Science Policy This Week: June 29, 2026

NSF proposes grant coverage updates primarily based on OMB rule

The National Science Foundation is looking for touch upon its plan
to carry its grant insurance policies into alignment with the sweeping rule proposed
by the White House Office of Management and Budget in late May, together with by altering grant termination provisions, disallowing publication prices, and eradicating references to fixed-price awards. Regarding oblique prices, the draft provides that oblique value charge restoration on NSF awards is all the time topic to the supply of funds, and that organizations might not have the ability to recuperate full oblique prices if ample award funding just isn’t accessible. The draft consists of extra provisions associated to analysis safety and eradicating necessities from rescinded Biden-era govt orders. The doc is open for comment
till Aug. 24, whereas the remark interval for the OMB proposed rule closes July 13.

As the top of the fiscal 12 months approaches, NSF has awarded far fewer grants and fewer funding in comparison with earlier years, Rep. George Whitesides (D-CA) stated at a House Science Committee hearing
final week, citing data
from Grant Witness. Whitesides prompt that grantmaking at NSF might have slowed as a result of political appointees on the White House Office of Science and Technology Policy at the moment are approving grant awards. NSF declined to touch upon Whitesides’s remarks.

Republican senators name on DOE to dam Chinese nationals from nationwide labs

Sens. Mike Lee (R-UT) and Tom Cotton (R-AR) wrote a letter
to Energy Secretary Chris Wright final week advising the Department of Energy to dam Chinese residents from accessing its nationwide labs, citing considerations about potential espionage and IP theft. In their letter, the senators questioned DOE’s present insurance policies and stated the 1000’s of Chinese nationals who go to or work on the labs “reflect severe vulnerabilities at our nation’s premier and most sensitive scientific environments.” Lee and Cotton beforehand wrote
to Wright in January with related considerations. The senators additionally launched the Guarding American Technology from Exploitation Act
final 12 months to forestall residents of a number of nations, together with China, from accessing DOE’s nationwide labs. Lee and Cotton stated Democrats on the Senate Energy and Natural Resources Committee are blocking the invoice’s progress.

Pentagon report flags deterioration of protection analysis labs

A review
of the navy’s Research, Development, Test, & Evaluation (RDT&E) infrastructure, revealed by the Department of Defense final week, warns that getting older services are eroding the U.S. navy’s technical benefit. The report finds that cash supposed to help these services is routinely diverted to different DOD priorities. To clear up this downside, the report recommends that Congress create a protected fund for analysis infrastructure that may obtain practically $4 billion over 5 years. The report additionally recommends elevating the edge for minor building initiatives from $9 million to $20 million to cut back administrative burden and permit labs to finish initiatives extra shortly. According to the report, the common DOD lab is over 45 years previous, with restricted funds for modernization and restore work, resulting in technical limitations and potential security considerations for researchers.

Also on our radar

• NASA plans to launch a spacecraft
  to spice up the altitude of the sinking Swift Observatory satellite tv for pc as quickly as Tuesday.
• Former NOAA staff have created
  a clone of the web site climate.gov,
  which hosted local weather science knowledge, experiences, and extra till the company took it down final 12 months.
• The House Appropriations Committee approved
  its FY27 protection invoice final week. The committee will now review
  the White House’s request
  for an additional $87.6 billion in protection funding for FY26, together with $673 million for NNSA to forestall Iran from growing or buying a nuclear weapon.
• The markup
  of the Senate appropriations invoice protecting NSF, NASA, and different science businesses, which was attributable to happen final week, was postponed again.
  The Senate is at the moment in recess and won’t return till mid-July.
• House Science Committee Ranking Member Zoe Lofgren (D-CA) asked
  the Senate HELP Committee to carry a nomination listening to for Jim O’Neill to be director of NSF. NSF’s final Senate-confirmed director, Sethuraman Panchanathan, resigned in April 2025.
• The House Science Committee advanced
  10 payments on AI final week, together with payments on the National AI Research Resource and on NSF awards for AI training.
• GAO’s plans
  to evaluate federal science and expertise efforts over the subsequent two years embody evaluating company safeguards for analysis safety and the standing of implementing semiconductor manufacturing and analysis initiatives.
• LineShine, a Chinese supercomputer on the National Supercomputing Center in Shenzhen, surpassed Lawrence Livermore National Lab’s El Capitan to take the highest spot on the TOP500 list
  of the world’s quickest supercomputers.