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To Mars or not to Mars?

Posted in Science Politics, The Universe and Stuff with tags , , , , , on April 17, 2010 by telescoper

Amongst  the news this week was President Obama’s announcement of a new space exploration policy for NASA. Out goes the Constellation program, including the Orion crewship, its Ares launch rocket, and the rest of the project’s Moon-bound architecture. Obama says NASA were on an unsustainable path, costing too much money and taking too long to develop. Instead he’s given them extra funds ($6 billion, modest by the standards of space exploration) and told them to find new ways of putting people into space. Obama’s particular goal is to send someone to Mars by the mid 2030s and return them safely to Earth. I think Obama’s plans have ruffled a few feathers, especially among those longing for a return to the Moon, but it seems to me to be both bold and intelligent. 

The European Space Agency also has a programme – called Aurora – which includes components involved with both robotic and human exploration. This programme is a kind of optional extra within the ESA budget and countries that wanted to join in were asked to pay an extra contribution. The UK opted in so now we pay a top-up on our subscription to ESA in order to participate. This will be one of the things that transfers to the new UK Space Agency, when it’s up and running properly, from the Science and Technology Facilities Council (STFC).

Thus far the UK policy has been not to get involved in human space exploration. There are a lot of reasons behind that, but one of the most important is sheer cost. Space exploration is expensive by its very nature, but involving human beings creates enormous extra costs connected with keeping them alive and keeping them safe while they are in space. Since our national expenditure on space exploration has largely been channelled through STFC (or its predecessor PPARC) where it has had to compete for funds with “pure” science activities in the areas of particle physics and astronomy (and, more recently, nuclear physics).

I think the scientific argument against funding human exploration has always been as follows. There aren’t many things that people could do on Mars that a robot couldn’t – here I’m talking just about scientific experiments and the like. Human space exploration is much more expensive than the robotic variety. The scientific value for money is consequently much higher for robotic missions ergo, since money is tight, we don’t do human space exploration. Plus, we couldn’t afford it anyway…

The other factor is that there aren’t many feasible targets for manned spaceflight in the first place. The Moon and Mars are basically it. Other objects in the solar system are either too distant or too inhospitable (or both) to be considered. Unmanned probes haven’t all been successful, but some certainly have paid off enormously in scientific terms. I give the Cassini-Huygens mission to Saturn (and its extraordinary moon Titan) as an example that has turned out, in my opinion, to be nothing short of sensational. The images of Titan’s surface sent back by Huygens were gobsmackingly amazing, for instance.

Before going on let me point out that I’m a cosmologist, not a planetary scientist. There’s a tendency among scientists to think that their own field is more important than the others with which it has to compete for funding. It’s perfectly natural that someone working on galaxy formation should find galaxies more interesting than planets, and vice-versa. We all pick what we want to work on, and obviously we pick what interests us most.  But any scientist worth his/her salt should have enough of a grasp of the big picture to recognize outstanding work in disciplines other than their own.  I don’t want anyone to think that the following comments are intended to suggest that there isn’t excellent work going on in the UK and rest of the world in the field of planetary exploration.

I do think, however, that there is a big difference in character between fundamental science (especially particle physics and cosmology) and planetary exploration. In fundamental physics we are attempting to uncover the nature of basic constituents of the universe and the general laws that govern the structure of matter and how it interacts and evolves – in other words, its scope is (or at least tries to be) universal. It’s certainly this aspect – trying to unravel an enormous cosmic puzzle – that drew me into cosmology. By contrast, the study of a particular planet – even a fascinating one, such as Saturn with all the beautiful orbital dynamics going on in its ring system – lacks this aspect of universality. That’s why cosmology interests me more than planetary exploration does. This is nothing more than a statement of personal interest.

Having said that – and pointing out  again that I’m no particular expert on the Solar System – I don’t find the Moon and Mars very  interesting from a scientific point of view compared with, say,  the outer planets which I find fascinating. Others – a great many others, in fact – obviously do see a lot of interest in Mars. I’m not at all convinced about the scientific merit of some other space probes either, especially the planned Mercury orbiter BepiColombo. But there we are. We can’t all expect to agree on everything. What I’m trying to say, though, is at the moment these different types of activity are funded from the same pot. In order to draw up an order of priority, STFC has to compare apples with oranges with predictably bizarre outcomes.

Moreover, space exploration – especially human space exploration – isn’t just about science. There are definite commercial opporunities in space, in both short and long term.  Space missions often  provide results that are fairly easily accessible to non-scientists, so has considerable popular appeal as well as inspiring young people to take up science and engineering subjects. It has immense cultural impact too, altering the way we think about ourselves and our place in the Universe. But these aren’t unique to space exploration. Particle physics and astronomy do this too.

