A generation at risk: Young investigators and the future of the biomedical workforce: Fig. 1.

There is no author summary for this article yet. Authors can add summaries to their articles on ScienceOpen to make them more accessible to a non-specialist audience.

Abstract

A number of distressing trends, including a decline in the share of key research grants going to younger scientists, as well as a steady rise in the age at which investigators receive their first funding, are now a decades-long feature of the US biomedical research workforce. Working committees have proposed recommendations, policy makers have implemented reforms, and yet the trajectory of our funding regime away from young scientists has only worsened. An investigation of some of the major factors and their geneses at play in explaining the increasing average age to first RO1 is presented. Recommendations related to funding, peer review, career paths, and the university-government partnership are provided.

Related collections

Most cited references 13

Record: found
Abstract: found
Article: not found

Rescuing US biomedical research from its systemic flaws.

B. Alberts, M Kirschner, S. Tilghman … (2014)

The long-held but erroneous assumption of never-ending rapid growth in biomedical science has created an unsustainable hypercompetitive system that is discouraging even the most outstanding prospective students from entering our profession--and making it difficult for seasoned investigators to produce their best work. This is a recipe for long-term decline, and the problems cannot be solved with simplistic approaches. Instead, it is time to confront the dangers at hand and rethink some fundamental features of the US biomedical research ecosystem.