[House Hearing, 116 Congress]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office]
TIME CHANGE: THE IMPACT
OF THE COVID 19 CRISIS
ON UNIVERSITY RESEARCH
=======================================================================
HEARING
BEFORE THE
SUBCOMMITTEE ON RESEARCH AND TECHNOLOGY
OF THE
COMMITTEE ON SCIENCE, SPACE,
AND TECHNOLOGY
HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES
ONE HUNDRED SIXTEENTH CONGRESS
SECOND SESSION
__________
SEPTEMBER 9, 2020
__________
Serial No. 116-79
__________
Printed for the use of the Committee on Science, Space, and Technology
[GRAPHIC(S) NOT AVAILABLE IN TIFF FORMAT]
Available via the World Wide Web: http://science.house.gov
______
U.S. GOVERNMENT PUBLISHING OFFICE
41-311 PDF WASHINGTON : 2021
COMMITTEE ON SCIENCE, SPACE, AND TECHNOLOGY
HON. EDDIE BERNICE JOHNSON, Texas, Chairwoman
ZOE LOFGREN, California FRANK D. LUCAS, Oklahoma,
DANIEL LIPINSKI, Illinois Ranking Member
SUZANNE BONAMICI, Oregon MO BROOKS, Alabama
AMI BERA, California, BILL POSEY, Florida
Vice Chair RANDY WEBER, Texas
LIZZIE FLETCHER, Texas BRIAN BABIN, Texas
HALEY STEVENS, Michigan ANDY BIGGS, Arizona
KENDRA HORN, Oklahoma ROGER MARSHALL, Kansas
MIKIE SHERRILL, New Jersey RALPH NORMAN, South Carolina
BRAD SHERMAN, California MICHAEL CLOUD, Texas
STEVE COHEN, Tennessee TROY BALDERSON, Ohio
JERRY McNERNEY, California PETE OLSON, Texas
ED PERLMUTTER, Colorado ANTHONY GONZALEZ, Ohio
PAUL TONKO, New York MICHAEL WALTZ, Florida
BILL FOSTER, Illinois JIM BAIRD, Indiana
DON BEYER, Virginia FRANCIS ROONEY, Florida
CHARLIE CRIST, Florida GREGORY F. MURPHY, North Carolina
SEAN CASTEN, Illinois MIKE GARCIA, California
BEN McADAMS, Utah THOMAS P. TIFFANY, Wisconsin
JENNIFER WEXTON, Virginia
CONOR LAMB, Pennsylvania
------
Subcommittee on Research and Technology
HON. HALEY STEVENS, Michigan, Chairwoman
DANIEL LIPINSKI, Illinois JIM BAIRD, Indiana, Ranking Member
MIKIE SHERRILL, New Jersey ROGER MARSHALL, Kansas
BRAD SHERMAN, California TROY BALDERSON, Ohio
PAUL TONKO, New York ANTHONY GONZALEZ, Ohio
BEN McADAMS, Utah THOMAS P. TIFFANY, Wisconsin
STEVE COHEN, Tennessee
BILL FOSTER, Illinois
C O N T E N T S
September 9, 2020
Page
Hearing Charter.................................................. 2
Opening Statements
Statement by Representative Haley Stevens, Chairwoman,
Subcommittee on Research and Technology, Committee on Science,
Space, and Technology, U.S. House of Representatives........... 8
Written Statement............................................ 9
Statement by Representative Jim Baird, Ranking Member,
Subcommittee on Research and Technology, Committee on Science,
Space, and Technology, U.S. House of Representatives........... 10
Written Statement............................................ 11
Statement by Representative Eddie Bernice Johnson, Chairwoman,
Committee on Science, Space, and Technology, U.S. House of
Representatives................................................ 12
Written Statement............................................ 13
Statement by Representative Frank D. Lucas, Ranking Member,
Committee on Science, Space, and Technology, U.S. House of
Representatives................................................ 13
Written Statement............................................ 14
Witnesses:
Dr. Joseph Walsh, Interim Vice President for Economic Development
and Innovation, University of Illinois System
Oral Statement............................................... 16
Written Statement............................................ 19
Dr. David Stone, Vice President for Research, Oakland University
Oral Statement............................................... 43
Written Statement............................................ 45
Dr. Theresa Mayer, Executive Vice President for Research and
Partnerships, Purdue University
Oral Statement............................................... 53
Written Statement............................................ 55
Mr. Ryan Muzzio, Physics Ph.D. Student, Carnegie Mellon
University
Oral Statement............................................... 65
Written Statement............................................ 67
Discussion....................................................... 84
Appendix I: Answers to Post-Hearing Questions
Dr. David Stone, Vice President for Research, Oakland University. 102
Dr. Theresa Mayer, Executive Vice President for Research and
Partnerships, Purdue University................................ 104
Appendix II: Additional Material for the Record
Letter submitted Representative Eddie Bernice Johnson,
Chairwoman, Committee on Science, Space, and Technology, U.S.
House of Representatives....................................... 108
TIME CHANGE: THE IMPACT
OF THE COVID-19 CRISIS
ON UNIVERSITY RESEARCH
----------
WEDNESDAY, SEPTEMBER 9, 2020
House of Representatives,
Subcommittee on Research and Technology
Committee on Science, Space, and Technology
Washington, D.C.
The Subcommittee met, pursuant to notice, at 11:30 a.m.,
via Webex, Hon. Haley Stevens [Chairwoman of the Subcommittee]
presiding.
[GRAPHIC(S) NOT AVAILABLE IN TIFF FORMAT]
Chairwoman Stevens. Well, this hearing will come to order.
Without objection, the Chair is authorized to declare recess at
any time. And, before I deliver my opening remarks, I do want
to note the circumstances that we find ourselves in today, in
which we are meeting pursuant to House Resolution 965 today,
the Subcommittee on Research and Technology on the House
Science, Space, and Technology Committee is meeting virtually,
and I want to announce a couple of reminders to the Members,
our House Members, about the conduct of today's remote hearing.
First, Members should keep their video feed on for as long as
they are present in the hearing, and Members are also
responsible for their own microphones, just as if we were in
the room together, and so please keep your microphones muted
unless you're speaking. And, finally, if Members have documents
they wish to submit for the record, please e-mail them to the
Committee Clerk, whose e-mail address was circulated to your
offices prior to today's hearing.
It certainly is nice to see everyone here today, and so
good morning, and welcome to our distinguished panelists.
Certainly want to give a special welcome to Dr. David Stone
from Oakland University (OU), one of the prides of Michigan's
11th District, and, you know, the university's certainly a
special place, but all of represent and come from special
institutions and jurisdictions which are critical to this
country's research fabric. We're here today to discuss the
impact of COVID-19 on innovation as it relates to our academic
system. We're here to discuss the disruptions brought on by
COVID-19 into our research efforts.
As we all know, federally funded research conducted on
university campuses across the Nation is certainly a critical
driver of our country's innovation, economic development,
pairing with the private sector and government partners to jump
start new technology and scientific breakthroughs. The COVID-19
crisis sent shockwaves through this ecosystem very early on,
particularly given some of the disruptions that were brought on
from needing to social distance, and also end school years
early. University administrators, research facility managers,
faculty, post-docs, and students are still reeling from some of
the profound disruptions to their work, and still making their
way to adapt amid persistent uncertainty, and the duration of
how long this pandemic will go on.
In the early days of the COVID-19 pandemic--we're now
saying early days--universities stepped up in a big way to help
us combat the disease. Many institutions reconfigured their
laboratories for COVID-19 related research, and donated masks,
gloves, and other personal protective equipment (PPE) to
hospitals and first responders, part of the remarkable supply
chain recovery efforts that we saw take place throughout this
great Nation. I remain concerned and alarmed that our Federal
Government is just not stepping up to its end of the bargain,
and that's part of what we're here to discuss today.
In the absence of, you know, a complete and holistic
national strategy to mitigate the spread of the virus,
universities have been faced with difficult decisions about the
fall semester. Many institutions find themselves in danger of
incredible financial disruption, and even, in some cases, ruin,
which is things that we are, you know, starting to hear from
stakeholders across the country. Universities are being
squeezed on both sides with a significant loss of revenue, and
unanticipated costs of cleaning up their campuses, providing
that PPE, developing their own testing and contact tracing
technologies, and ramping down and restarting their research
programs, as well as the virtual learning environment. And,
boy, wouldn't it be nice to have some financial assistance or
grant dollars made available to all of you, because you're
certainly best in class examples. Many universities, for
instance, had to implement hiring freezes, and the near-term
impact on the research workforce is worrying, and will be long
lasting if we don't find solutions.
The impacts to our wider STEM (science, technology,
engineering, and mathematics) pipeline could also be quite
devastating, and it's certainly troubling from the place which
we're sitting right now. Undergraduate students are missing out
on critical hands-on training. Graduate students are worried
that there won't be funding for them to finish their research
projects, I can't even imagine, and even raising some questions
about graduating. So post-docs and other early career
researchers are also searching for jobs in a severely
contracted academic job market when we want those bright
research minds on the forefront of innovation, and in high
demand for their talents and research abilities at universities
across the United States. Early data indicate that the impacts
of these challenges are more pronounced for women and other
groups historically underrepresented in STEM, which in and of
itself is quite unfortunate, and troubling, and something I
hope that today's hearing also touches on.
So, Chairwoman Johnson, and Ranking Member Lucas, and
several Members of this Committee have been a part of
championing two bipartisan bills which propose a great
approach, a bold approach, to meeting the urgent needs to help
universities and academic researchers recover from this crisis.
The RISE Act, which authorizes $26 billion in emergency relief
funding for science agencies to support full cost extension of
research grants so that we don't literally lose years of
research. This goes beyond just a general disruption. This is a
sustained period that we're operating in, and the RISE Act
certainly gives us a lot of hope and potential. We're really
proud of that legislation. And then the Supporting Early Career
Researchers Act creates a $250 million fellowship program at
the National Science Foundation (NSF). I'm so proud of the NSF,
and the work that they have been doing, and we want to,
obviously, continue to support that. So with the Supporting
Early Careers Researchers Act, the National Science Foundation
will be able to keep recent Ph.D. recipients in the STEM
pipeline.
And I certainly look forward to hearing from our panelists
about their experiences navigating these new challenges that
have been thrown their way, and the challenges posed to
innovation presented by the COVID-19 crisis, and the need for
getting back to the research enterprise, and getting back on
track.
[The prepared statement of Chairwoman Stevens follows:]
Good morning and welcome to our distinguished panelists.
I'd like to give a special welcome to Dr. David Stone from
Oakland University, the pride of Michigan's 11th district.
We are here to discuss the impact of the COVID-19 crisis on
innovation as it relates to our academic research system. We
all know that federally funded research conducted on university
campuses across the nation is a critical driver of U.S.
innovation and economic development, pairing with private
sector and government partners to jumpstart new technology and
scientific breakthroughs.
The COVID-19 crisis sent shock waves through this critical
ecosystem. University administrators, research facility
managers, faculty, postdocs, and students are all reeling from
the profound disruptions to their work and struggling to adapt
amid persistent uncertainty about how long this crisis will
last.
In the early days of the pandemic, universities stepped up
in a big way to help us combat the disease. Many institutions
reconfigured their laboratories for COVID-related research and
donated masks, gloves, and other personal protective equipment
to hospitals and first responders.
