important metrics discussed include:
- Lawful permanent residents, whether new arrivals or individuals who adjusted status, to include the highest degree earned, field of study, whether the degree is in STEM, and the country where the highest degree was earned;
- Characteristics of F-1 student visa and J-1 Research Scholar visa denials, including gender, country of birth, age, major field of study, and whether denial was related to financial support or document integrity;
- Funding opportunities from the federal government, state governments, industry, and philanthropy for noncitizen STEM experts; and
- Immediate-term stay rate characteristics of advanced STEM degree holders, identifying how many international students and scholars who obtain a STEM master’s or Ph.D. in the United States or complete a postdoc in the United States, obtain either O-1A, H-1B, or Lawful Permanent Resident status at the three-year mark after expiration of their underlying F-1 or J-1 status, and providing gender, country of birth, age, and major field of study.
- Benchmarking against other countries in the competition for new international students at the master’s and doctoral levels in critical STEM fields.
- RECOMMENDATION 11: Higher education associations, scientific societies, and industry groups and leaders should engage in efforts to educate federal and state policymakers and staff on issues including the importance of foreign talent, the economic competitiveness and national security value of foreign talent, the importance of an open scientific ecosystem, the importance of international research collaborations, the current models for funding research, and current research security issues.
Foreign-Funded Language and Culture Institutes at U.S. Institutions of Higher Education
Foreign-funded language and culture institutes exist on U.S. campuses beyond Confucius Institutes (Chinese government-funded centers established to extend the reach of Chinese language and culture and to enhance worldwide opinion of China through offering classes in Mandarin Chinese). Regardless of the sponsoring nation, foreign-funded language and culture institutes may pose risks for U.S. host institutions regarding academic freedom, freedom of expression, governance, and national security. This report explores the role of other foreign-funded institutes at U.S. institutions of higher education and recommends actions that U.S. colleges and universities can take to minimize risks associated with hosting on or near campus and protect academic freedom and national security.
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View Report Recommendations
- RECOMMENDATION 1: U.S. host institutions should develop and implement appropriate policies, procedures, and processes to identify, address, and mitigate risks associated with foreign-funded language and culture institutes on campus.
- RECOMMENDATION 2: U.S. host institutions should promote a culture that clearly articulates, ensures, and promotes the core values of U.S. higher education, including academic freedom and freedom of expression, among faculty, staff, and students.
- RECOMMENDATION 3: U.S. host institutions should consider the foreign nation they are partnering with, in the event that a partner nation is considered a country of concern. In this case, U.S. host institutions should consider additional vetting to better understand and mitigate possible risks presented by a language and culture institute with ties to such a country.
- RECOMMENDATION 4: U.S. host institutions should bolster the dissemination of information to administrators, faculty, and staff on the process used to initiate and review foreign-funded collaborations.
- RECOMMENDATION 5: Additional research should be conducted in support of developing research security recommendations and implementable practices for institutions that are below the $50 million federal research expenditure threshold and therefore not subject to NSPM-33.
- RECOMMENDATION 6: The U.S. government, led by the Office of Science and Technology Policy and the National Science Foundation, should create or facilitate the creation of a publicly available clearinghouse of research security information and resources that universities can access.
- RECOMMENDATION 7: The U.S. government should develop a harmonized, consistent approach across federal agencies for the reporting of foreign gifts and contracts by U.S. institutions of higher education.
- RECOMMENDATION 8: Higher education accrediting bodies should subject foreign-funded language and culture institutes at U.S. host institutions to review as part of the accreditation process.
Confucius Institutes at U.S. Institutions of Higher Education: Waiver Criteria for the Department of Defense (2023)
More than 100 U.S. institutions of higher education hosted Chinese government-funded language and culture centers called Confucius Institutes (CIs) during the late 2000s and 2010s. CIs funding enabled U.S. colleges and universities to build capacity, programming, and community engagement, but they also posed a legitimate source of risk to host institutions. The National Defense Authorization Act (NDAA) for Fiscal Year 2019 required that DOD issue a waiver in order to support Chinese language study at any school that housed a CI. The new requirements, along with other factors, led to the closing of several CIs. By 2023, only seven CIs remained on U.S. university and college campuses. Produced at the request of DOD, this report presents a set of findings and recommendations regarding DOD waivers.
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View Report Recommendations
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Recommendation 1.1: Granting Waivers
In the absence of any applicable adverse information that cannot be addressed or mitigated through the criteria below or other means, DOD should grant a waiver if an applying institution of higher education meets the stated waiver criteria.
