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NIH Director Nominee Gets Hearing After Delay by Sanders

The Senate Health, Education, Labor, and Pensions Committee will hold a hearing on Wednesday to review President Joe Biden’s nomination of oncologist Monica Bertagnolli to lead the National Institutes of Health. Bertagnolli currently directs the National Cancer Institute, a role she has held for the past year, and previously she was chief of surgical oncology at the Dana-Farber Brigham Cancer Center and a professor at Harvard Medical School. NIH has lacked a Senate-confirmed director since former director Francis Collins stepped down at the end of 2021. Biden nominated Bertagnolli in May, more than a year after Collins’ departure, and HELP Committee Chair Bernie Sanders (I-VT) then refused to hold a hearing on her nomination until the Biden administration offered a “comprehensive” plan for lowering drug prices. In September, Sanders agreed to move forward after the administration struck a deal with pharmaceutical company Regeneron that caps the price of a prospective treatment for COVID-19. Meanwhile, Committee Ranking Member Bill Cassidy (R-LA) is mounting a campaign to reform NIH and is soliciting input on ways the agency could “improve its process for approving federal research grants, better support the biomedical research workforce, bolster collaboration across academia and industry, and increase transparency into agency activities.”

DOE Grant-Vetting Procedures Under Senate Scrutiny

The Department of Energy’s “due diligence” process for vetting prospective grant and loan recipients will be the focus of a hearing on Thursday by the Senate Energy and Natural Resources Committee. Ranking Member John Barrasso (R-WY) has pressured DOE to expand the vetting process after it selected the battery technology company Microvast to receive a $200 million grant despite the company’s connections to China. Microvast disputed claims about the extent of its ties to China, but DOE ultimately rescinded the selection in May without offering a public explanation. Among the witnesses for the hearing is David Crane, DOE’s first under secretary for infrastructure, a role it created to distribute the hundreds of billions of dollars of grant and loan authority provided by the Infrastructure Investment and Jobs Act and Inflation Reduction Act. Also testifying are Jigar Shah, director of DOE’s Loan Programs Office, which received a ten-fold increase in loan authority from the IRA, and DOE Inspector General Teri Donaldson, who has said she needs more resources to properly oversee the acts’ implementation.

Rollout Begins for Nuclear Weapons Commission Report

Leaders of the Congressional Commission on the Strategic Posture of the United States are presenting their final report at a Senate Armed Services Committee hearing on Thursday and at the Atlantic Council think tank on Friday. In light of China and Russia’s buildout of their nuclear weapons arsenals, the commission recommends the U.S. urgently expand its industrial base for nuclear weapons production and the associated weapons-science infrastructure. The commission comments at length on workforce retention and knowledge transfer challenges faced by the National Nuclear Security Administration and offers various recommendations for maintaining the necessary pool of skilled personnel. It also calls for complementary efforts to develop expertise in emerging technologies such as generative AI, quantum computing, and biotechnology to avoid “strategic surprise.” Former NNSA Deputy Administrator Madelyn Creedon chaired the 12-member commission with former Sen. Jon Kyl (R-AZ) as the vice chair.

Experts to Testify on AI Security and Safety

The House Energy and Commerce Committee is kicking off a series of hearings on artificial intelligence, beginning with one on Wednesday on data privacy and another on Thursday on the uses of AI in the energy sector. The committee plans to explore AI applications “across every sector of the economy,” listing telecommunications, healthcare, and emerging technologies as topics for subsequent hearings. Meanwhile, the House Science Committee will hold a hearing on Wednesday titled, “Balancing Knowledge and Governance: Foundations for Effective Risk Management of Artificial Intelligence.” Among the witnesses is Elham Tabassi, associate director for emerging technologies at the National Institute of Standards and Technology, which released an AI Risk Management Framework early this year. Also testifying are Michael Kratsios, who served as U.S. Chief Technology Officer during the Trump administration; Emily Bender, a linguistics professor at the University of Washington; and Caleb Watney, co-CEO of the Institute for Progress think tank. Separately, the National Artificial Intelligence Advisory Committee managed by NIST will meet on Thursday to receive reports from its working groups and an update from its law enforcement subcommittee.

