I discussed most of this article during the most recent episode of my podcast, Dylan’s Public Journal. You can find all episodes on Spotify or wherever you get your podcasts.

On February 7, 2025, the National Institutes of Health (NIH) announced that it would change its maximum indirect cost rate for university research grants from 50% in some cases to 15%, as recommended by Project 2025.

The National Institutes of Health (NIH) funds crucial health research to address cancer, diabetes, dementia, and more. NIH funding also boosts the economy, returning >250% of the value invested. Scienceimpacts.org developed a website to depict how funding cuts reduce economic activity and employment nationwide.

As you can imagine, the map ranges from light red (pretty bad) to dark red (very bad). In total, the SCIMaP estimates that scientific research in America will lose $16 billion and 68,000 jobs.

Today, I’ll explore how these cuts to scientific funding will harm both institutions and communities.

My Background

You may or may not already know this, but I possess about four years of scientific research experience. I conducted full-time biochemistry research in a laboratory at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, where we engineered immune proteins for use in cancer immunotherapies.

My post-baccalaureate research focused on two projects involving the immune targeting of somatic mutations expressed in cancer cells. I developed a rapid, high-throughput method for measuring the stability of neoantigen peptide/MHC complexes, which helped to identify which mutated proteins in a patient’s cancer can best serve as antigenic targets (called neoantigens) for T cells to destroy cancer.

I apologize if you’re confused. Major histocompatibility complex (MHC) proteins present antigens to T cells (part of your innate immune system). Neoantigens are polypeptides (a series of amino acids) that possess one or two mutations; they’re a way for your body to tell your cells apart from the cancer. However, because neoantigens are SO similar to your normal self antigens, only a small number of them serve as useful targets for immunotherapy. I hope that explanation helps a little.

My graduate research focused on engineering Class I MHC molecules to break T cell tolerance in cancer. Class I MHC molecules present antigens to killer T cells (CD8), while Class II MHC molecules present antigens to helper T cells (CD4). T cell tolerance is a fancy way of saying that our body deletes any T cell that binds too tightly to our own self antigens, when presented by MHC.

While this prevents autoimmunity, it makes curing cancer through immunotherapy much more difficult. Many T cells that could have killed the cancer were potentially deleted as well. By creating mutagenesis libraries and analyzing them using yeast display and fluorescence-based cell sorting, I found several mutations that stabilized MHC. Alright, I believe I’ve talked about myself enough for one article. Moving on.

Let’s Talk About NIH

Many of the lifesaving medicines we have today - including every one of the 210 new drugs approved by the Food and Drug Administration from 2010–2016 - wouldn’t exist without years of research funded by the National Institutes of Health (NIH). Long before these drugs hit the market, NIH-supported scientists were studying how the immune system fights cancer and how certain hormones control blood sugar. Their discoveries laid the groundwork for pharmaceutical companies to develop targeted treatments that now help millions of people.

For example, NIH-funded research on the PD-1 pathway helped scientists understand how cancer cells evade the immune system, leading to drugs like Keytruda that boost the body’s natural defenses. Similarly, studies on GLP-1 hormones, supported by NIH grants, paved the way for drugs like Ozempic, which helps people with diabetes and even aids in weight loss. These breakthroughs show how public investment in medical research can lead to real-world treatments that save lives and improve health.

Each year, NIH awards over 60,000 grants that directly support studies conducted at more than 2,500 different institutions. These studies involve more than 300,000 researchers, in addition to the business, administrative, and support staff necessary to keep research infrastructure and facilities running smoothly.

The economic contribution of NIH funding throughout the United States is substantial: on average, each dollar of NIH funding generated approximately $2.46 in economic activity. Last year, NIH's investment of $47 billion produced $92.89 billion in economic activity. Every state and almost every congressional district benefit from NIH investment.

For example, in Republican house districts, such as TX-10 (House Rep. Michael McCaul) and TX-25 ( House Rep. Roger Williams ), NIH funding amounts to $86,956,895 and $139,142,905 respectively. These investments not only advance scientific research but also stimulate local economies by creating jobs and supporting businesses related to healthcare and research sectors.

Due to the 15% cap on indirect funding, the University of Illinois system estimates they will lose around $67 million in funding per year, which will affect academic research and the local economy.

Pennsylvania’s 3rd Congressional District (part of Philadelphia) is a hub for cutting-edge health research, home to several leading universities and research institutions, including the Children’s Hospital of Philadelphia, the University of Pennsylvania, and Drexel University. At CHOP, researchers are currently uncovering how high-risk neuroblastoma resists treatment and developing new therapies to improve survival rates and reduce side effects for children with this challenging cancer.

NIH funding plays a crucial role in supporting this research, with the district receiving $747 million in direct NIH funding and an additional $290 million in current indirect costs in 2024. If indirect costs were capped at the 15% flat rate, they would total $112 million, reducing overall indirect costs by $178 million.

What does Project 2025 say about science?