I am deeply concerned that the federal government has yet
to hold up its end of the bargain. In the absence of a national
strategy to mitigate the spread of the virus, universities are
faced with difficult decisions about the Fall semester.
Many institutions find themselves in real danger of
financial ruin. Universities are being squeezed from both
sides, with a significant loss of revenue and unanticipated
costs of cleaning their campuses, providing PPE, developing
their own testing and contact tracing technologies, and ramping
down and restarting their research programs as well as the
virtual learning environments.
Many universities have had to implement hiring freezes. The
near-term impact on the research workforce is worrying and will
be long-lasting if we don't find solutions.
The impacts to our wider STEM pipeline could be
devastating. Undergraduate students are missing out on critical
hands-on training. Graduate students are worried there won't be
funding for them to finish their research projects and
graduate. Post-docs and other early-career researchers are
desperately searching for jobs in a severely contracted
academic job market.
Early data indicate that the impacts of these challenges
are more pronounced for women and other groups historically
underrepresented in STEM.
Chairwoman Johnson, Ranking Member Lucas, and several
Members of this Committee have championed two bipartisan bills
which propose a bold approach to meeting the urgent needs to
help universities and academic researchers recover from this
crisis.
The RISE Act authorizes $26 billion in emergency relief
funding for science agencies to support full-cost extensions of
research grants so that we don't lose literally years of
critical research.
The Supporting Early-Career Researchers Act creates a new
$250 million fellowship program at the National Science
Foundation to help keep recent Ph.D. recipients in the STEM
pipeline.
I look forward to hearing from our panelists about their
experiences navigating the unprecedented challenges to
innovation presented by this crisis and the needs for getting
our research enterprise back on track.
Chairwoman Stevens. So, with that, the Chair, myself, I'm
going to recognize Dr. Baird now, our Ranking Member, for an
opening statement. Dr. Baird, I'll pass it over to you.
Mr. Baird. Thank you, Chairwoman Stevens, and thank you
for holding today's hearing. All of us here on this Committee,
I think, recognize the critical role that the universities play
in America's research enterprise, and they really are the
largest performer of basic research, which drives scientific
and technological discovery, in this country. They play a
significant role in regional and national economic development
by spurring countless startups and patent grants in a number of
industry. And they educate and train our STEM workforce of
tomorrow that will be critical for our future, and to stay
competitive.
So, over the last six months, our research universities
have faced one of the greatest disruptions they have ever
experienced due to the COVID-19 pandemic, and yet they have
played a critical role in addressing the pandemic by conducting
research and development to detect, defend, and eventually
defeat this COVID-19. For example, Purdue University, my alma
mater, researchers are working on developing a handheld paper
diagnostic device that will make COVID-19 detection fast, easy
to use, and portable.
While COVID-19 related research has permitted us to
continue, tens of thousands of other labs across the country
have been forced to close or severely reduce their operations.
Throughout this summer research institutions have been taking
the tremendous task of planning for how to safely reopen and
operate their research facilities, and adhering to the proper
social distancing practices is challenging in general, but it's
especially challenging when you consider the tight, confined
spaces laboratory work is traditionally conducted in. So I look
forward to hearing from our witnesses today on how their
campuses are dealing with these challenges and creating a ``new
normal'' that allows the research enterprise on their campuses
to rev back up.
The restarting of the university research enterprise is
particularly important to our future domestic STEM talent
pipeline, especially early career researchers and post-docs.
The limited access to laboratories has restricted the research
that post-docs can complete, and, in some cases, causing their
trajectories to change, and an uncertainty of when or if they
would be able to complete their research and their degree on
time. Additionally, because many universities have instituted
hiring freezes, there's a great concern that many post-docs
will have to leave academia to find a job in the near term,
which will be extremely damaging to the U.S.'s domestic STEM
talent and U.S. competitiveness. It is critical Congress takes
steps to fight the threat of such a loss of STEM talent and
brain drain.
I would like to thank all of our witnesses, and I would
make a special welcome to Dr. Mayer from Purdue University to
taking the time to join us today, especially given it is the
start of the school year, and I expect much more demanding than
the start of a normal school year. So I look forward to hearing
our testimonies, and having a productive session. I yield back.
[The prepared statement of Mr. Baird follows:]
Thank you, Chairwoman Stevens, for holding today's hearing.
All of us on this Committee know the critical role our
universities play in America's research enterprise.
They are the largest performers of basic research, which
drives scientific and technological discovery in this country.
They play a significant role in regional and national economic
development, spurring countless start-ups and patent grants in
a number of industries. And they educate and train our STEM
workforce of tomorrow, which will be critical to our future
competitiveness.
Over the last six months, our research universities have
faced one of the greatest disruptions they have ever
experienced due to the COVID-19 pandemic. And yet, they have
played a critical role in addressing the pandemic by conducting
research and development to detect, defend, and eventually
defeat COVID-19.
For example, at Purdue University, researchers are working
on developing a handheld paper diagnostic device that will make
COVID-19 detection fast, easy-to-use, and portable thanks to
the inherent properties of paper. While COVID-19 related
research was permitted to continue, tens of thousands of other
labs across the country were forced to close or severely reduce
their operations.
Throughout this summer, research institutions have been
taking on the tremendous task of planning for how they can
safely reopen and operate their research facilities. Adhering
to proper social distancing practices is challenging in
general, but especially when you consider the tight, confined
spaces laboratory work is traditionally conducted in. I look
forward to hearing from our witnesses today on how their
campuses are dealing with these challenges and creating a ``new
normal'' that allows the research enterprise on their campuses
to rev back up.
Restarting the university research enterprise is
particularly important to our future domestic STEM talent
pipeline, especially early-career researchers and postdocs. The
limited access to laboratories has restricted the research that
postdocs can complete, in some cases causing their trajectories
to change and creating uncertainty of when or if they will be
able to complete their research and degree on time.
Additionally, because many universities have instituted hiring
freezes, there are great concerns that many postdocs will have
to leave academia to find a job in the near term, which will be
extremely damaging to the US's domestic STEM talent and U.S.
competitiveness. It is critical Congress takes steps to fight
the threat of such a loss of STEM talent and ``brain drain.''
I would like to thank all of our witnesses for taking the
time to join us today, especially given it is the start of the
school year and I expect, much more demanding than the start of
a normal school year. I look forward to hearing your
testimonies and a productive discussion.
I yield back the balance of my time.
Chairwoman Stevens. Thank you, Dr. Baird. And, with that,
the Chair now recognizes our Chairwoman of the Full Committee,
Chairwoman Johnson, for an opening statement.
Chairwoman Johnson. Thank you very much, Chairwoman
Stevens, and thanks to Ranking Member Baird for holding this
hearing, and thanks to all of our distinguished panelists for
joining us today. The Nation is in a crisis on many fronts. Due
to the unprecedented lack of firm guidance, nearly 200,000
Americans have died from the COVID-19 pandemic. Millions of
American children are hungry. Countless Americans have no safe
place to live, and our very democracy is at stake.
In the midst of all these crises, it may be hard to think
about our future, and it may be even harder to convince our
colleagues, and the American people, of the urgent need to help
rescue our universities, and, by doing so, help to rescue our
future. And yet, that is what we are here today to discuss, for
even now we cannot afford to ignore it. Even as China looms
large as a competitor, and many other nations have strong
science and technology capacity, U.S. universities continue to
lead the world in cultivating the next generation of STEM
talent, and serving as an engine for our economy. I believe
that our universities can do more to recruit and nurture all
talent, no matter their gender, race, disability, or other
background, and I'm pleased that Ranking Member Lucas has
joined me in pursuing many efforts to address diversity and
inclusion in STEM education and research. While I will continue
my own efforts to address these disparities, I remain confident
that the American universities have the essential ingredients
to carry our Nation into a healthy, secure, and prosperous
future.
More than that, I believe we cannot have a healthy,
secure, and prosperous future without our universities. This
Nation is blessed with hundreds of excellent research
universities that collectively serve the very diverse needs of
our population and underpin our innovation economy. I am not
suggesting that all--that even most of our universities'
research is going to collapse due to the COVID-19 pandemic. I
am, however, deeply concerned that many institutions may not
survive, that years of important research will be lost, and
that we will suffer irreparable harm to our talent pipeline.
I'm especially concerned about the fallout from this pandemic
undercutting the gains that we have made in diversity, and
diversifying our STEM pipeline, including the geographic
diversity that will help communities across the Nation
revitalize their economies in the coming years. We cannot allow
that long term damage to happen. The stakes for our Nation are
simply too high.
For those reasons, I did not hesitate to join my
bipartisan colleagues in the House co-sponsoring the RISE Act,
despite the hefty price tag. I was also pleased to be joined by
many colleagues on the Science, Space, and Technology Committee
in introducing Supporting Early Career Researchers Act, which
is focused specifically on keeping the best and brightest in
research careers that they already worked so hard for. I hope
my colleagues on both sides of the aisle will continue to join
me in advocating for real funding for these two bills, and I
thank you, and yield back.
[The prepared statement of Chairwoman Johnson follows:]
Thank you Chairwoman Stevens and Ranking Member Baird for
holding this hearing, and thank you to our distinguished panel
for joining us today. This nation is in crisis on many fronts.
Due to an unprecedented lack of leadership, nearly 200,000
Americans have died from the COVID19 pandemic, millions of
American children are hungry, countless Americans have no safe
place to live, and our very democracy is at risk.
In the midst of all of these crises, it may be hard to
think about our future. And it may be even harder to convince
our colleagues and the American people of the urgent need to
help rescue our universities, and by doing so, help rescue our
future. And yet, that is what we are here today to discuss, for
even now, we cannot afford to ignore it.
Even as China looms large as a competitor, and many other
nations have strong science and innovation capacity, U.S.
universities continue to lead the world in cultivating the next
generation of STEM talent and serving as an engine for our
economy. I believe that our universities can do more to recruit
and nurture all talent, no matter their gender, race,
disability, or other background. And I am pleased that Ranking
Member Lucas has joined me in pursuing many efforts to address
diversity and inclusion in STEM education and research. While I
will continue my own efforts to address these disparities, I
remain confident that American universities have the essential
ingredients to help carry our nation into a healthy, secure,
and prosperous future. More than that, I believe we cannot have
a healthy, secure, and prosperous future without our
universities.
This nation is blessed with hundreds of excellent research
universities that collectively serve the very diverse needs of
our population and underpin our innovation economy. I am not
suggesting that all or even most of our university-based
research is going to collapse due to the COVID-19 pandemic. I
am, however, deeply concerned that many institutions may not
survive, that years of important research will be lost, and
that we will suffer irreparable harm to our talent pipeline. I
am especially concerned about the fallout from this pandemic
undercutting the gains we have made in diversifying our STEM
pipeline, including the geographic diversity that will help
communities across the nation revitalize their economies in the
coming years. We cannot allow that long-term damage to happen--
the stakes for our nation are too high.
For those reasons, I did not hesitate to join my bipartisan
colleagues in the House in cosponsoring the RISE Act, despite
its hefty price tag. I was also pleased to be joined by many
colleagues on the Science, Space, and Technology Committee in
introducing the Supporting Early Career Researchers Act, which
is focused specifically on keeping the best and brightest in
research careers that they have already worked so hard for. I
hope my colleagues on both sides of the aisle will continue to
join me in advocating for real funding for those two bills.
