A REVOLUTION is under way in the US that will affect the entire world. It is orchestrated by a president and Congress who are convinced that the future of the economy lies in science and technology. Under normal circumstances, this might lead to modest budget increases for research, and a supportive environment for high-tech business – warm glows all round. But with the economy in a state of collapse, and long-neglected problems with energy, climate, health and infrastructure coming home to roost, these are extraordinary times, and they have prompted extraordinary action.

President Barack Obama has decided to deluge research and high-tech projects with unprecedented levels of funding (see page 8). It is a thrilling prospect for anyone who recognises science as a force for progress. But there are perils. The American public is notoriously impatient. If the scientists can’t quickly demonstrate the benefits of all the tax dollars they will be getting, they had better watch out – witness the ire directed at bank executives perceived to have squandered multibillion-dollar bail-outs. Merely promising that the fruits of innovation will be harvested years down the line won’t cut it.

Obama’s bonanza and its pitfalls for science

EDITORIAL

The trickle-down effect of high-wage, high-tech jobs into spending in malls and restaurants is just the start. There is in fact good evidence that spending on science can be as effective an economic stimulus as spending on conventional infrastructure. According to one report this year , $20 billion spent on research and scientific infrastructure should create and retain 402,000 jobs. Another analysis suggests that broadband networks are almost as effective as roads and bridges at creating short-term jobs, and probably better in the long run. Scientists must also understand that unprecedented funding brings unprecedented accountability. They

really do need to deliver clean energy, cheap and effective medicines, and so on.

Obama’s agenda is so audacious that it is inevitable that some aspects will misfire. Plans to use research into evidence-based medicine to cut wasteful treatments will be particularly hard to deliver. That brings a real danger that the science boom will dissolve into a bust. If the stimulus isn’t backed by sustained investment, scientists will join the unemployment lines.

Other leading economies face pitfalls too. In the UK, for example, the prime minister, Gordon Brown, has matched Obama in terms of pro-science rhetoric, but there is no sign of a flood of new funding for British science. If Obama’s gamble pays off, then the UK and other nations will wish they had made a similar bet. America’s brain gain will become their brain drain. ■

The imaginative boost for research in the US budget is risky – and not just for America

What’s hot on NewScientist.com

CARS From the racetrack

to the emergency room

Technology developed to send

Formula 1 cars round a track at high

speed turns out to have unexpected

uses elsewhere – including outer

space and in hospital. Find out more

in our online gallery.

MIND Humans may be primed

to believe in creation

Why are people so ready to accept

creationism and intelligent design?

Our brains’ tendency towards

“promiscuous teleology” might

be responsible.

TECH Micromachines

controlled by magnetic fields

Tiny swimming machines, similar to

the spinning tails of bacteria, have

been powered and controlled by

manipulating a magnetic field.

ENVIRONMENT Marine animals

leak greenhouse gas

Water-dwelling animals release small

amounts of nitrous oxide into the

atmosphere – an effect boosted by

nitrate fertilisers leaching off the land.

SPACE Air-breathing planes: the

spaceships of the future?

Today’s rockets need multiple stages

to climb into orbit, but a new class of

spaceship could make it in one jump by

sucking oxygen from the air as it climbs.

HEALTH Bizarre devices

from medicine’s dark past

Over the years, doctors have used

everything from ceramic dolls to cut-

throat razors to treat their patients.

We’ve collected some of the most

intriguing – and painful looking – in

this gallery.

COMPUTERS Wave your

hand to log in Meet a computer

that’s part robot, part mirror. It

responds to hand gestures rather

than mouse clicks, making it easier

to use while talking to other people.

Find these articles and more at www.

newscientist.com/article/dn16688

PEOPLE who work with orang-utans are regularly struck by their uncanny similarity to humans. Orang-utans walk on two legs. They have been known to fashion rain hats and shelters, and teach their young to make tools. One even taught herself to whistle.

As Elaine Morgan points out on page 26, orang-utans are in many respects closer to us than chimps. Yet we know chimps are our closest genetic relatives. So the humanness of the red ape is a puzzle. Is it a case of convergent evolution, with orangs and humans independently evolving similar adaptations? Or did chimps lose human-like skills after diverging from our lineage? We may never know – but here is yet another reminder what we will lose if we allow this beguiling but threatened creature to go extinct. ■

We stand to lose that most human of apes

Food of the future

SOME of the world’s greatest restaurants rely on molecular gastronomy. But amid plaudits for the likes of Ferran Adrià, traditionalists have sometimes expressed dismay over an emphasis on exotic ingredients and arcane kitchen technologies, rather than high-quality produce cooked simply and well. Now the pace of destruction of marine life is presenting such super-chefs with a new challenge: how to turn local ingredients of the future, notably algae and jellyfish (see page 40), into tasty treats. ■

“If Obama’s gamble pays off, then the UK and other nations will wish they had made a similar bet”

7 March 2009 | NewScientist | 5