Funding

The  2010 Budget provides $1.6 billion for the National Nanotechnology Initiative (NNI), reflecting steady growth in the NNI investment.      

The cumulative NNI investment since 2001, including the 2010 request, now totals almost $12 billion. Cumulative investments in EHS research since 2005 now total over $350 million. Cumulative investments in education and in research on ethical, legal, and other societal dimensions of nanotechnology since 2005 total over $220 million.

The 2010 NNI budget supports nanoscale science and engineering R&D at 13 agencies. Agencies with the largest investments are:

• NSF (fundamental research across all disciplines of science and engineering)

• DOD (science and engineering research advancing defense and dual-use capabilities)

• DOE (research providing a basis for new and improved energy technologies)

• NIH (nanotechnology-based biomedical research at the intersection of life sciences and the physical sciences)

• NIST (fundamental research and development of measurement and fabrication tools, analytical methodologies, and metrology for nanotechnology)

Other agencies investing in mission-related research are NASA, NIOSH, EPA, USDA (including both CSREES and FS), DHS, DOJ, and DOT (including the Federal Highway Administration, FHWA).

Other Resources

*Based on preliminary allocations of the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act of 2009 (P.L. 111-5) appropriations. These figures may change. Other NNI agencies with ARRA funding, but not listed in the table, are in the process of determining their allocations.

** In Table 1, the 2008 and 2009 DOD figures include Congressionally directed funding that is outside the NNI plan ($117 million for 2009).

*** Funding levels for DOE include the Office of Science and the Office of Energy Efficiency and Renewable Energy.

**** NIH recently unveiled the Research, Condition, and Disease Categorization (RCDC) system, a new knowledge management system designed to provide more consistent and transparent information to the public about NIH research. The shift to the RCDC process of categorization changes the way individual research projects are assigned to categories. This change will result in some differences in total dollar amounts between the 2008 reports and those issued in previous years. Any difference, whether an increase or decrease in funding levels, does not necessarily reflect a change in the amount of money the NIH received from Congress or a change in the actual content of the NIH research portfolio. For more information about the RCDC process and some of the factors that might contribute to the differences between the previously reported and new RCDC-generated funding levels, please go to: http://report.nih.gov/rcdc/category_process/Default.aspx and http://report.nih.gov/rcdc/reasons /default.aspx.

***** For Tables 1–2, totals may not add, due to rounding.

See: Funding Strategy