Thank you and I yield back.
Chairwoman Stevens. Thank you, Madam Chair. And now the
Chair recognizes Ranking Member Lucas for an opening statement.
Mr. Lucas. Thank you, Chairwoman Stevens, for holding
today's hearing to examine the challenges our academic research
enterprise has faced during the COVID-19 pandemic. When the
pandemic reached our shores, many researchers immediately
pivoted to apply the knowledge and resources to fight this
virus. Universities have devoted engineering departments to 3D
printing personal protective equipment for front line workers.
They've engineered inexpensive ventilators and self-sterilizing
equipment for hospitals, and they've even repurposed the
veterinarian labs to process COVID-19 tests.
Unfortunately, even while doing this exceptional work,
universities have also had to slow down, or entirely stop,
other research that is non-essential to fighting COVID-19.
Social distancing, travel restrictions, campus closures have
forced many researchers to stop their work. There are
tremendous costs to halt in research. First, we lose the
scientific knowledge and technology development that would've
been gained from this work. Second, we face economic
consequences. According to the IRS data, American universities
used research funds to pay more than 560,000 people on campuses
across the country Fiscal Year 2018 to 2019. And, third, we
could slow our scientific progress for years to come because of
the damage being done to our STEM pipeline. We know it will
take time and financial resources to get the research
enterprise back up on its feet, but if we do not provide the
resources now, we'll be limiting our ability to support new and
innovative research, and forced to play catch-up to our foreign
competitors, like China.
That's why I'm a proud co-sponsor of ``the Research
Investment to Security the Economy Act.'' It will help ensure
that our research sector recovers from the current challenges,
and continues to thrive even after the pandemic subsides. The
``RISE Act'' authorizes approximately $26 billion in emergency
relief that Federal science agencies will award to research
universities, independent institutions, and national
laboratories to continue working on federally funded research
projects. This funding will allow us to continue to support the
critical research we need to keep progressing as a nation.
Along with the ``RISE Act,'' we have ``the Supporting
Early Career Researchers Act,'' a bipartisan bill led by
Chairwoman Johnson and Congressman Mike Garcia. This bill
creates a fellowship program at the National Science Foundation
for post-doc researchers who are unable to continue their
research at universities due to COVID-19. By allowing graduate
students and post-docs to stay in research, rather than leaving
to find other employment, these bills will help preserve our
STEM workforce so we don't lose out on years of discoveries. As
we fight to keep America safe, healthy, and economically stable
during this pandemic, there's one certainty, our success
depends on science. I look forward to hearing from our
witnesses today about their experiences, the lessons they've
learned, and the recommendations they have for how Congress can
invest in American research and technology to overcome future
pandemics and scientific challenges. Thank you, and I yield
back the balance of my time.
[The prepared statement of Mr. Lucas follows:]
Thank you, Chairwoman Stevens, for holding today's hearing
to examine the challenges our academic research enterprise has
faced during the COVID-19 pandemic.
When the pandemic reached our shores, many researchers
immediately pivoted to apply their knowledge and resources to
fight this virus. Universities have devoted engineering
departments to 3D printing personal protective equipment (PPE)
for frontline workers. They have engineered inexpensive
ventilators and self-sterilizing equipment for hospitals. And
they have even repurposed veterinary labs to process COVID-19
tests.
Unfortunately, even while doing this exceptional work,
universities have also had to slow down or entirely stop other
research that is non-essential to fighting COVID-19. Social
distancing, travel restrictions, and campus closures have
forced many researchers to stop their work.
There are tremendous costs to this halt in research:
First, we lose the scientific knowledge and technological
development that would be gained from this work.
Second, we face economic consequences. According to IRS
data, American universities used research funds to pay more
than 560,000 people on campuses across the country in fiscal
year 2018-2019.
And third, we could slow our scientific progress for years
to come because of the damage being done to our STEM pipeline.
We know it will take time and financial resources to get
the research enterprise back up on its feet. But if we do not
provide the resources now, we will be limiting our ability to
support new and innovative research, and forced to play catch
up to our foreign competitors like China.
That's why I am a proud cosponsor of the Research
Investment to Secure the Economy (RISE) Act. It will help
ensure that our research sector recovers from the current
challenges and continues to thrive even after the pandemic
subsides. The RISE Act authorizes approximately $26 billion in
emergency relief that federal science agencieswill award to
research universities, independent institutions, and national
laboratories to continue working on federally funded research
projects. This funding will allow us to continue to support the
critical research we need to keep progressing as a nation.
Along with the RISE Act, we have the Supporting Early
Career Researchers Act--a bipartisan bill led by Chairwoman
Johnson and Congressman Mike Garcia. This bill creates a
fellowship program at the National Science Foundation for
postdoctoral researchers who are unable to continue their
research at universities due to COVID-19.
By allowing graduate students and post-docs to stay in
research rather than leaving to find other employment, these
bills will help us preserve our STEM workforce, so we don't
lose out on years of discoveries.
As we fight to keep America safe, healthy, and economically
stable during this pandemic, there is one certainty: our
success depends on science.
I look forward to hearing from our witnesses today about
their experiences, the lessons they've learned, and the
recommendations they have for how Congress can invest in
American research and technology to overcome future pandemics
and scientific challenges
Chairwoman Stevens. Thank you, Ranking Member Lucas, and
if there are any other Members who wish to submit additional
opening statements, your statements will be added to the record
at this point. And, at this time, I'd like to introduce our
witnesses.
Our first witness is Dr. Joseph Jay Walsh. Dr. Walsh is
the Interim Vice President for Economic Development and
Innovation for the University of Illinois System, a position he
has held since May of this year. Prior to his position in the
University of Illinois System, Dr. Walsh was a faculty member
and administrator for more than 30 years at Northwestern
University. Dr. Walsh currently serves on the Board of
Directors at MxD (Manufacturing x Digital), and the Board of
Governors at Argonne National Laboratory, among others, and
previously served on the Board of Directors at Fermi National
Laboratory, the Illinois Governor's Innovation Council, the
Naval Research Advisory Committee, and the U.S. Secretary of
Navy Advisory Panel.
Following from Dr. Walsh is Dr. David Stone. Dr. Stone is
the Vice President for Research at Oakland University in
Michigan, where he is also a Professor of Public Health, and a
Professor of Philosophy. Dr. Stone has previously taught and
conducted research at Harvard Schools of Medicine and Public
Health, Tufts University School of Medicine, Sheffield
University in the U.K., and Northern Illinois University. Dr.
Stone's recent scholarship focuses on the nature of
interdisciplinarity, and takes a transdisciplinary approach to
public health, education, and research development. He has also
served as an American Council on Education Fellow, as President
of the National Organization of Research Development Fellows,
and is a member of the charter class of NORDP Fellows.
Our third witness is Dr. Theresa Mayer. Dr. Mayer is the
Executive Vice President for Research and Partnerships at
Purdue University. In this role she oversees the University's
research enterprise, and supports engagements with Federal,
industry, and global strategic partnerships. Prior to her role
at Purdue, she served as Vice President for Research and
Innovation at Virginia Tech, and in a number of roles at Penn
State University, including Associate Dean for Research and
Innovation and Engineering, the Site Director of the NSF
National Nanotechnology Infrastructure Network, and Director of
the Materials Research Institute Nanofabrication Laboratory.
Dr. Mayer is also a member of the U.S. President's Council of
Advisors on Science and Technology, otherwise known as PCAST,
and a Fellow of the Institute for Electrical and Electronics
Engineers.
Our final witness is Mr. Ryan Muzzio. Mr. Muzzio is
currently pursuing a Ph.D. in Physics at Carnegie Mellon
University, where his research focuses on the electronic
properties of novel materials and devices in the 2D regime by
utilizing nano-scaled angle resolved photoemissions and device
fabrication. Mr. Muzzio is also serving as a student volunteer
on Carnegie Mellon's Equity, Diversity, and Inclusion
Committee. This is just an amazing panel. I feel like we could
spend--witnesses, I feel like we could have testimonies
individually, and hearings about what each of you have
dedicated your careers to, so thank you so much for your time
today with this Science Committee.
Our witnesses should know you're each going to get 5
minutes for spoken testimony, and your written testimony--which
these testimonies, folks, are fabulous, OK? I mean, there's
addendums, they're graphs. They're doing research on the
research. It's--this is an amazing moment in time. So your
written testimonies are going to be included in the record for
the hearing, and when you've completed your spoken testimonies,
we're going to begin with questions, and each Member is going
to have 5 minutes to question the panel. And I know we've got a
lot of fabulous Members of Congress here. We're all chomping at
the bit to have this conversation, have this hearing, talk
about our legislation. And we're going to begin with our first
5-minute testimony, we've got the clock buzzing in the
background here, with--we're going to hear from Dr. Walsh. And
so, with that, Dr. Walsh, we'll begin with you.
TESTIMONY OF DR. JOSEPH WALSH,
INTERIM VICE PRESIDENT FOR ECONOMIC DEVELOPMENT
AND INNOVATION, UNIVERSITY OF ILLINOIS SYSTEM
Dr. Walsh. Thank you, Chairwoman Stevens, Ranking Member
Baird, and Members of the Subcommittee. Thank you for inviting
me to testify, and for holding this timely and important
hearing. You asked about the impacts of the COVID-19 crisis on
the research enterprise, and steps Congress can take in
response. In brief, the impacts have been, and could continue
to be, significant, disrupting productivity, the careers of
students and post-docs, and the development of new technologies
that drive the economy. Strong Federal assistance, including
passage of the RISE Act, is needed to help prepare--repair the
damage to America's research universities and researchers. In
my written testimony I documented the challenges we face and
the actions to take. Here I will focus on the pandemic's
harmful impact on research, the consequences to the Nation's
research infrastructure, the effects on our students and
researchers, and the role the Federal Government can take going
forward.
Research universities train students, produce graduates,
and conduct research that leads to new knowledge. They also
provide the infrastructure that serves as the backbone for the
Nation's research and development enterprise. The resulting
outputs drive U.S. economic prosperity, and are the foundation
for the country's health, well-being, and national security. In
their role as researchers, every faculty member at a research
university should be viewed as the sole proprietor of a small
business, a research group. Each is an entrepreneur striving to
produce two key products, new knowledge and graduates.
The impact of the pandemic for these small business
owners, the researchers, has been significant. In March, to
protect health and safety, most universities shut down on-
campus operations. By most estimates, in the early spring of
2020, approximately 80 percent of all research was
significantly slowed or stopped. One key exception was research
into solutions to address COVID-19. As the pandemic raged, our
faculty and staff developed new diagnostics, manufactured PPE,
and developed models and systems to understand and mitigate the
spread of the virus. In late spring university researchers
cautiously started returning to campus, and, as we entered late
summer, most on-campus labs are operational, but with social
distancing limiting the number of researchers in a lab space,
vital person-to-person exchanges are disrupted, as is the
research training of students and post-docs in the discovery of
new knowledge.