DOE Biological and Environmental Research Advisors to Meet

The advisory committee for the Department of Energy’s Biological and Environmental Research program will meet on Thursday and Friday to discuss progress on two reports the committee is preparing. The first will inform BER’s work to reestablish a research program on the effects of low-dose radiation on human health, and the second will recommend a strategy for creating a “unified framework” for data management and analysis across the biological, environmental, climate, and Earth system sciences. The committee will also hear an update on the recent AI for Science, Energy, and Security report prepared by DOE national lab staff and a presentation on “building a culture of safety and trust in team science.”

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DOE Allocates $7 Billion for Regional Hydrogen ‘Hubs’

Speaking in Philadelphia on Oct. 13, President Joe Biden announced the Department of Energy’s selection of seven regional “hubs” for hydrogen production and distribution that it will support:

• Mid-Atlantic Clean Hydrogen Hub (MACH2) in Pennsylvania, Delaware, and New Jersey
• Appalachian Regional Clean Hydrogen Hub (ARCH2) in West Virginia, Ohio, and Pennsylvania
• Alliance for Renewable Clean Hydrogen Energy Systems (ARCHES) in California
• HyVelocity Hydrogen Hub in Texas
• Heartland Hydrogen Hub in Minnesota, North Dakota, and South Dakota
• Midwest Alliance for Clean Hydrogen (MachH2) in Illinois, Indiana, and Michigan
• Pacific Northwest Hydrogen Hub (PNW H2) in Washington, Oregon, and Montana

Each of the hubs will employ “clean” production methods, such as sequestering the carbon emitted when hydrogen is extracted from fossil fuels or using renewable or nuclear energy to electrolyze water. The $7 billion they will collectively receive, pending successful award negotiations, represents the single largest initiative to commercialize energy technology funded through the Infrastructure Investment and Jobs Act of 2021. DOE intends to spend the rest of the $8 billion the act provided in total for the hub initiative on projects aimed at establishing demand for the hydrogen the hubs produce. The infrastructure act is also providing $1.5 billion for separate initiatives to support clean hydrogen electrolysis, manufacturing, and recycling, and last year the Inflation Reduction Act established tax credits to further boost clean hydrogen.

DOE’s Final Earthshot Targets Home Energy Efficiency

The Department of Energy announced its eighth and final Energy Earthshot on Oct. 12, this one focused on lowering energy bills in affordable housing. The Energy Earthshots Initiative comprises a set of ambitious cost reduction goals for specific technology areas. The Affordable Home Energy Shot aims to reduce the cost of energy-efficiency retrofits by at least 50% and decrease residents’ energy costs by at least 20% within the next 10 years, with a focus on homes occupied by people making less than 80% of the median income in their surrounding area. Late last month, DOE awarded $264 million to 29 basic research projects linked to the first six Energy Earthshots, covering areas such as hydrogen production, carbon storage, offshore wind, and decarbonization of industrial heating processes. DOE will hold a virtual summit to discuss the objectives of the industrial decarbonization Earthshot on Oct. 23.

Board Picked for National Semiconductor Technology Center

Jim Plummer, former dean of Stanford University’s Engineering School, will be the inaugural chair of the National Semiconductor Technology Center’s board of trustees, who will create a non-profit entity to operate the NSTC. Plummer and six other trustees were announced last week by an independent selection committee established by the Commerce Department in June. The other trustees are technology entrepreneur Robin Abrams, former Intel CEO Craig Barrett, former national security official Reginald Brothers, retired IBM executive Nicholas Donofrio, technology entrepreneur Donna Dubinsky, and Carnegie Mellon University engineering and public policy professor Erica Fuchs. Among the board’s first tasks is hiring the executive leadership team for the NSTC, which will aim to boost U.S. semiconductor research and prototyping capabilities via a network of facilities and R&D centers. The CHIPS and Science Act allocated $3 billion to start up the NSTC, with billions more to follow.