Project 2025 outlined several goals for the administration, related to scientific research. Many of these policies center on The Heritage Foundation’s rejection of climate science and clean energy programs.

Indirect costs. Project 2025 recommended Congress cap the facilities and administrative reimbursement rate for university research to be comparable to rates offered by private organizations, which would require universities to cover much more of their current indirect research costs. The author of the proposal is the director of the Center for Education Policy at the Heritage Foundation, Lindsey Burke, who stated universities use overhead costs to pay for DEI initiatives.

NIH. Project 2025 suggested that Congress consider converting the National Institutes of Health’s grants budget into block grants provided to state governments. Grants comprise a large majority of NIH’s budget: the agency reported spending $34.9 billion of its total $47.7 billion appropriation in fiscal year 2023 on grant awards.

The report also proposed instating term limits for top leaders at NIH. “Funding for scientific research should not be controlled by a small group of highly paid and unaccountable insiders at the NIH, many of whom stay in power for decades,” wrote chapter author Roger Severino, director of the Department of Health and Human Services Office of Civil Rights under Trump’s first administration.

Prioritizing fundamental research over deployment. Project 2025 looked to focus the Department of Energy on fundamental research that the private sector would not otherwise conduct, arguing that many current DOE programs “act as subsidies to the private sector for government-favored resources.” It proposed eliminating many of the agency’s offices focused on energy technology development as well as programs focused on climate change.

Scaling back climate science programs. Project 2025 repeatedly targeted climate science beyond its discussion of DOE. A chapter on White House agencies states that “the Biden administration’s climate fanaticism will need a whole-of-government unwinding.” The chapter author Russell Vought, director of the White House Office of Management and Budget during the last year of the first Trump administration, proposed the White House Office of Science and Technology Policy work to roll back climate initiatives along with policies promoting diversity, equity, and inclusion across science agencies.

Project 2025 also proposed breaking up the National Oceanographic and Atmospheric Administration (which the Trump administration has already done), describing it as “one of the main drivers of the climate change alarm industry.” The chapter author is Thomas Gilman, who served under Trump as the chief financial officer of the Commerce Department, NOAA’s parent agency.

Environmental Protection Agency. Project 2025 proposed subjecting EPA research activities to closer oversight by political appointees, who would be selected more for their management skills than their personal scientific output. Regarding grants, the plan would put a political appointee in charge of determining the distribution of EPA grants and institute a pause for current grants over a certain threshold. The report also suggested the EPA “deputize the public” to scrutinize the agency’s scientific conduct, such as by making data and publications underlying regulations immediately accessible to the public and incentivizing the public to identify scientific flaws and research misconduct.

Tightening research security. Various contributors to Project 2025 proposed to restrict academic and technology exchanges with countries they label as adversaries, principally China. Ken Cuccinelli, who was acting director of the U.S. immigration services agency during the first Trump administration, proposed to “eliminate or significantly reduce the number of visas issued to foreign students from enemy nations.” Similarly, Peter Navarro, a White House trade policy advisor under Trump, proposed to “significantly reduce or eliminate the issuance of visas to Chinese students or researchers to prevent espionage and information harvesting.”

Many ideas for expanding export controls were also floated in Project 2025. Gilman proposed tightening the definition of what fundamental research is exempt from export controls to “address exploitation of the open U.S. university system by authoritarian governments through funding, students and researchers, and recruitment.” He also proposed to expand deemed export controls, which restrict transfers to foreign nationals working in the U.S.

How have Universities responded?

Recent cuts to funding, mass firings, and political edicts over University curriculums prompted an open letter, which was signed by a sizable portion of the nation’s leading researchers, all members of the National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine.

President Donald Trump derided hormone health studies as “making mice transgender” in a March speech to Congress, and his administration has banned words connected to climate science and racial equality at federal agencies and labs.

From Albert Einstein to J. Robert Oppenheimer, scientists have long braved dangerous political moments in public life. For example, many nuclear scientists championed arms control throughout the cold war.

During the first Trump administration, members of the National Academy of Sciences released two open letters that decried the U.S.’s withdrawal from the Paris climate agreement and wider government attacks on science. The March letter, however, represents a first in that it comes from members of all three National Academies and was aimed at the public and lawmakers under the new Trump administration.

However, concerns about the Trump administration’s attacks on their institutions and on immigrant students dissuaded some scientists from signing the open letter, said Steven H. Woolf, Director Emeritus of the Center on Society and Health at Virginia Commonwealth University School of Medicine and one of the letter’s co-authors.

However, some Universities have started to capitulate to the administration’s demands. For example, Columbia University acquiesced to cracking down on student protests and putting its Middle Eastern, South Asian and African studies department under new supervision in March.

Additionally, student scholars face their own persecution. A Harvard Medical School researcher who has been on a scholar visa from Russia was detained at an immigration detention center in Louisiana, and a Turkish student who was studying childhood development at Tufts University was grabbed off a street by immigration officials for writing an opinion piece that was critical of the U.S.’s policy toward Gaza.

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