The pandemic's disruptions have also extended to essential
research infrastructure. Nearly every researcher uses core
university research facilities with shared scientific
instrumentation. This is an efficient and effective aspect of
the U.S. research enterprise. The financing of these core
facilities comes from fees paid from grants by users. For
example, when a grad student uses an electron microscope to
study the spiky surface of a virus, grant funds are used to pay
the costs of using that microscope. During the pandemic,
researchers are not using these facilities at pace, user fees
are not being collected, and thus university funds must be used
to maintain facilities. This is not sustainable, particularly
at universities that are already struggling to cover the many
other costs associated with the pandemic.
While its impact has been broad, the pandemic has been
particularly harmful to certain categories of researchers. In a
study I co-authored recently in Nature, we found that
scientists with young children experienced a substantial
decline in productivity. This burden falls on early career
researchers, and disproportionately on women.
Today, maintaining the momentum of research, indeed
accelerating our activities, when we are in a war against the
disease, is our challenge and our opportunity. Strong and
timely Federal actions are needed to ensure that the U.S.
maintains its prominent global position in research, and that
research universities can continue to provide answers and
opportunities for citizens at this crucial time in history.
Without supplemental funding from Congress for relief, Federal
research agencies will be forced to choose between abandoning
new research opportunities of national importance, or
discontinuing research projects that are not yet completed,
thus failing to maximize the return of Federal dollars already
invested. Either approach will slow discovery and innovation,
and jeopardize a generation of scientists and engineers crucial
to America's innovation capacity and economic competitiveness
for years to come. Passage of the RISE Act and Supporting Early
Career Researchers Act will help propel our researchers and our
Nation forward. I thank you for your time, and look forward to
your questions.
[The prepared statement of Dr. Walsh follows:]
[GRAPHIC(S) NOT AVAILABLE IN TIFF FORMAT]
Chairwoman Stevens. And next up is Dr. David Stone.
TESTIMONY OF DR. DAVID STONE, VICE PRESIDENT
FOR RESEARCH, OAKLAND UNIVERSITY
Dr. Stone. Good afternoon, Chairwoman Stevens, Ranking
Member Baird, and Members of the Subcommittee. Thank you for
allowing me to address you today. Oakland University sits
proudly in Chair Stevens's district, and provides
undergraduate, graduate, professional, and medical education to
about 19,000 students, who come largely from the surrounding
counties in Southeast Michigan. Oakland is classified as a
Research II University, and does provide doctoral training in
physical sciences and engineering that is supported by Federal
research funding. But for the purposes of my comments today,
Oakland is representing, and speaking to the challenges of, the
nearly 400 public universities around the Nation that are
neither State flagship nor land grant institutions. These
regional universities, which include many historically Black
and Hispanic-serving institutions, are the backbone of U.S.
science, engineering, and technologies workforce pipeline. We
accomplish this by providing meaningful research experiences to
our undergraduate students that engage them directly with
faculty in solving real problems and committing--contributing
to the scientific record by publishing their results. As such,
we serve as the launching pad for the majority of STEM
students, including the underrepresented minority students and
first-generation college students who bring a diversity of
experiences, perspectives, and goals to our science and
engineering workforce.
In general, the effects of COVID--of the COVID-19 pandemic
on Oakland University, and other regional universities, mirrors
what you've already heard in terms of disruptions, delays, and
added costs of agency-funded research. At this point only a
third of Oakland University's funded researchers and students
are back in the labs. To give an example, we have a 30-year NIH
(National Institutes of Health) funded study of DNA damage,
which is important to long term space flight. When these highly
productive faculty restarted preparations for their next
experiment at the National Supercomputing--sorry, National
Superconducting Cyclotron at Michigan State, they quickly
realized that the only person on their team who knew how to
fabricate their nanoparticle samples, one Mr. Alex Stark, was
an undergraduate, who was not allowed back in the lab. The
principal investigator petitioned me to make an exception, but
I could not contravene the Governor's executive order. In the
end, this high-powered team had to wait six more very
unproductive weeks to get their expert undergraduate back in
the lab.
The pandemic has imposed a different set of challenges on
Oakland University and other regional universities than just
traditional research grant funding. Support for the high impact
practice of undergraduate research, which we know contributes
to retention and graduation in STEM, and to sustaining the
science and engineering workforce pipeline, comes largely from
the university's general fund, which is derived primarily from
two sources, tuition and State funding. The pandemic has put
both in peril. OU already has incurred more than $25 million in
direct losses to the costs of the pandemic. The State also just
imposed an 11 percent reduction on our State funding for this
year, and prospects look grim for the next two. Here's an
example of what's at stake. Oakland University's world-renowned
Eye Research Institute runs a summer research program that is
funded through our State appropriation. Our super program has
trained 100 undergraduates over the last 20 years. In the early
2000's an undergraduate named Cristina Kapustij conducted
vision research in the Eye Research Institute and co-authored a
scientific paper. She went on to attend law school at
Georgetown, serve as a congressional Health Fellow for
Representative John Dingell, and is currently chief of policy
and program analysis at the National Human Genome Research
Institute. Such is the impact of high-quality State supported
undergraduate research programs.
This combination of operational losses and State budget
cuts in Michigan and around the country will cripple our
ability to provide undergraduate research opportunities, and do
immediate and long-lasting damage to the science and
engineering workforce pipeline. Oakland University fully
supports the RISE Act so that agencies have the funds to help
our investigators complete their research. We also support H.R.
8044 to help our early career investigators keep their research
careers on track. But it is imperative that research funding be
distributed more widely. We all know that life circumstances
distribute talent such that great ideas often come from
unexpected places. This lesson should show us the value of
distributing resources across the spectrum of institutions so
that we imbue our science and engineering workforce pipeline
with the full diversity of experiences, perspectives, talents,
and goals.
America must maintain a robust research enterprise and a
healthy workforce pipeline. It is therefore imperative that you
also complete a fourth stimulus that includes direct university
funding, funding for the research agencies, and relief for
State governments. Failure to do so will have a huge negative
impact on our economy, on the workforce pipeline, and on the
students across our country who have committed their lives and
livelihoods to science. In that spirit, I ask each of you to
support these proposals.
[The prepared statement of Dr. Stone follows:]
[GRAPHIC(S) NOT AVAILABLE IN TIFF FORMAT]
Chairwoman Stevens. Great. Thank you so much. And now
we'll hear from Dr. Mayer.
TESTIMONY OF DR. THERESA MAYER,
EXECUTIVE VICE PRESIDENT FOR RESEARCH
AND PARTNERSHIPS, PURDUE UNIVERSITY
Dr. Mayer. Chairwoman Johnson, Ranking Member Lucas,
Subcommittee Chairwoman Stevens, Ranking Member Baird, and
Members of the Subcommittee, thank you for the opportunity to
testify to the Subcommittee today, and for your efforts to
ensure the CARES Act included funding to help universities
cover the significant costs associated with our ongoing
response to the COVID-19 pandemic. We also greatly appreciate
the flexibilities that Federal agencies have offered
researchers during this national and global emergency. Our 70-
year partnership with the Federal Government has brought our
national unparalleled success in basic research at the
frontiers of science and transformative innovation in
technology and medicine. Most importantly, it has built human
capital. The--this academic talent, research, and tech transfer
will be key in the emerging industries of the future, such as
artificial intelligence (AI), quantum information science, 5G,
advanced manufacturing, biotechnology, and others. Today I'm
pleased to share the perspective I gained leading the COVID-19
research response at Purdue, and through my collaboration with
colleagues in the Big Ten academic alliance and beyond. For
context, Purdue is the State of Indiana's comprehensive public
land grant university, with over 2,200 faculty, 500 post-docs,
and 45,000 students. More than 2/3 of the students graduate in
STEM fields. Purdue is committed to affordability and
accessibility, and has frozen tuition and fees for the last 8
years. We rank as the 6th most innovative university in the
U.S., and are in the top 25 in research expenditures among
publics.
In early March the Nation watched as universities flipped
from residential to remote instruction in a matter of weeks.
The impact on research has garnered less attention by the
media. At Purdue the ramp down of on campus research to remote
research whenever possible occurred over 3 weeks, and involved
over 1,200 principal investigators, with 4,500 funded programs
in 100 campus buildings, ag centers, and sites in all 92
counties of Indiana. Travel restrictions severely limited field
work and halted in person collaborations across the country and
the world. Faculty shared comments such as, ``Fortunately, we
were able to shift non-experimental work with the data we had
in place.'' With a major shift to remote research, on campus
critical research continued. For example, three of our faculty
have been working together for years to develop therapeutics to
fight coronaviruses. NIH is now funding pre-clinical trials to
test their potential drug molecules on the SARS-COVID virus.
In May Purdue implemented a return to operations plan. By
the end of June, nearly all of our 1,200 campus research spaces
and core labs were back online under modified operation. This
translated to access for 7,000 researchers, including 370 post-
docs, more than 3,000 graduate students, and 400 undergrads.
This number does not include researchers who continue to work
entirely remotely. During this time Purdue also collaborated
with Microsoft to create an online tool to quantify the impact
on COVID on sponsor programs. Investigators responsible for the
137 million in expenditures reported effort and financial loss.
The aggregate for Purdue's entire portfolio is 11 percent, or a
$15 million loss on total expenditures. Notably, 50 percent of
the researchers who focus on computation, data science, and
related activities reported little or no impact over this
period. Of those impacted, 70 percent stated restriction access
to facilities as the primary reason for the loss.
The no cost time extensions afforded by the Federal
agencies have been critical. One researcher shared, ``Federal
sponsors have been very open to shifting deliverables and scope
because they understand our situation.'' Other institutional
losses for research included lost revenue for core labs,
facility retrofits, enhanced PPE, testing and contract tracing,
and others, are large, and measured in the tens of millions for
Purdue alone. In addition to the short-term impact and losses,
we expect that researchers will experience ongoing decreased
productivity to reduce capacity and modified operations of
labs, ongoing travel restrictions, absences due to illness,
quarantine, gaps in childcare and school, and many other
factors, what we call our new pandemic normal. There is also
growing evidence that women and other underrepresented groups
in STEM have been disproportionately impacted. The proposed
bipartisan RISE Act, together with the Support for Early Career
Research Act, would provide critical supplemental support
needed to complete work that was directed--disrupted, and to
extend education and training opportunities for early career
researchers to mitigate the potential loss of our best and
brightest STEM talent at this very critical time for the
Nation. Thank you, and I look forward to the Q and A.
[The prepared statement of Dr. Mayer follows:]
[GRAPHIC(S) NOT AVAILABLE IN TIFF FORMAT]
Chairwoman Stevens. Thank you, Dr. Mayer. And now, Mr.
Muzzio.
TESTIMONY OF MR. RYAN MUZZIO, PHYSICS PH.D. STUDENT, CARNEGIE
MELLON UNIVERSITY
Mr. Muzzio. Thank you, Chairwoman Stevens, Ranking Member
Dr. Baird, Congresswoman Johnson, Ranking Member Lucas, and the
entire Subcommittee on Research and Technology, for giving me
the opportunity to testify today. I'm an experimental physicist
and a graduate student at Carnegie Mellon University. For the
past 2 years my work was funded by the Department of Energy,
and is currently funded by the National Science Foundation. I
thank you all for supporting the mission of the Federal
funding--research funding agencies. My doctoral research is
aimed at designing materials as thin as a single layer of
atoms, such as grafting, and studying and exploiting their
properties for real world applications. This research involves
in person operation of instrumentation in enclosed spaces with
my collaborators at Carnegie Mellon, or the Lawrence Berkeley
National Labs in Berkeley, California. My collaborators and I
use the same tools, and at times need to be overlapping in
space, using the same gloves and viewports on instrumentation.
