The President's budget request for fiscal 1992 reduces the NIH Division of Research Resources Shared [instrumentation Grant (SIG) program to a quarter of its present level. The requested fiscal 1992 budget would provide only $8.9 million to fund less than 40 proposals in contrast to the 1991 budget of $32.5 million which will fund an estimated 140 proposals. This program is one of the few sources of major equipment funds to shared resource facilities. If this severe reduction is approved by Congress, it will have a major negative impact on resource facilities and the many research projects that these facilities serve.
All members are urged to write to your senators and congressmen to stress this program's importance to the entire biomedical research community. Encourage your major users to write to their senators and congressmen as well. Letters should note that without shared resource facilities and the state-of the-art sophisticated equipment required to equip these facilities, much of the current biomedical research would not be affordable or possible. Reducing the level of support for major instrumentation will slow progress in many areas of biomedical research including the genome initiative.
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Created: 19th August 1995
Last modified: 19th August 1995