 But the overriding factor is the politics. When NASA put a man on the Moon 40 years ago, it was never about science – it was a political statement made right at the height of the Cold War. We no longer have a Cold War, but nations still feel the need to show off to each other. It’s called national pride. Politicians know how this works, and how it can turn into votes…

So we shouldn’t think of the plan to put a man on Mars as being primarily a scientific thing anyway. I’m quite comfortable with that.  My worry – if the UK decides to take part in manned Mars exploration – is that the money will come from the already dwindling pot allocated to fundamental science. Particle physics and astronomy research in the UK is on the ropes after the recent devastating cuts. Any more blows like this and we’ll be on the floor. I’m deeply worried that far worse is already on the way – a combination of public spending cuts after the general election and political directives to devote more to space exploration.

The new UK Space Agency could be either a hero or a villain, and I don’t know how it will turn out. On the one hand, the creation of this organization may prevent the fundamental sciences from being squeezed further by expensive space projects. In this way it might represent a recognition of the different characteristics I talked about above. The industrial and commercial aspects of space exploration are present in the new outfit too.  On the other hand, the result of hiving off the “glamorous” space parts of STFC may lead to further cuts in what is left behind. I’m also nervous about the future relationship between UKSA and STFC, especially the extent to which the former can demand research grant funding from the latter.

I’m sorry this has been such a long and rambling post, but this has been on my mind for quite some time and I wanted at last to put something together about it. I could summarise what I’m saying as follows:

  •  I’m not convinced about the scientific case for Mars exploration – particularly if it involves manned missions
  • BUT it’s not my field so it’s not my decision to make
  • AND there’s more to Mars than science anyway
  • SO by all means do it if there’s a will
  • BUT for heavens sake don’t pay for it by killing off the rest of astronomy

This is something that I’d be genuinely interested in hearing other views on. What is stated above is my opinion and is not intended to be representative of anyone, but I’d be very interested in hearing other views through the comments box.

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Ash Thursday

Posted in Science Politics with tags , , on April 15, 2010 by telescoper

I couldn’t resist putting up a quick post about the bizarre circumstances that have seen all airports closed and planes grounded all around Britain,  and the  skies emptied of aircraft.  The eruption of a volcano in a part of Iceland called Eyjafjallajoekull – there will be a pronunciation test at the end – has led to considerable plume of ash being thrown up into the atmosphere. Prevailing winds being roughly south-easterly in direction, part of this cloud has been heading towards mainland Britain.

You can see the cloud as the dark brown and black region on the following satellite image taken early this morning.

Apparently the ash contained in this cloud poses a significant danger to aircraft engines, so the UK Air Traffic Control system decided during the course of today to close UK airspace to all incoming and outgoing flights. Cue travel chaos.

It is anticipated that the ash will affect all of Britain by about 1800 GMT (i.e. 1900 British Summer Time) . It will dissipate as it spreads but of course as long as the eruption continues more ash will be pumped into the air.

One of the events disrupted by this display of vulcanism is the UK National Astronomy Meeting currently taking place in Glasgow. Many UK participants travelled to this meeting by plane and some of them are stuck there now because their return flights are not flying. NAM usually tends to be the sort of thing that senior academics tend to attend for only a day or two because the specialist sessions are quite brief and there are so many other things to do.

Today (Thursday) there was meant to be a Panel meeting organized by the Royal Astronomical Society at which members of the Science and Technology Facilities Council Executive, among others, were supposed to face questions from the assembled throng of astronomers. UK Astronomy has been under a dark threatening cloud for quite a while already, even before the Icelandic volcano did its thing.

However, the panel discussion was drastically curtailed by some not being able to make it to Glasgow and others having to leave early in order to get the train because their planes had been cancelled. In fact, according to what I’ve gleaned from the extensive Twitter traffic (from #NAM2010), John Womersley (Director of Science Programmes at STFC) was basically holding the fort in the absence of the other pundits. He seems to have come in for quite a lot of flak from younger scientists, particularly those whose careers have been wrecked by decisions made by the STFC Executive. I suspect those unable to make it are probably not ungrateful at being presented with an excuse for their absence.

Fellow blogger Andrew Jaffe was commendably prescient in deciding well in advance to return to London from Glasgow by train rather than plane. That’s the kind of  decision many people live to regret given the legendary unreliability of our train network, but this time it certainly paid off.

Not so many Cardiff astronomers went to NAM this year – the reason being that we are back to teaching while most other UK universities are still in their Easter break. However, those Cardiff staff and students who have gone there face more than a few problems getting back!

The meeting is scheduled to end tomorrow but it’s very unclear whether the skies will be open by then. We might have a few cancelled lectures if the situation doesn’t improve quickly…

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Our New Chief Scientific Advisor …

Posted in Science Politics with tags , , , , on April 14, 2010 by telescoper

I just came across an interesting bit of news that I thought I’d share with those of you who haven’t heard it already. It came out some time ago, in fact, but I  missed it at the time.