Today none of this work can take place without extreme caution
to prevent the spread of COVID-19.
Just last year I was at Berkeley National Labs learning
how to operate a tool for my collaborators, who had made the
trip to Denmark. This training is integral to my research and
career development. Every year I prepare samples to learn and
perform measurements there. However, due to the lab shutting
down in March of this year, I have not been able to attend in
person measurement sessions. My ultimate goal is to work at a
national lab for an extended period of time, and missing these
sessions impacts my chances of attending--or obtaining such a
position. I've also missed opportunities to work and network
with researchers at conferences.
The pandemic has also drastically slowed my ability to
perform research and make meaningful progress toward my Ph.D.,
and between March and May my work was constrained to performing
only data analysis, and the process was very slow. Now, when I
enter the lab, I must follow tedious, but essential, safety
protocols, including donning PPE, minimizing the number of
people in labs, and wiping down all of the surfaces that we
touch. Social distancing has been difficult because we are
building a new research instrument, which requires multiple
people to work on it in close proximity. In person training is
minimized too, slowing everybody's learning process.
But what I bring to you today are my experiences of just
one graduate student. There are--they are hardly representative
of all of us, and many of us are living in multiple different
realities with this virus. To adapt to operating remote
instruction, we have had to take time away from our research.
Students have been unable to run experiments, brainstorm, and
collaborate due to the lack of in-person activities. Delays in
graduation, hiring freezes that disrupt job searches,
internships, and collaborations are lost. All of these stories
are far too common. Disruptions in the academic job market have
also come at a high cost for us, making it impossible for many
of us to proceed to do--to proceed with research careers. And
we're more than just researchers. We're a linchpin in the
entire university system. We come from all over the world to
conduct groundbreaking research, teach classes, mentor
undergraduates, and without the support--without support, the
United States loses--or risks losing a generation of talent
forever, impeding the pace of innovation in the country, and in
particular in our universities.
That said, academic issues are not all that we are facing
in this pandemic, as I have laid out in my written testimony.
For instance, at Carnegie Mellon, students are using the food
pantry at astonishing rates. Student parents have experienced
the most challenging disruption, and have been forced to juggle
their research and teaching responsibilities while parenting
full time. International students are in particular in a
difficult situation due to travel restrictions. One student
lost both their father and grandmother during the pandemic, but
could not travel home. Beyond this isolation, students have
lived in uncertainty caused by sudden policy shifts, like the
July 6 directive from ICE (Immigration and Customs
Enforcement), requiring them to either attend in person class
or leave the country. Two-thirds of the students at Carnegie
Mellon are international, and many of them are the most
talented individuals I work with.
Ph.D. students report symptoms of--consistent with major
depressive order--disorder at higher rates than ever before.
Personally, my mental health has taken an impact from this
pandemic because of the--because thoughts are constantly
clouding my mind about whether my family, friends, or myself
are going to--furthermore, being a Black man, I have been
deeply affected by the ongoing national conversation about
structural racism, and the calls for change through Black Lives
Matter movement. All of this has taken significant troll--toll
on me. We are not in a bubble.
In closing, graduate school is something we do because we
want to be here, to learn and to work with like-minded
individuals, and to further our collective knowledge of the
world. In the best of times it is intense, and we are not in
the best of times. We need support now more than ever. I look
forward to answering your questions, and hope you continue to
hear directly from graduate students on the front lines of our
Nation's research environment. Thank you, Madam Chairwoman.
[The prepared statement of Mr. Muzzio follows:]
[GRAPHIC(S) NOT AVAILABLE IN TIFF FORMAT]
Chairwoman Stevens. Well, thank you so much. Thank you to
all of you, and, Ryan, thank you for that courageous and
important testimony. We are now going to begin our first round
of questions, and the Chair is going to recognize herself for 5
minutes.
We are here today to talk about the research and
innovation directive of this Nation that is people-fueled by
the universities and the research centers that exist throughout
our country. And certainly today we've had the opportunity to
really hone in on the role that innovation and economic
development play as a cohesive force in communities and
localities across this country. We know that we are at a crux.
We know that we need to unlock the human capital, the talent,
as well as the innovation dollars, the investment dollars.
We've had this conversation before as a Committee in previous
hearings, where we have been able to discuss and hone in on the
principle of where the Federal Government comes in as a
catalytic research partner.
And, Dr. Stone, I really want to commend you for being so
student-focused, and obviously it's very important that we had
Ryan as one of our witnesses giving the background of the
student voice, the student experience. And certainly, in your
testimony, hearing about the Eye Research Lab at Oakland
University, as well as some of the other recent student
experiences that have taken place. And what I'd like to hone in
on is something that this Committee focuses on, particularly in
our role with the National Science Foundation, which is
unlocking the Federal dollars to be of best use for the
ultimate success of the research, and the outcomes of that
research.
And so, if you look at the grants, or the research awards
that you're getting, one, I'm very interested to hear about the
timeframe, and adjustments to the timeframe, and the
flexibility. Two, the additional support that you might need
for safety measures, or protocol, or adjusting to this current
environment, and some of the uncertainty with the timeframe on
that. And then three, Dr. Stone, if you don't mind, also--you
can kind of combine this all into one, but I think what's so
special about what's going on at Oakland University is
something you touched on, being a smaller university that's not
land grant, that's doing a lot with a little, and some of how
you're existing today as a university with the measures that
you put into place as a university to operate right now, or--
with the contact tracing, and some of the testing that you have
going on at the university. And you get a whopping 2 minutes to
answer, David.
Dr. Stone. Thank you, Chair Stevens, and I might ask you
to repeat the first part, since it didn't start as a question,
but let me start with the time loss challenge. As I said, we
are a research--we do do lots of funded research, NIH, NSF, DOD
(Department of Defense), others, and the fact that this far
into the pandemic, only about half our labs are back online at
all, and only about 35 percent of our faculty and students who
are normally paid on funded grants are active in their labs, is
saying to us that the challenge here isn't simply replacing the
2-1/2 or 3 months that we were out of our labs, it's that it's
very difficult, and you heard this a bit from Ryan, to re-think
about how you structure experiments that usually require people
to stand right next to each other, or share a given instrument,
to do that when they have to stay 6 feet apart. I mean, we have
State rules that govern how we can practice research, and, in
doing that, we're seeing that a lot of the research that we're
trying to do is simply impossible with the old ways, and we
haven't yet found the new ways. We are challenging ourselves
every day to think about how can we do that experiment without
violating State rules, without putting students and faculty at
risk of COVID-19, which nobody wants.
So as we think about the needs for the agencies to give us
sort of what's been called, you know, for cost extensions, or
full cost extensions, it isn't simply going to be for the time
that was physically lost in the lab, it's going to need to also
cover the challenges that we have in overcoming how you do
research this way, because we can't do it, in many cases, in
the old way. This is equally a challenge at OU. The reason I
focused on the undergraduate pipeline is that that's critical,
and undergraduate research isn't funded usually by grants, but
is funded by the States, and that's our bigger challenge.
Chairwoman Stevens. Well, we--we're right at time, David,
so I'm going to stop there, but I will loop back at the end
there on that first question. And then, with that, I'm going to
pass it over to Dr. Baird, to keep us on time, for 5 minutes of
questioning.
Mr. Baird. Dr. Mayer, in order not to get into your time,
in your testimony you state you're leading the COVID-19
response for the university-wide research enterprise at Purdue
University, and I know that President Daniels has called the
school back, and the students, they have had quite a challenge,
and made a tremendous effort over the summer to bring the
students back. So would you briefly discuss some of the key
aspects of Purdue's response, and how you're coordinating these
all across Purdue's multiple campuses?
Dr. Mayer. Thank you, Ranking Member Baird, for asking
about the integrated response. It has--I think I begin by
saying that I think for most of us involved in the response
we--and, as you probably say, the--a COVID day is equivalent to
about a week or normal time, so it has been a very intense and
integrated response. The timeline for the research response did
move quite differently than the academic response. We ramped
down over a course of 3 weeks, as we--as I indicated, shut down
or ramped down activities remaining with critical research
activities. We were fortunate, in the State of Indiana, that we
were able to maintain a fairly large level of activity. We had
over 400 labs that were able to continue to work at reduced
capacity.
And one thing that I'd really like to emphasize, I think
this came up before, is that our entire enterprise, from our
faculty to our students, they are flexible and agile, and
they've worked incredibly efficiently to make the best of a
very bad situation, spending the 3 weeks, as we gave them
advance warning about the ramp down, trying to wind down
experiments, collect data so that they could continue to work
efficiently for what was, at that point, an undefined period of
time. But I think that that has really been beneficial in
ensuring that there was some degree of continuity. We've
pointed out that oftentimes missing critical--a lab member can
really disrupt the research, and that has definitely been the
case.
Briefly turning our attention to the ramp up, it really
was a whole of university approach, including the other
campuses, and that we had to, as the research enterprise--it's
not simply about the research labs. And one thing that I'd like
to point out is that we oftentimes think of research labs as
people in white coats next to wet benches, but in a--in our
research enterprise, recall that we are really the feeder to
all industry sectors. What that means is everything from
agriculture, people working in the field, to people conducting
biomedical research, all the way to doing engine research, and
those labs are all distinct. So through this process we worked
with, as Dr. Walsh pointed out, our individual groups in order
to customize the safety measures that they needed to put in
place so that we could meet the safety criteria so that our
faculty and our students could come back and continue the very
important work that they're doing.
We focused on continuing to de-densify campus, and so even
though we have moved to re-open labs, and I did do a poll of
our Big Ten, the range of opening right now is everywhere from
50 percent to providing access to labs, but that does not mean
that the labs look the way that they did before. We're
operating--many are operating remotely. We are asking our
students, whenever possible, to work remotely, and we have to
reduce the overall capacity at any given time, so that's really
changing the way that we're doing work. We're moving into what
we're calling the new pandemic normal, and so the amount of
effort--I think this was an earlier question. COBRA did a very
interesting study, and projected that the cost of doing
research under the new pandemic normal, under these modified
operating conditions, will be higher than previously, so we
need to take all of these measures into consideration. But it
has been a whole of university approach. There's not a single
group that we haven't worked with, and I just really want to,
once again, recognize all of the tremendous faculty, and
students, and post-docs for all of the efforts, and trying to
make the best out of a very bad situation. Thank you.
Mr. Baird. I appreciate you remind me of the term de-
densify. That's what we use in this situation, de-tensify. So I
yield back.
Chairwoman Stevens. Great. And, with that, recognizing
Chairwoman Johnson for 5 minutes of questions.
Chairwoman Johnson. Thank you very--am I muted? Can you
hear me?
Chairwoman Stevens. Yeah, we can hear you just fine.