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Recommendation 1.2: Communicating about Waivers
If DOD does not grant any waivers, or decides not to grant a waiver to a specific institution of higher education when other waivers are awarded, it should specify the reason(s) for denial to the extent possible at the unclassified level.
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Recommendation 1.3: Establishing the Waiver Application Process
Outside input is critical to ensure that the waiver application process is free from undue administrative and regulatory burden. In addition to U.S. government input, DOD should solicit external input from key organizations, including industry, higher education associations, and universities.
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Recommendation 2: Waiver Criteria
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U.S. host institutions should demonstrate that the CI is a formally established Center or Institute at the institution, thereby subjecting the CI to all policies and procedures prescribed in faculty, staff, and student codes, as well as in shared governance documents that ensure that similar units within the university support the key values of American academic institutions, including academic freedom and openness and respectful behavior toward other host institution academic units. If a U.S. host institution is not structured in a way that allows for formal Centers or Institutes, it should develop a structure for oversight and include the details for that structure in the documents governing a CI. Show Details
U.S. host institutions should provide documentation of:
- relevant sections on Centers and Institutes in their institutional handbook or policy manuals.
- Am established, regular review process for Centers and Institutes that would ultimately include the CI and would specify the period/frequency of review. This would include external reviews and advisory councils, as required by the institution.
- Public statements on academic freedom and freedom of expression as codified in university policy.
- Posted CI bylaws and governance documents, including operational and administrative policies and practices.
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U.S. host institutions should demonstrate that they meet and comply with all applicable DOD requirements for information, data, physical, and research security.Show Details
- U.S. host institutions conducting $50 million or more of federally funded research per year should demonstrate compliance with National Security Presidential Memorandum – 33 (NSPM-33) or subsequent versions of this document. These institutions can satisfy this criterion by demonstrating that they have established and operate a research security program that includes elements of cybersecurity, foreign travel security, insider threat awareness and identification, and export control training.
- U.S. host institutions conducting less than $50 million of federally funded research per year should demonstrate the presence and implementation of adequate research security measures on campus. These institutions can satisfy this criterion by providing research security-related documents, including elements of cybersecurity, foreign travel security, insider threat awareness and identification, and export control training.
- U.S. host institutions should demonstrate that they have appropriate safeguards in place to ensure that CI faculty and visitors who are not university employees have limited or guest access to university computer networks and cannot access networks that store research results and communications. Institutions can satisfy this criterion by providing the university’s cybersecurity and visitor network access policy and demonstrating that CI faculty and visitors have limited or guest access.
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U.S. host institutions should demonstrate that they possess full managerial control of CI curriculum, instructors, textbooks and teaching materials, programmatic decisions, and research grants.Show Details
- U.S. host institutions should demonstrate that CI employees and affiliates are formally associated with the host institution and subject to human resources policies and procedures. Institutions can satisfy this criterion by providing documentation, such as an employment contract or agreement, that the director of the CI is employed by the university with a reporting line to the host institution’s chief academic officer or their designee, and by providing public-facing personnel rosters that clearly state whether the host institution classifies CI-affiliated personnel from the Chinese partner institution as either host institution employees or as visiting scholars. CIs should hire their employees and affiliates in accordance with the host institution’s human resources policies and procedures and subject to corresponding campus policies.
- U.S. host institutions should demonstrate that CI curricula, including syllabi, textbooks, and teaching materials, are approved through faculty governance review.
- U.S. host institutions should demonstrate oversight over CI-supported research grants. In addition, universities should submit conflict of interest, conflict of commitment, and export control protocols that demonstrate university control.
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U.S. host institutions should ensure that no contract or other written agreement pertaining to creating or operating the CI calls for the application of foreign law to any aspect of the CI’s operation at any U.S. campus of the host institution.
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U.S. host institutions should demonstrate appropriate fiduciary and financial oversight of the CI. Host institutions can satisfy this criterion by providing these elements.Show Details
- A publicly available annual budget for the CI, including sources of revenue and expenses.
- A copy of the agreement between the host institution and Hanban2 to host a CI (a hard or electronic copy of the original document, including the original version of the agreement in Chinese). The host institution should manage the agreement through its sponsored program process.
- A copy of the Memorandum of Understanding and contract between the U.S. host institution and Chinese partner institution, if applicable.
- A copy of the policy that any financial contribution from foreign or domestic sources supporting the CI must be treated as a sponsored contract, not a gift, with a deliverable (programming, education, etc.).
