Leaving the EU could significantly hurt UK research efforts

Science : On 17 May, research software company Digital Science released a report on the potential effects if the UK were to leave the European Union (EU). The report notes that although the UK is the world’s 5th largest producer of scientific papers, it spends just 1.63% of its GDP on research, which puts it in 20th place for research funding. That efficiency is somewhat misleading, however, because of the significant financial contributions that UK research organizations receive from the EU. Between 2006 and 2015, the EU provided £8 billion ($11.6 billion) in funding to UK research programs; over the same period, the UK spent £25 billion on research. Digital Science’s report indicates that the areas of study most at risk of lost funding are economics, evolutionary biology, and nanotechnology, for which EU grants have provided 94%, 67%, and 62% of the funding, respectively. Proponents of the UK’s withdrawing from the EU have said that the UK could still receive EU funding through an association agreement similar to those of Norway, Israel, and other nations that are not EU members. But over the past decade, only £3.5 billion of EU funds have gone to nonmember states.