Watchdog Criticizes Regulators’ Oversight of Research Reactors

Last month, the Office of Inspector General for the Nuclear Regulatory Commission released a report from a “special inquiry” that deems the agency’s oversight procedures for research and test reactors to be “outdated” and “inadequate.” The inquiry started as an examination of NRC’s oversight of the research reactor operated by the National Institute of Standards and Technology in Gaithersburg, Maryland, which only began restoring operations last spring following a February 2021 radiation incident caused by errors during refueling. The report states that NRC inspectors had not identified earlier incidents in fuel handling at the reactor that could have presented opportunities to address the issue. Expanding its scope to other research and test reactors, the inquiry found it is common for NRC not to directly inspect fuel movement and other activities important to safety. The report spotlights two other facilities where the agency failed to identify problems with fuel operations: the now-decommissioned Aerotest research reactor in San Ramon, California, and the Nuclear Engineering Teaching Laboratory at the University of Texas at Austin, which notified NRC last year it had operated its reactor for nine months with improper fuel.

Psyche Launches, Mars Sample Return Meeting Moved to This Week

NASA’s Psyche mission launched successfully on Oct. 13 after adverse weather caused it to miss its Oct. 12 target date. The spacecraft is scheduled to reach its namesake destination, a metal-rich asteroid, in 2029 and will undertake observations there for at least two years. Due to the launch timing, an advisory panel discussion of NASA’s Mars Sample Return mission that was set for Oct. 13 will now be this Friday. This past summer, Senate appropriators broached the possibility of canceling the flagship mission, and last month an independent review concluded it is facing at least a two-year delay and will likely cost billions of dollars more than expected.

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All times are Eastern Daylight Time, unless otherwise noted. Listings do not imply endorsement. Events beyond this week are listed on our website.

Monday, October 16

IAEA: 29th Fusion Energy Conference (continues through Saturday)

AAAS: 2023 Science, Technology, and Human Rights Conference (continues through Oct. 24)

RAND: “Keeping Up with the Joneses: How Can DOD Address Its Technical Talent Shortage?”
12:00 - 1:00 pm

NSPN: “How To; Now Do - Science Policy Writing for Advocacy Workshop,” part one
6:00 - 7:00 pm

Tuesday, October 17

National Academies: Committee on Biological and Physical Sciences in Space fall meeting
(continues through Thursday)

DOE: Electricity Advisory Committee meeting
(continues Wednesday)

DOD: Microelectronics Commons annual meeting
(continues Wednesday)

National Academies: Action Collaborative on Preventing Sexual Harassment in Higher Education 2023 public summit
(continues Wednesday)

National Academies: Aeronautics and Space Engineering Board fall meeting
(continues Wednesday)

National Academies: “Atmospheric Methane Removal: Needs, Challenges, and Opportunities”
(continues Wednesday)

Hoover Institution: Conversation with FBI Director Christopher Wray on “Emerging Threats, Innovation, and Security”
10:30 am PDT

National Academies: “Exploring Principles and Practices for Ethical Science Communication within Community Engagement”
11:00 am - 12:45 pm

National Academies: “Accelerating Decarbonization in the United States: Technology, Policy, and Societal Dimensions,” report release webinar
12:00 - 1:15 pm

National Academies: “Global Microelectronics Models for the Department of Defense in Semiconductor Public-Private Partnerships,” meeting
12:00 - 1:00 pm

American Academy of Arts and Sciences: “Becoming Interplanetary and Action for Spaceship Earth”
5:00 - 7:15 pm

Wednesday, October 18

LEAPS: League of European Accelerator-based Photon Sources meeting
(continues through Friday)

University of Maryland: Workshop to plan for a replacement reactor and accompanying facilities for NIST and the nation
(continues through Friday)

Senate: Hearing to consider the nomination of Monica Bertagnolli to be NIH director
10:00 am, Senate Health, Education, Labor and Pensions Committee

House: “Strengthening Biosafety and Biosecurity Standards: Protecting Against Future Pandemics”
10:00 am, Oversight and Accountability Committee

House: “Safeguarding Data and Innovation: Building the Foundation for the Use of Artificial Intelligence”
10:00 am, Energy and Commerce Committee

Brookings: “2023 Department of Defense Strategy for Countering Weapons of Mass Destruction”
10:00 - 11:30 am