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Protecting U.S. Technological Advantage (2022)
In today’s rapidly changing landscapes of technology and competition, the United States cannot expect to maintain its leadership by focusing on narrow technology areas and restricting access to the research carried out. That approach is further challenged by the proliferation of the globally shared platforms that enable most modern technology applications. This report recommends changes to technology protection policies and practices that reflect the current realities of how technologies are developed and incorporated into new products and processes.
Key Findings
- U.S. leadership in technology innovation is central to our nation’s interests, including its security, economic prosperity, and quality of life.
- The government should shift from its historical emphasis on protecting specific technologies to a risk-management approach that protects the U.S. own capacity to innovate.
- The growth of systems-based technologies and platforms is disrupting traditional approaches to technology protection. Because they are shared, such platforms cannot be protected using the historical approach of restricting knowledge or use without causing widespread problems with other technologies that share those same platforms, including applications that benefit and support U.S. national security and economic competitiveness.
- Science, technology, and innovation are much more multidisciplinary and multinational today than in the past, which complicates efforts to protect individual technologies from military or commercial competitors.
- Efforts to protect U.S. research interests in biotechnology, artificial intelligence, and quantum computing, and other emerging areas are unlikely to work and may even backfire as the nature of technology development and global competition has changed. For example, shared platforms such as 5G and the internet cannot be protected with restrictions.
- The U.S. now faces an adversarial near-peer competitor — China — that over the past two decades has systematically pursued strategies for dominating technology development in key areas.
- China is willing to obtain technology through the acquisition of companies, foreign-talent programs, and the theft of intellectual property and has learned the United sates reacts by instituting bureaucracies that can slow its own capacity to innovate.
- The U.S. research community has seen an extraordinary increase in the number and complexity of policies, processes, procedures, and requirements governing the conduct of science and technology R&D.
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View Report Recommendations
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Recommendation 1
The President, through an executive order, should clearly reaffirm that it is the policy of the United States that fundamental research, to the maximum extent possible, should remain unrestricted. In addition, the executive order should direct the Office of Science and Technology Policy, in coordination with federal agencies, to define criteria for open and restricted research environments within 120 days of issuance of the executive order. Furthermore, the executive order should direct federal agencies to designate the appropriate environment for work under a grant or contract prior to making the award, and to maximize the amount of sponsored work that can be performed in open research environments. In making this designation, agencies should state clearly that any restrictions or recommended restrictions apply only to the particular research grant or contract being funded, and not universally across the entire institution receiving the funding.
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Recommendation 2
The National Science Foundation (NSF) should fund and coordinate an effort to define those elements of the U.S. innovation system that are essential to developing, attracting, and retaining the top scientific, research, engineering, and innovation talent that is necessary for U.S. leadership in technology innovation. NSF should engage other federal science agencies, universities, research institutions, educators, and research-intensive companies in this effort. The agency should produce a report detailing its findings within 180 days of the start of the effort. Based on those findings, the Office of Science and Technology Policy should coordinate with federal research agencies, the Department of Homeland Security, and the Department of State to develop a national strategy for promoting leadership in science and technology through policies and programs aimed at developing domestic research talent, expanding opportunities for international research collaboration, and attracting and retaining top talent in the United States for training and employment.
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Recommendation 3
The National Security Council, the National Science and Technology Council, and the National Economic Council should develop and lead an interagency process for identifying and assessing threats or vulnerabilities of strategic significance to U.S. technology leadership and other national interests. For each threat, the process should include developing an associated risk management strategy and evaluation rubric for use by federal agencies in addressing the risk. The execution of these risk management strategies should be coordinated and overseen by the above interagency process to ensure a “whole-of-government” approach. The strategies resulting from this interagency risk management process should have these qualities. Show Details
- proactive, in that they define technology-related threats with national or economic security implications as early in the research and development process as possible;
- strategic, in that they are based on global realities, including the plans, actions, intentions, and capabilities of adversaries, and on reasoned risk acceptance decisions about which technologies must, should, or cannot be protected;
- timely, in that they are based on current understanding of the associated threats and vulnerabilities and are adjusted as required;
- integrated, so that different mechanisms for technology protection, such as export controls, information classification, or decisions by the Committee on Foreign Investment in the United States, are directed and coordinated in such a manner as to effectively reduce or mitigate the risk;
- adaptive, with mechanisms for subjecting identified technology areas to regular reviews by integrated expertise in science, technology, and national security;
- dynamic/repeating, with a scheduled review to ensure that there have been no changes to the technology, the environment, or the actor(s) that would warrant a change in the threat status; and
- assessed for adverse effects, to ensure that they do not result in unnecessary and unintended barriers to U.S. innovation leadership.