Chairwoman Johnson. OK. Thank you very much. I guess I
would like to point this question to all of our witnesses, but
most especially to Mr. Muzzio. I'm very concerned about the
potential loss of talent due to the contraction of the academic
work market. The unprecedented financial strain on universities
has led some institutions to implement hiring freezes, which
threatens to derail recent graduates and post-docs at a
critical point in their career. This potentially irreversible
loss of talent from the research pipeline could have lasting
negative consequences for the U.S. innovation and economic
competitiveness. Can you talk about what is needed to help the
recent Ph.D. recipients weather this crisis? And I know that
several Members of the Committee have introduced this bill to
establish a new $250 million fellowship program at the National
Science Foundation. Could you also give us some thoughts on
this bill and the Supporting of Early Career Researchers Act?
So let me--I'd like to hear from all of you, but I'd especially
like to hear from Mr. Muzzio.
Mr. Muzzio. Thank you very much for that question. So I
will say that I definitely support, and I know that the
Carnegie Mellon Graduate Student Assembly, and the MIT
(Massachusetts Institute of Technology) Graduate Student
Council, both support this bill. And I think that it will
certainly allow these fine students, who are, for one, as I
said, very good at what they do, as they are the expert in
their field, but also they are struggling to graduate. And so--
I'll get to that point in a second, but if they are able to
take this money with them and be funded through the NSF, and
bring themselves to a different lab, this will certainly help
them, there's no question about it. And they will be able to--I
think that that will open up doors, as I said.
But, to kind of go back to my earlier point about them
struggling, one student in particular reached out to me and was
telling me that he's trying to graduate. It's already been
pushed--his graduation date has already been pushed back by 6
months or so, and--or, sorry, about 4 months, and he's trying
to get data by going into the lab about once a week, which
usually he's working 6 days a week, and then, on top of that,
he's having to train students in an emergency way because
during the whole summer he was unable to train his students,
who are being introduced into the lab. And so now he's looking
at the situation as, one, where will I go after I graduate,
with less data than I want to, with less papers than I want to,
which is the fundamental going into the next step, but also how
will I leave my lab in a good situation?
Chairwoman Johnson. Thank you.
Dr. Mayer. If I may?
Chairwoman Johnson. Next witness.
Dr. Mayer. Congressman Johnson, this is Theresa Mayer----
Chairwoman Johnson. Yes.
Dr. Mayer [continuing]. From Purdue University. I want to
add a point that I think is very important to make, and you
made earlier, which is, if we look at the downstream
opportunities currently for the academic enterprise, polling
all of the Big Ten, and this is not uncommon, we are largely
under a hiring freeze scenario for new faculty, and so the
pipeline, the opportunities, the downstream opportunities, are
simply not there. The different industry sectors are being
impacted differently, some continuing to hire, while others not
in a position to hire, and so the support, particularly of the
Early Career Researchers Act, is an essential part of the
solution to ensure that we maintain continuity and provide
opportunities to weather the storm, and allow our enterprises
to recover to provide those downstream opportunities for our
best and brightest to continue in that pipeline.
Chairwoman Johnson. Thank you very much. Any further
comments?
Dr. Walsh. I'll keep mine very short. This is a critical
time in people's careers, when they're just finishing their
Ph.D., and having the support that is in the Supporting Early
Career Researchers Act is really exciting, and will help an
incredible number of students who have put an incredible amount
of time into their STEM education, and allow them to move
forward, and really provide the return on investment that the
U.S. Government and the taxpayers have already put into each of
these folks.
Chairwoman Johnson. Thank you very much. I yield back.
Thank you.
Chairwoman Stevens. Great. Thank you, Chairwoman Johnson.
With that, we'll recognize Ranking Member Lucas for 5 minutes
of questions.
Mr. Lucas. Thank you, Chair. Dr. Walsh, in your testimony
you emphasized the need for U.S. research relief funding to
maintain the continuality of research across disciplines, to
maintain the flow of talent from within and to the U.S., and to
continue to fuel innovation in vital national prosperity and
security. You also mentioned that foreign government investment
in research has not halted, but, in fact, has increased in many
countries during this time. Could you speak to how China's
research enterprise is recovering from the crisis, and, while
you're thinking about that, also elaborate on how the pandemic
would impact global competitiveness if we see dramatic shifts
in research investments around the world.
Dr. Walsh. Representative Lucas, that's--those are great
questions. Regarding China, I would note that Xi Jinping gave a
talk within the last few weeks, and he said that China must
make breakthroughs in core technologies as quickly as possible,
and he was making that statement in regard to the changes that
occurred in the global landscape, in part due to COVID, and in
part due to international relationships. There's a history
within China of taking those statements and turning them into
action, and I think that none of us would be surprised to see
that those actions move forward. Regarding China, I think we
will absolutely see activity. I don't, frankly, know what
they're doing right now, but it is clear that that messaging--
that that was clear messaging that came out of the leadership
in China.
I think you're also going to see a time when there are
very heterogeneous responses to COVID-19. Certainly one of the
things that we have seen in the United States is that different
universities have different responses to COVID-19. You've got a
couple of them represented here, and, as Dr. Mayer has stated,
within the Big Ten, and actually across the major research
universities. You know, she and I have done a lot of--had a lot
of conversations with folks, and seen many different ways of
doing things. Some of these universities are going to pick
paths that move them forward quickly. By the same token, I
think you're going to see countries that look at the landscape
here and decide how much of an opportunity there is to advance
their research, which is what the point of this conversation is
about, and their economies. So the question is, how much of
this is an opportunity to move forward, and how do we move that
forward? I must applaud Congress in moving forward with the
RISE Act, which will allow the research that has already been
funded to be completed, and it won't stop the research that has
been proposed from moving forward also. I'll yield to others.
Mr. Lucas. Dr. Mayer and Dr. Walsh both on this question,
speaking of the nature of universities, I'm a land grant
university graduate, very proud of that, from Oklahoma State
University. Given that both Purdue and the University of
Illinois are land grant institutions, can you elaborate on the
role they played in supporting their communities as they battle
coronavirus, and how your institutions have continued to serve
community engagement during these trying months? Because, after
all, it's research, it's education extension, the land grant
principles. Either one of you.
Dr. Mayer. Thank you, Chairman Lucas. I really appreciate
you asking that question. The engagement portion of our mission
is an essential--the third leg of the stool, so to speak, for
our land grant institutions, and we've continued to support, in
multiple ways, including through our agricultural extension,
working hand in hand with our communities around the State,
continuing to ensure that--understandings from disruptions due
to COVID as individual farmers are concerned about supply chain
disruption. We also have a manufacturing extension program that
is very actively engaged. They worked hand in hand with small
manufacturers across the State to basically transition to being
able to help to supply critical PPE to the country. We also
have a health care advisor team that is working with
communities. Particularly, I think, what we're finding is that
during the COVID time we are finding increased use of opioids,
and they work hand in hand with our public health officials in
individual communities to really try to engage in educational
opportunities as we think about the interrelation between drug
addiction, mental health, and our--the current crisis that
we're facing.
Mr. Lucas. With that, Chair, I see my time's expired. This
has been a very worthwhile hearing, and I remind my colleagues
the U.S. Congress controls the purse strings. Yield back.
Chairwoman Stevens. Thank you. And, with that, the Chair
is going to recognize Dr. Bill Foster for 5 minutes of
questions.
Mr. Foster. Well, thank you, Chairwoman Stevens, and
Ranking Member Baird, and our witnesses for joining us today.
And I'd like to continue Ranking Member Lucas's observations
about the importance to note the contributions that university
researchers are making to combat COVID-19 in their communities
and their States.
Dr. Walsh, the University of Illinois system has developed
a comprehensive approach, which is called SHIELD, that includes
rapid saliva tests that are developed at Urbana-Champaign, and
is being performed on as many as 15,000 students per day. And I
was especially at how quickly this has been deployed to other
smaller institutions, such as Northern Illinois University,
which I believe at least one of our witnesses has some history
with. And, you know, although the SHIELD Program itself has
been entirely funded by the U of I, and indirectly by the much-
maligned State of Illinois, Federal grants helped develop the
ecosystem that allowed for this rapid development. Dr. Walsh,
can you explain how Federal funding contributed directly and
indirectly to this breakthrough, and how the Federal Government
can help expand SHIELD and programs like it?
Dr. Walsh. Representative Foster, thank you very much.
You're right, we developed very quickly a saliva-based test for
COVID-19 that has sensitivity and specificity that's sufficient
to help us mitigate the spread of the virus, that has a
turnaround time that allows us to isolate and quarantine folks
quickly, that we can do in reasonably high frequency, so it's
low cost, and it's non-invasive because it's saliva-based. The
whole process started in late March, actually. These were
federally-funded researchers who were doing work on other
viruses, or a variety of different chemical reactions, and they
pivoted their work to develop a new way of doing polymerase
chain reaction, PCR-based measures of the nucleic acids within
the viruses. That work, as I said, pivoted, and within a month
or so, using labs that had been federally-funded for a long
period of time, came up with a new method of isolating the RNA
within those viruses.
Then there was a question of where does the University of
Illinois at Urbana-Champaign put a lab that can do human
testing? And the answer was, well, we have a veterinary school,
we can do it there. So there was a veterinary lab that had been
federally-funded for quite some time that was repurposed for
human testing, and that's where the tests are being run. Fast
forward to now, as you mentioned, we're testing up to 15,000 a
day. The average is actually 70,000 a week, and we're catching
very early in the process folks who are usually asymptomatic--
not usually, almost entirely asymptomatic, but carriers of the
virus, and we're isolating them from the rest of the community,
contract tracing, and moving their contacts to quarantine.
We've spread this across other universities, the publics, the
R-2s and R-3s across our State, and we are now talking also
with communities across the State of Illinois. So, going back
to the land grant mission, we view this very much within our
land grant mission to spread the use of this technology quickly
across the State so that others could take advantage of the
ability to detect COVID-19, too----
Mr. Foster. Well, thank you, that's a real success story
that we shouldn't be shy about letting the world know about.
You know, I am also very worried that we're going to see a so-
called K-shaped recovery, where the wealthy institutions with
billion-dollar endowments recover relatively quickly, while the
smaller, less wealthy universities get left behind. And, you
know, Dr. Walsh, you actually published an opinion column that
touched on this, about how the pandemic is transforming the
entire research ecosystem, and so I was interested in, you
know, what are some of the implications of that transformation,
and what should we do--in Congress be doing about this?
And, you know, in particular, and this is, I guess, a
question for any witness who wants to take it, you know, given
the disparate impact of COVID on--in different fields, you
know, for example, researchers in computational biology, field
biology, or laboratory biology would be impacted very
differently by COVID, is it better for Congress and the
agencies to distribute relief directly as grants to researchers
and students, or to contribute the relief funds to research
institutions, and let the institutions allocate that money to
their researchers and labs? Or do we do a mixture of both? Does
anyone have an opinion on what the best approach is there?
Dr. Walsh. I see the time that we have here, and I'm going
to keep this----
Mr. Foster. OK.
Dr. Walsh [continuing]. Short. I think you give it to the
researchers. I think that, you know, you give it, through the
agencies, to the researchers, and, for the most part, that's
the best way to move forward on this. But I would love to hear
others' opinion.
Mr. Foster. OK. Thank you, and anyone who wants to respond
for the record, please feel free, because we're faced with that
kind of decision all the time in these emergency relief
programs. Thank you, yield back.