FLC: “Meet the NIST Information Technology Laboratory”
1:30 - 2:30 pm

House: “Balancing Knowledge and Governance: Foundations for Effective Risk Management of Artificial Intelligence”
2:30 pm, Science Committee

Senate: “Promoting Safety, Innovation, and Competitiveness in U.S. Commercial Human Space Activities”
2:30 pm, Commerce, Science, and Transportation Committee

Thursday, October 19

DOE: Biological and Environmental Research Advisory Committee meeting
(continues Friday)

National Academies: Committee on Planetary Protection fall meeting
(continues Friday)

National Academies: “Building STEM Ecosystems for Our Communities”
(continues Friday)

National Academies: “Developing New Approaches to Promote Equitable and Inclusive Implementation of Open Scholarship Policies: A Workshop”
9:00 am - 2:30 pm

House: “Can It Work? Outside Perspectives on DOD’s Replicator Program”
9:00 am, Armed Services Committee

Senate: “Hearing to receive testimony on the findings of the Congressional Commission on the Strategic Posture of the United States”
9:30 am, Armed Services Committee

Senate “DOE’s Decision-Making Process for Awarding Competitive Loans and Grants Funded Through the Inflation Reduction Act and the Bipartisan Infrastructure Law”
10:00 am, Energy and Natural Resources Committee

House: “IP and Strategic Competition with China: Part III – IP Theft, Cybersecurity, and AI”
10:00 am, Judiciary Committee

SSURF: Society for Science at User Research Facilities annual meeting
10:00 am - 5:00 pm

NIST: National Artificial Intelligence Advisory Committee meeting
10:00 am - 1:30 pm

House: “The Role of Artificial Intelligence in Powering America’s Energy Future”
10:30 am, Energy and Commerce Committee

NASA: Science Mission Directorate town hall
1:00 - 2:00 pm

NASA: Earth Science Advisory Committee meeting
1:00 - 3:30 pm

Lemelson Center: “New Perspectives on Energy Innovation”
1:00 - 3:30 pm

Issues in Science and Technology: “Have We Been Looking for Interdisciplinarity in All the Wrong Places?”
3:00 - 4:00 pm

Hoover Institution: “Deepening US-Taiwan Cooperation through Semiconductors”
5:00 pm PDT

Friday, October 20

National Academies: “Future Directions for Southern Ocean and Antarctic Nearshore and Coastal Research,” report release webinar
12:00 - 1:00 pm

NASA: Mars Exploration Program Analysis Group meeting
12:00 - 3:30 pm

Atlantic Council: “A Strategic Posture for a New Era: Introducing the Congressional Strategic Posture Report”
3:00 - 5:00 pm

Monday, October 23

Planetary Science Institute: Workshop on EDIA for Leaders in Planetary Science
(continues through Wednesday)

National Academies: Roundtable on Global Science Diplomacy fall meeting
8:30 am - 5:00 pm

DOE: Industrial Heat Shot Summit
11:00 am - 5:00 pm

Columbia University: “Artificial Intelligence for Energy: AI and Energy Technology Discovery”
12:00 - 1:00 pm

National Academies: “Carbon Utilization Infrastructure, Markets, Research and Development,” meeting on coal waste separations
1:00 - 2:20 pm

Wilson Center: “Dreams for a Decade: International Nuclear Abolitionism and the End of the Cold War”
4:00 - 5:30 pm

Know of an upcoming science policy event either inside or outside the Beltway? Email us at fyi@aip.org.

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Science Societies Seeking Policy Fellows

Science policy fellowships sponsored by several scientific societies are currently open for applications including the American Institute of Physics, American Physical Society, Optica, American Geophysical Union, American Association for the Advancement of Science. Application closing dates and requirements vary by program.

Science and Technology Policy Institute Hiring Fellows

The Science and Technology Policy Institute is accepting applications for its two-year fellowship. Fellows will support research that informs leaders in the White House Office of Science and Technology Policy as well as various federal research agencies. Applications are due Jan. 15, 2024.

Academies Environmental Research Boards Hiring Director

The National Academies is hiring a director for its Board on Atmospheric Sciences and Climate and its Polar Research Board. Applicants must have at least ten years of related professional experience, with five years in a supervisory capacity. Applications are due Oct. 25.