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Recommendation 4
The National Science and Technology Council, the National Security Council, and the National Economic Council should jointly develop a new policy framework for the identification of strategically important platforms and for the development of coordinated risk management strategies covering their development, control, and use. This new framework should include these elements. Show Details
- defining and designating specific technology platforms that are essential to U.S. interests;
- involving the private sector in specifying the technical features and requirements that should be included in platform development, such as performance standards for security, integrity, interoperability, control features, and user controls;
- developing a coherent, whole-of-government strategy for establishing and managing trust relationships among platform developers or users, including international governance mechanisms, use agreements, regulatory approaches, trade agreements, content requirements, and law enforcement cooperation agreements; and
- establishing a range of responses to security or trust problems related to the use of shared platforms, with participating agencies planning for and preparing appropriate “incident response” capabilities.
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Recommendation 1
Other Relevant National Academies Work
Many of the materials listed above were informed by previous Academies work, including the activities listed below.
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Fundamental Research, Openness, and Protecting the U.S. Technological Advantage (2023)
Fundamental Research, Openness, and Protecting the U.S. Technological Advantage: NSDD-189 in the New Global Context (2023 Meeting of Experts)
Following up on the recommendation in the 2022 NASEM report Protecting U.S. Technological Advantage, the National Academies held a 2-day meeting of experts for the National Science Foundation to discuss National Security Decision Directive 189 (NSDD-189). The meeting explored whether it was time to revisit NSDD-189 and the practical effects of doing so, based on views of the foreign policy, security, scientific, and legislative communities.
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Openness, International Engagement, and the Federally Funded Science and Technology Research Enterprise (2022)
Openness, International Engagement, and the Federally Funded Science and Technology Research Enterprise (2022 Proceedings-in-Brief)
In November 2022, the National Science, Technology, and Security Roundtable convened a two-day workshop to assess the state of the U.S. research enterprise in a time of increasing global competition. The workshop featured discussion of the challenges confronting researchers as they seek to ensure the vitality of research and innovation in America, foster increased international scientific research cooperation, and simultaneously counter illicit foreign interference that threatens national security interests.
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Beyond Fortress America: National Security Controls on Science and Technology (2009)
Beyond Fortress America: National Security Controls on Science and Technology (2009)
Beyond "Fortress America" concludes that the national security controls that regulate access to and export of science and technology are broken. Many of these controls undermine our national and homeland security and stifle American engagement in the global economy, as well as research in science and technology. Fixing these controls does not mean putting an end to them, but implementing reforms based on the realities of the risks and opportunities of today’s threats to the nation. -
Science and Security in a Post-911 World (2007)
Science and Security in a Post-911 World (2007)
The tragedy of September 11, 2001, the subsequent anthrax attacks, and ongoing terror threats raised concerns about the possible use of technologies against the United States and spurred caused U.S. research institutions to impose stricter security controls. Based on a series of regional meetings on university campuses with officials from the national security community and academic research institutions, this report concludes that even with these threats, the U.S. needs to maintain an open science and engineering environment to maintain a thriving scientific research environment in an era of heightened security concerns. -
Rising Above the Gathering Storm (2007)
Rising Above the Gathering Storm (2007)
“There can be no security without the economic vitality created by innovation, just as there can be no economic vitality without a secure environment in which to live and work.”
—p. 67, Rising Above the Gathering StormThis congressionally requested report points to the many ways in which U.S. advantages in the marketplace and in science and technology have begun to erode in a landscape of changing technology. It urged the federal government to undertake a comprehensive and coordinated effort to bolster U.S. competitiveness and to create high-quality jobs to meet the nation's needs, especially in the area of clean, affordable energy. The report recommends that federal policymakers focus on the following goals:
- Increase America's talent pool by vastly improving K-12 mathematics and science education;
- Sustain and strengthen the nation's commitment to long-term basic research;
- Develop, recruit, and retain top students, scientists, and engineers from both the U.S. and abroad; and
- Ensure that the United States is the premier place in the world for innovation.
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Scientific Communication and National Security (“the Corson report”) (1982)
Scientific Communication and National Security ( “the Corson report”) (1982)
The economic and military strength of the United States is based to a substantial degree on its superior achievements in science and technology and on its capacity to translate those achievements into products and processes that contribute to economic prosperity and national defense. Concerns in 1980 that the Soviet Union had gained militarily from access to the results of U.S. scientific and technological efforts spurred calls for tighter controls on the transfer of information through open channels to the Soviets. This report examines various aspects of the application of controls to scientific communication and to suggest how to balance competing national objectives of innovation and security.