Chairwoman Stevens. I swear 5 minutes is not the same 5
minutes over virtual as it is in the hearing room. It's a
shorter 5 minutes, so thank you, Bill, that was--those are
great, and we do want to keep gnawing on that, so why don't we
try and get that for the record? But, with that, we've got a
couple other Subcommittee Members in the queue, and we're going
to start with Congressman Balderson. 5 minutes of questions.
Mr. Balderson. Thank you, Madam Chair Stevens. Good to see
you this afternoon, early afternoon. Thank you, panel, for
being here. My questions are for the whole panel, and anybody
can just take the liberty to jump in, Columbus is home to one
of Nation's largest and most vital research institutions, the
Ohio State University (OSU). It is essential to my district,
and the Nation, that researchers at OSU are able to continue
their great work in partnership with the Federal Government and
private partners. I'm hoping you all could tell us a bit about
how each of your institutions have been navigating this crisis
from the beginning. In terms of strategies to overcome the
challenges posed by COVID-19, what have you found that has
worked, and what has not worked? I believe the collective
knowledge of your experiences could ensure the entire research
apparatus continues to succeed in these trying times. And any
of the panelists may start off.
Mr. Muzzio. I can give a little bit of background what it
was like to be in the lab. So, upon returning from the canceled
March meeting, I was working in the lab, trying to do as much
as I could, knowing the impending shutdown of the lab, and we
eventually had to close all of the labs and go home, and work
from home for about two or so months. And during that time,
apart from the lack of productivity, we started to write up
documents and order PPE equipment just in preparation for all
of the things that we were going to have to do in order to be
safe.
So we, my lab, were approved to be one of the first labs
back onto campus, and that--the way that we did that is by
applying, and it went through many sectors of people who are
experts in this sort of information, which I can get more
information later, but not right now, of who they are. But we
went through all of them, and we were finally approved, and so
ultimately we are now in the lab, and there's other labs that
are back, but we all have our protocols, and we're all, you
know, signing into different--or you have to sign in to all the
different doors and everything like that to ensure that people
are safe, and to minimize this risk. But there's always that
impending potential for the lab to shut down again. So that's
my experience----
Dr. Mayer. I'll just add a----
Mr. Balderson. Thank you.
Dr. Mayer. I'll add a few words. I described our
experience at Purdue. During my oral remarks, I underscored the
strong collaboration. That was a strong collaboration. Regular
bulletin boards, our listservs, were lighting up virtually
every minute for periods of time, particularly during the ramp
down. That included the Big Ten Academic Alliance, and so in
regular contact with my counterpart at Ohio State and other
universities. And, in fact, we iterated with one another to
inform and learn as different people were in different stages
of both the ramp down as well as the recovery.
I also want to underscore the importance of the APLU, the
American--well, the Association for Public and Land Grant
Universities, which is a network of public institutions across
the country that includes R-1s and R-2s, and I think, through
that network, once again, we were able to share best practices,
and so it's been a highly collaborative and engaged process,
and continues to be. When I was preparing, I very rapidly
reached out to the Big Ten, and had immediate responses in
terms of just being able to share where they are in the
recovery.
Mr. Balderson. Thank you.
Dr. Walsh. I want--just a couple quick things. Actually,
virtual meetings are interesting, in the sense that they work,
in a lot of ways, really well. You can go and you can listen to
a talk that you wouldn't normally be able to go to because it's
really easy to get there, OK? There are aspects of it that
don't work, because you can't do networking there, but there
are aspects that work. Opening up the labs has actually worked
really well. The coronavirus is not spreading in the labs.
These are folks, you know, we have a grad student here, who
know how to put on protective equipment, and know how to use
it, and you don't get a lot of spread of the virus. What
doesn't work for those students, especially for the new
students, is training them. It's hard to stand shoulder to
shoulder with a brand-new student and teach them how to turn a
knob, how to, you know, how to operate a piece of equipment,
and especially how to do that safely.
The other thing that's not working really well is core
facilities. I mentioned that earlier. Representative Foster
asked where should the money go, researchers or institutions?
Core facilities. A nanofabrication lab, you have to have
funding for that that goes directly to the institution to fund
that sort of thing. All right.
Mr. Balderson. Thank you all very much. Thank you,
Chairwoman Stevens.
Chairwoman Stevens. Yeah, great question, great responses.
And, with that, we've got Congressman Anthony Gonzalez here for
5 minutes of questions.
Mr. Gonzalez. Hello. Thank you, Madam Chair, for convening
this hearing, and thank you, everybody, for all that you're
doing during this pandemic. Certainly a unique time. I wanted
to start with Dr. Walsh, if I could, or anybody who has insight
on this. It's obviously been a massive disruption, from a
research standpoint, but, you know, what are we learning from
other countries with respect to how to continue the research
enterprise, and are we falling behind? I think it's obvious
that, you know, our research enterprise is being damaged by the
COVID-19 pandemic in certain ways, but, relative to our
competitor nations, how do you feel we're stacking up, and what
can we learn from them, in terms of overcoming these barriers,
and getting back on par?
Dr. Walsh. So, you know, there's a couple of answers to
that question. One is, frankly, it's early to tell exactly what
every country is doing. I'm not sure you were in the room
earlier, I mentioned that China is looking to move forward in
funding of core technologies, which generally I would take as
AI, quantum----
Mr. Gonzalez. Yeah.
Dr. Walsh [continuing]. Those sorts of technologies. And,
you know, I suspect what you will find is that other nations
will put substantial resources at this time into technologies
that will move their ecosystems, in particular their innovation
ecosystems, their economic ecosystems, and their national
security, that they will move those forward. That's what I
expect.
Mr. Gonzalez. Thank you. And, you know, I think you
highlighted a longstanding issue, which is one that I've been
talking about in this Committee for the last year and a half,
or almost two years now, which is chronic underfunding, and
lack of focus, in my opinion, from the Federal Government with
respect to how we fund our research enterprise. I'm somebody
who wants to significantly increase the funding that we provide
to the basic research space because it's, you know, it's my
opinion that that's an investment, that's money incredibly well
spent. And, you know, in a world where we're competing on every
major technological innovation with the Chinese Communist
Party, those are fights that we need to win, frankly, and so I
appreciate what you said there.
Also in your testimony you mentioned the need, or not the
need, but the necessity to reimagine operating assumptions with
respect to our research enterprise as a result of COVID-19.
What could you share in that vein that we all should know
about, and, you know, what learnings might we be able to pass
on to the broader research community as a result of some of
these sort of changed operating assumptions, if you will?
Dr. Walsh. Yeah, I don't think any of us would've imagined
that we would hold a congressional hearing in the way that
we're doing this.
Mr. Gonzalez. Yeah.
Dr. Walsh. I think there are a lot of things that we just
couldn't imagine doing, you know, the better part of a year
ago. We would've all just said this is crazy. I mentioned
earlier you could do virtual meetings. Dr. Mayer and I are
involved with University-Industry Demonstration Program, UIDP.
It sprung out of the National Academies a few years ago. They
very quickly pivoted to a virtual meeting, in March and it went
really well. And what went well about that is that people could
attend that meeting who couldn't normally attend because their
institution didn't have enough funding for them to attend.
So I think what we're going to see is we're going to see
remote meetings, you're going to see remote seminars. You're
going to also see some remote experiments that are done in ways
that couldn't be done previously. You know, you're going to
have a collaborator someplace that you're going to send a
sample to, and they're going to set it up, and you're not going
to have to travel, and actually things are going to get more
efficient because of that. We wouldn't have necessarily thought
of that previously, but I think we're now in a place where
we're being forced to think differently, think outside the box,
and folks aren't saying, you're crazy to do that. Frankly,
we're in a position where we're allowed to do this. So, you
know, back to one of the points I've been making, there's real
opportunity here, and we have to figure out what those
opportunities are.
Mr. Gonzalez. Great. Thank you for that, and I agree,
although I will say in person hearings are significantly more
effective, in my opinion. But, that being said, I will yield
back. Thank you.
Chairwoman Stevens. It's because the 5 minutes goes
quicker over virtual, so----
Mr. Gonzalez [continuing]. But you're probably right.
Chairwoman Stevens. No, great questions by our
Subcommittee Members. And, you know, listen, this is a popular
topic, and everyone's all excited about this legislation we're
doing, and these great topics, and this is why we're on this
Committee. And now we've got 5 minutes of questions from
Congresswoman Bonamici of Oregon here, so pass it over to her.
Ms. Bonamici. Thank you so much, Chairwoman Stevens, and
thanks to the Ranking Member, but thank you to all the
witnesses. I strongly support the bipartisan bills we're
talking about today, the RISE Act, and the Supporting Early
Career Researchers Act, and I'll continue to advocate for their
passage, hopefully in a coronavirus relief package.
But I wanted to talk--Mr. Muzzio, thank you so much for
being here and sharing your perspective. I recall a few years
ago talking with a Ph.D. candidate who was working with NSF and
NASA (National Aeronautics and Space Administration). Because
of the 2013 government shutdown, she missed the window in which
to launch her balloon from Antarctica, and her research was set
back a year. That shutdown lasted 17 days, so if you multiply
that times--so much longer now that we've been dealing with the
pandemic--I've been hearing from graduate students, like you,
who have been forced to set aside their research because of the
pandemic.
And this spring, my alma mater, the University of Oregon,
the physical distancing requirements forced graduate students
in education to halt observations in classrooms that are used
to inform their research. We had archaeology students lose the
opportunity to participate in scheduled summer digs. Those
students aren't alone. According to the recent estimates from
the Council on Government Relations, research universities are
seeing somewhere between a 20 to 40 percent research output
loss just between March of this year and February of next year.
So in your testimony you talked about how these disruptions to
the academic experience have the potential to reduce the number
of people who continue in science, ultimately leading to the
loss of valuable talent. So how can Congress better support
graduate students in not only restarting your research, but
also restoring confidence in the Federal research enterprise to
support the next generation of students?
Mr. Muzzio. Thank you very much for that question, and
thank you for the support on those two bills. And I think that
the--currently, the thing that will have the most immediate and
long-lasting support for graduate students who need it the most
right now will be to support those two bills, the RISE Act, as
well as the Supporting Early Careers Researchers, and--or Act.
And, you know, to support that yourself, but also to get other
people on board with it as well, and--so to have these
discussions and, like, hold hearings like this. And I thank you
so much, and--for having this, for allowing us to have our
voice heard.
Ms. Bonamici. We appreciate your voice very much. And I
saw a lot of heads nodding in the affirmative when my colleague
was talking about increasing the funding for Federal research.
Absolutely agree with that.
Dr. Walsh, Oregon State University is one of the Nation's
leading oceanographic institutions. It operates an oceangoing
research vessel program, and prior to the pandemic, OSU
scientists were scheduled to sail three international ocean
discovery program expeditions this year on an NSF vessel. All
expeditions are postponed at least a year. That creates a sort
of domino effect for delays and cancellations for in demand
research that's already been scheduled. So, in your testimony,
you noted that most researchers have had their work temporarily
halted, derailed, and some regressed. What are the consequences
of disrupting the continuity of research in the short term? How
will those disruptions affect our ability to solve the world's
most challenging programs--or, excuse me, like the climate
crisis, for example, in the long term?