Know of an opportunity for scientists to engage in science policy? Email us at fyi@aip.org.

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News and views currently in circulation. Links do not imply endorsement.

White House

White House: Upgrading the US–Singapore strategic technology partnership
White House: US–Singapore critical and emerging technology dialogue: Joint vision statement
Issues in Science and Technology: Interview with OSTP Director Arati Prabhakar
OSTP: RFI to support the development of a federal environmental justice science, data, and research plan
OSTP: Readout of low Earth orbit R&D workshop
Politico: White House AI order to flex federal buying power
White House: Investing in America to create fair and competitive markets (perspective by Heather Boushey)

Congress

Washington Post: What the House speaker fight means for a possible government shutdown
Politico: How a billionaire-backed network of AI advisers took over Washington
Sen. Chuck Schumer (D-NY): Majority Leader Schumer statement following meeting with Chinese President Xi Jinping
House Education Committee: Republicans introduce bill to deter foreign adversaries’ influence in postsecondary education
Rep. Andrea Salinas (D-OR): Bipartisan bill to accelerate quantum R&D introduced by Salinas and Rep. Jim Baird (R-IN)
CSET: FY2024 NDAA emerging technology provisions tracker

Science, Society, and the Economy

ITIF: Unpacking the Biden administration’s strategy for technical standards: The good, the bad, and ideas for improvement
South China Morning Post: China to impose ‘ethics reviews’ on research covering humans, animals, and AI
New York Times: The quest for scientific certainty is futile (perspective by Adam Mastroianni)
The Guardian: Climate expert ‘sacked’ after refusing flight to Germany over carbon emissions
FAS: Federation of American Scientists announces public service awards recognizing outstanding work in science policy and culture

Education and Workforce

Chronicle of Higher Education: China was long the top source of foreign students in the US, but India has overtaken it
National Academies: Three new issue papers on sexual harassment
Nature: International Astronomical Union revises harassment policy after outcry
Inside Higher Ed: Do ‘women in STEM’ programs violate Title IX?
The Times: Science can’t afford to make light of ‘creeping wokeism’ (perspective by John Womersley)
Times Higher Education: AI seen as benefit in judging admissions essays

Research Management

Nature: How ChatGPT and other AI tools could disrupt scientific publishing
Nature: ChatGPT use shows that the grant-application system is broken (perspective by Juan Manuel Parrilla)
Scholarly Kitchen: AI and scholarly societies (perspective by Robert Harington)
Nature: Dear journals: Stop hoarding our papers (perspective by Dritjon Gruda)
Scholarly Kitchen: The peer review renaissance: An urgent call for transformation (perspective by Roohi Ghosh)
COGR: Analysis of NIST Safeguarding International Science Research Security Framework
ITIF: The US approach to quantum policy
The Guardian: Some Nobel winners are great intellects, others are lucky. There’s more to science than these prizes (perspective by Martin Rees)

Labs and Facilities

DOE: DOE selects Jefferson Lab as director of the High Performance Data Facility hub
Sandia National Lab: Scorpius images to test nuclear stockpile simulations
NASA: NASA targets 2024 for first flight of X-59 experimental quiet supersonic aircraft
Bloomberg: ITER looking to rehire retired engineers to recover knowledge
Science|Business: EU and Japan agree to share supercomputers in groundbreaking deal
South China Morning Post: China builds world’s largest deep sea telescope to hunt for cosmic neutrinos
CERN: CERN joins with leaders from research and industry to propose an Open Quantum Institute
Symmetry: CERN opens Science Gateway

Computing and Communications

EE Times: Understanding the big spend on advanced packaging facilities
Texas A&M Today: Texas semiconductor summit highlights potential for state to lead manufacturing surge
Reuters: Rule curbing AI chip exports to China under final review
ChinaTalk: CHIPS China guardrails: Labor hawks vs industry doves
IEEE Spectrum: Despite Chinese export controls, chipmakers and others who use gallium or germanium haven’t faced much difficulty
Reuters: South Korean firms get indefinite waiver on US chip gear supplies to China
SpaceNews: Ligado sues US government for using its roadblocked 5G spectrum
Wall Street Journal: America’s ‘gold standard’ GPS risks falling behind rival systems