Dr. Walsh. Yeah. So, you know, there's a lot of
heterogeneity here, but in oceanography--and just as
background, I grew up in Woods Hole, so there's an
oceanographic institution there--what ends up happening is they
don't go out, and there's almost always a seasonal component to
that work, and therefore, just as your example of a student not
being able to launch a balloon at a particular time period,
you're going to lose either a significant amount of time
greater than what you would think, or a whole year for that
sort of work. So, in those sorts of cases, the loss is really
significant. And this is why the RISE Act would be tremendously
helpful, and the Supporting Early Career Researchers Act would
be really helpful, so that you have continuity of these
programs.
Ms. Bonamici. Thank you. And, as the clock ticks down, Dr.
Walsh, I want to thank you for your study about the unequal
effects of COVID-19 on women, and you note that female
scientists with young children experienced a substantial
decline in time devoted to research. I've been working on this
issue, so I'm glad you acknowledge the importance of addressing
the need for affordable child care. It comes up in economic
development conversations. We won't restart our economy without
access to child care. It's something the House has recognized,
we passed the Childcare Is Essential Act. And I know that
time's about to expire, so if you can't get an answer in, I'm
going to ask if you would submit for the record, do you see a
role for higher education institutions in helping to fill the
need for child care as a way to help close the gender gap in
science?
Dr. Walsh. Short answer, yes.
Ms. Bonamici. Terrific, thank you. Thanks so much, and I
yield back. Thank you, Madam Chair.
Chairwoman Stevens. Great. Great to have you here. And,
with that, the Chair's going to pass it over to Congressman
Garcia for 5 minutes of questions.
Mr. Garcia. Thank you, Madam Chair, I appreciate it. Thank
you for the panel joining us today, very important discussions.
I'm a proud co-sponsor of the ``Early Career Researchers Act''
myself, so this is of critical importance as we navigate this
really uncharted waters. I really appreciate you guys taking
the time. Most of my questions have actually been addressed
already, so I'll just simply ask a question I think that Dr.
Mayer was touching on earlier. You were mentioning, Doctor,
effectively the second and third order effects as they touch
adjacent industries, whether it's the agricultural businesses,
the pharmaceuticals.
What I'm wondering, and this is really directed to any of
you, have you seen any telltales or indications of impacts to
national security as the result of the strains or delays in any
of the research that we're seeing at any of these major
universities? The reason I bring that up is because that does
help us provide more of an impetus beyond some of the research
that we've been discussing here, and can help us really
translate that to the average American when we start talking
about how this affects frankly, our Nation's security. So I'm
just wondering if we've seen any telltales of that, or if it's
still too early in the development stages of some of the
technology you're dealing with.
Dr. Mayer. I will begin. Just as we touched on the other
areas of research, the critical work that universities conduct
in support of national security has been impacted as well. If
you look at--particularly as we look at the areas--the 11
modernization areas for the Department of Defense, I think many
of our institutions did have that as part of our critical
research----
Mr. Garcia. Um-hum.
Dr. Mayer [continuing]. Lists, so, during the ramp down,
we worked very diligently to try to keep that research moving,
at least in a limited capacity, so we didn't lose access to key
facilities. We have been conducting work in hypersonics
research, for example, and we were able to keep our wind
tunnels operating at limited capacity to continue studies.
Microelectronics is key to the backbone of our national
security, so--as we're looking at all of these areas. But they
really suffered the same level of impact, in terms of lab
closures, in terms of delays in protocols, so it--we didn't see
substantial differences.
Mr. Garcia. OK, thank you.
Dr. Walsh. So, you know, the one quick thing I would say
is that, for national security, and the reason that we've done
well in this country, is we have really great people who are
involved in that, and we have really great technologies.
Mr. Garcia. Absolutely, yeah.
Dr. Walsh. And, you know, and so what you're getting at is
the key component here, and that is, you know, basic research
provides new technologies, and really great people, you know,
the soon to be Dr. Muzzio and his colleagues at Carnegie
Mellon, and across the country. So the two acts that are moving
forward will help mitigate the impact of COVID-19 on
potentially national security issue.
Mr. Garcia. Absolutely. Thank you guys, and thanks again
for your hard work through this very difficult time. I'm sure
we will do everything we can to support you, and I really
appreciate you guys taking the time there. Madam Chair, I yield
back.
Chairwoman Stevens. Thank you, Congressman Garcia. And,
with that, we've got at least one more Member with questions,
and that's Sean Casten, Congressman Casten from Illinois.
Mr. Casten. Thank you, Madam Chair. Thank you all so much.
Dr. Walsh, I want to follow up on some of what you talked about
with my colleague, Mr. Foster. I think what you guys have done
with saliva testing is awesome, but I'm wondering if you could
personalize it a little bit for us. Am I correct, are you based
at--on the--over on the Champaign campus?
Dr. Walsh. I'm with the system, so I'm on all three
campuses.
Mr. Casten. OK. Well, for someone who is a part of that
campus, I mean, the numbers mean something, but if you're based
full time on that campus, whether student or faculty, how often
are you tested?
Dr. Walsh. Twice a week.
Mr. Casten. And how long does it take for your test
results to get back?
Dr. Walsh. So the short answer right now is longer than we
want, which is about a day. We're trying to get that down to
about 6 hours.
Mr. Casten. Wow. And if someone tests positive, what do
you do, practically?
Dr. Walsh. So when they test--when the test results come
out, the positives are turned over to the Public Health
Department--actually, all the data flow to the Public Health
Department--and those are the folks who get in contact with the
students to tell them, or faculty or staff, if they happen to
be positive. Then there's an isolation component that occurs,
so if the student is living in a dorm, we have dorms in which
we can isolate them. If it's a faculty or staff member, then we
ask them to isolate at home. We also contact trace, and that's
done in a couple of different ways, but then those who are
close contacts are quarantined.
Mr. Casten. What I find sort of so cool and so depressing
about that is that at the start of this pandemic we had a lot
of experts testifying that we should do as a country exactly
what you are now doing, you know, rapid testing of everybody,
identify, isolate, contact trace. And kudos to you all for
doing it, shame on us for not.
You know, I know our office is working with some of you
guys about trying to do some of the rollouts. Can you help us
understand, what is constraining your ability to massively ramp
this up, and what, if anything, could lead you to remove those
barriers in Congress?
Dr. Walsh. Yeah. So we've broken up the rollout of SHIELD,
which is what Representative Foster indicated is the name of
this. So SHIELD is on campus. It's being rolled across the
State of Illinois beyond the campuses, and rolled out beyond
the State of Illinois so there's three different levels at
which we're doing it. The biggest challenges that we have are
some supply chain issues, in particular with equipment, and
also, frankly, just training of people to stand up this whole
operation. It is really not just testing. It is an entire
program where you figure out who you want to test, you arrange
for them to be tested, which means you have to go collect a
specimen from them, and then you have the data--so you have a
chain of custody all the way from the beginning, when they walk
in before you, to when you get the results to them, and to the
public health officials. So, you know, the testing is just one
of the hard parts. There are many other hard parts to this
that, very candidly, we're learning every day how difficult
this really is, especially when we move from a couple thousand
a day to 15,000 a day.
Mr. Casten. Full disclosure, when this hearing ends, I
am--I'm off to go meet with some of your colleagues to inspect
some labs up in Northern Illinois that might be able to provide
at least a de-bottleneck up here for some of the community, so
it's--let us know what we can help, and if you have thoughts on
those bottlenecks.
The last thing, just with the time we have left, and I
don't know if you're--you feel sort of qualified to answer this
or not, but, if I'm understanding right, you are doing the
first really large scale testing of asymptomatic populations.
Is it--maybe it's too soon, but are you learning anything about
the virus, and how it spreads, and its dormancy from this
population, or, if you aren't, are there things you expect to
learn from the fact that you now are testing everybody, not
just the people who are symptomatic or were exposed?
Dr. Walsh. Yeah. So there were a few things that we've
learned. Yeah, there are events--this isn't a huge surprise--
there are events that are sort of super-spreader events, and
we've certainly seen those on our campus. I would say there's
one other part to this, and that is we stood this up not only
at three campuses, but also a small university in Southern
Illinois in a relatively sparsely populated county, Bond
County, which has about 17,000 people, and at Greenville
University, which has about 700 folks, and they came in with
the same positivity rate that we've seen at other places, 1
percent, and the short version is they're not spreading within
their campus right now. The only new positives they've had are
people coming from the outside. So we have learned that if you
find the people who are positive, and you remove them from the
community, then, big surprise, the virus doesn't spread.
Mr. Casten. From your lips to God's ears. Thank you, and I
yield back.
Chairwoman Stevens. Great. Well, with that, we've reached
the conclusions of our questions, but certainly not the
conclusion of this topic. And it's fair to say that this
hearing's been very, very informative, and so we want to thank
our witnesses for leaning in with us. I'd also say, to what Dr.
Stone mentioned in his testimony, particularly around the need
for COVID funding to support State budgets, that end up
impacting university budgets. It's been amazing to see what--
the talent coming out of all of these research institutions,
and the talent that one of our soon to be Ph.D.'s is bringing
to his research enterprise, and in particular the rapid
adjustments that our researchers have had to make, and also the
impacts that their talents have brought to combatting COVID-19,
or addressing COVID-19.
Obviously it's nice to hear your overview, Dr. Walsh, and
we've heard from Dr. Foster and, you know, at length about some
of the work that you all are doing with the University of
Illinois system. I would also say, even as a smaller research
institution and university with Oakland University, it--just
hats off to all of you. You know, we've seen OU grads form
testing companies, and implementing different strategies across
the country, as well as what all of you are doing as a smaller
university, and so it's really important, to me, having had the
experience now as a Congresswoman, and in this Committee, but
also previous to coming into Congress, having worked with all
of you, and--not--you personally, but your institutions, and
remaining very excited and enthusiastic. And so we, you know,
are going to continue to come up with the best and most
cohesive strategies, one for human capital and our workforce
potential, which is just such a precious asset for us here in
the United States, and what we all care so much about. Dr.
Baird and I were very pleased to have last year the Building
blocks of STEM Act signed into law which we worked on together,
and it's this joint collaboration, and the dialog that we
insist on having in this Committee to lead to great results.
So, with that, our record is going to remain open for 2
weeks, and this is for any additional statements from Members,
or questions that they might have of you, and so we'll--we can
do some questions for the record. And thank you all so much to
your dedication to your professions. This just--is why we're
here doing this work, and, of course, we appreciate that it's
very Midwestern focused, so it's nice having colleagues from
across the country, you know, seeing what we're doing here in
the heartland. That was not intentional at all, but it's a--
just really a testament to the work that all of you do. And so,
with that, thank you all so much, and I'm going to close out
this hearing, and the witnesses are excused, and the hearing is
now adjourned. Thank you. Thank you all so much.
[Whereupon, at 1:17 p.m., the Subcommittee was adjourned.]
Appendix I
----------
Answers to Post-Hearing Questions
Answers to Post-Hearing Questions
Responses by Dr. David Stone
[GRAPHIC(S) NOT AVAILABLE IN TIFF FORMAT]
Responses by Dr. Theresa Mayer
[GRAPHIC(S) NOT AVAILABLE IN TIFF FORMAT]
Appendix II
----------
Additional Material for the Record
Letter submitted by Representative Eddie Bernice Johnson
[GRAPHIC(S) NOT AVAILABLE IN TIFF FORMAT]