Space

SpaceNews: NASA considering budget cuts for Hubble and Chandra space telescopes
Planetary Society: The future of Mars Sample Return
NASA: NASA’s Bennu asteroid sample contains carbon, water
SpacePolicyOnline: NASA IG skeptical of major SLS cost savings from services contract
DARPA: Accelerating interoperability standards for commercial lunar infrastructure
Wall Street Journal: The next big solar storm could fry the grid
Vox: Real scientists are searching for alien life. Don’t let the kooks distract you (perspective by Robin George Andrews)
SpaceNews: NASA expands purchase of commercial Earth-observation data with latest award

Weather, Climate, and Environment

Nature: The pandemic and the invasion of Ukraine have had a significant impact on international collaboration and field access in polar research
NOAA: NOAA invests $26 million to improve NOAA forecasts of droughts and floods through public-private partnership
Washington Post: Weather Service director works midnight shift in forecasting first
E&E News: New National Weather Service deputy director: ‘We need to definitely up our game’
Physics World: Physics for fairness: Tackling global sustainability challenges through science (audio)
Science: Defining sustainable chemistry — an opportune exercise? (perspective by Vânia Zuin Zeidler)
Science, Technology, & Human Values: The birth of green chemistry: A political history (paper by Laura Maxim)
E&E News: Supreme Court rejects challenge to Biden climate metric
E&E News: The legal battle over Biden’s climate metric isn’t over
NPR: Climate rules are coming for corporate America
Wall Street Journal: Climate advocates fighting Exxon were hacked in far-flung scheme, prosecutors say
E&E News: What’s next for direct air capture?

Energy

American Nuclear Society: Rethinking how we structure federal R&D programs in nuclear energy
Centrus: Centrus begins uranium enrichment operations in Ohio
World Nuclear News: Operations begin at US chloride salt test system
Exchange Monitor: Ex-Orano man is new assistant secretary for spent fuel
Wall Street Journal: Super investor Sam Altman’s interests collide in a nuclear merger
World Nuclear News: Argentina and Brazil sign MOU on radioisotopes and research
American Nuclear Society: Fusion power? Yes! (perspective by Ken Petersen)

Defense

SpaceNews: US to pursue stronger collaboration with allies in military space programs
SpaceNews: NRO building new satellites to deliver ‘10 times more signals and images’
Federation of American Scientists: Strategic Posture Commission report calls for broad nuclear buildup
Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists: An alternative to the proliferation of uranium enrichment in the Middle East (perspective by Seyed Hossein Mousavian and Frank von Hippel)
DOD: Building the US biofabrication workforce through the BioFabUSA Apprenticeship Program

Biomedical

Science: Looking to gamble, ARPA–H places first research bets
Stat: Congress extends some pandemic preparedness programs, but not all
Vanity Fair: Operation Warp Speed: The untold story of the COVID-19 vaccine
New York Times: Lab leak fight casts chill over virology research
New York Times: Scientists investigating Alzheimer’s drug faulted in leaked report
Nature: AI’s potential to accelerate drug discovery needs a reality check (editorial)
Science: Norwegian global health expert John-Arne Røttingen named Wellcome Trust CEO

International Affairs

Times Higher Education: ‘Everything’s come to a halt’: Israel–Hamas war stops research
New York Times: On the front lines, an Israeli university grieves and readies for war
Chemistry World: Berkeley Lab to lead US hunt for element 120 after breakdown of collaboration with Russia
The Economist: American and Chinese scientists are decoupling, too
Scientific American: Broken US–China science cooperation needs repair, not persecution (perspective by KC Cole)
South China Morning Post: China names new science ministry chief to help lead high-tech self-reliance drive
IEEE Spectrum: Japan’s Moonshot program aims sky-high — at the weather
Science|Business: EU R&D spending rose to €331 billion in 2021, but research intensity fell
Science|Business: European Commission research chief: It’s time to start talking about the next EU research program
Science|Business: Horizon Europe successor needs €200 billion to meet future challenges, say MEPs
Physics Today: Researchers applaud UK’s reentry to European framework program
Research Professional: US and French science agencies ink joint funding deal