Over a year ago I went to a meeting about Science Policy in Wales. One of the issues raised at that meeting was that the Welsh Assembly Government hadn’t yet managed to appoint a Chief Scientific Advisor, despite the results of a review in carried out in 2008 by Sir Christopher Pollock that argued strongly that this should be done. In June 2009, the (new) First Minister Carwyn Jones finally announced that he would proceed with an appointment to this new position but it’s still taken quite a while to get someone to fill the post.

Still, better late than never, and we now know who it is who will advise the WAG on matters scientific. It turns out that the first ever Chief Scientific Advisor for Wales will be John Harries (left), who is originally from Aberavon, and is the University of London Professor of Earth Observation at the Blackett Laboratory of Imperial College London, who has previously been a senior adviser to the UK Government in several roles. Professor Harries will take up his role on May 1, but I think he’ll carry on working at Imperial about 20% of his time.

The Chief Scientific Adviser’s role will be to provide scientific advice to the First Minister and the Welsh Assembly Government, to promote science, technology, engineering and mathematics and the role of science within the wider knowledge economy.

First Minister Carwyn Jones said:

The appointment of Professor Harries as our first Chief Scientific Adviser for Wales will ensure that we build on an impressive track record of achievement, and develop a more effective promotion of science and technology within the wider knowledge economy arena.

This will prove invaluable as we continue to encourage the knowledge, skills and enterprise to strengthen businesses in Wales ahead of the global economic upturn.

According to Professor Harries,

It is a huge honour to be asked to become the first Chief Scientific Adviser for Wales and I look forward with great enthusiasm to carrying out this new role on behalf of the government and people of Wales.

Wales is a small country, but is capable of the intelligent application of new science and engineering as a basis for greater commercial success in industry. The role includes acting as Head of Profession, providing a focus for good practice and the enhancement and encouragement of scientists and engineers in Wales. This is a job that encompasses two (along with my family and rugby) of my great passions – Science and Wales. I will give it my very best effort.

The appointment of a physicist as Chief Scientific Advisor for Wales could be very interesting with regard to the future development of the subject within the Principality. In particular, the recent devastating cuts in the UK’s  astronomy funding have led to some of our astronomers wondering whether they should work on space instruments that look down rather than up, and a move into Earth observation might now be even more timely.

In more general terms, it’s good to see the Welsh Assembly recognizing the importance of science, although whether they see its importance  being connected very narrowly with commerce remains to be seen. Anyway, I think it could turn out to be an excellent move, and I want to take this opportunity to wish Professor Harries the best of luck  in his new job!

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Another Day, Another Panel..

Posted in Science Politics with tags , , , on April 13, 2010 by telescoper

I’m completely knackered, and my dinner’s warming up, so I’ll keep this relatively brief…

I got up at 5am this morning to take the train  to London  in order to attend the first meeting of the STFC Astronomy Grants Panel (AGP) for this year. The deadline passed in early April, and the applications have now all been received by Swindon Office so now the AGP has to swing into action, like a well-oiled machine, to rank the applications and make recommendations as to which ones should receive funding.

This meeting was chaired by the new Astronomy Grants Supremo,  the e-astronomer (although on STFC business he uses his pseudonym, Andy Lawrence). The real hard work comes in a succession of meetings later in the year, but this one was basically in order for us newbies to learn the ropes and to get a bit of background before we get going. Actually, I’ve been on such panels before – I chaired the Astronomy Theory Panel a few years ago, before moving to Cardiff – but it’s all changed quite a lot and I’m actually glad  I had the chance to learn about the new procedures. It was nice to see the other people involved too, some of whom I didn’t know before and some of whom I’ve known for years (often from other panels). When you get older as an academic, life turns into a Succession of  Panels. Sigh. I wonder if there are Panels in the Afterlife?

The backdrop to this round was provided by the deep cuts in Astronomy research that emerged from last year’s STFC  Prioritisation Exercise. We heard a summary of the Financial Position that was shocking in its magnitude as well as depressing in its likely long-term effects. In 2008, STFC funded “new” 92 postdoctoral research positions across the UK making the total number of astronomy PDRAs at that time about 295 (a PDRA usually lasts three years). In 2009 the number of new positions dropped to 69, and projections suggest a  number of about 60 this year. This will put the number of astronomy PDRAs at about 180, just short of a 40% cut with respect to the 2008 number. Moreover, last year saw a significant reduction in the number of rolling grants by about a third, although many of these carried on at a reduced level as standard (3-year) grants. Projections suggest that current funding levels will see 70% of the UK’s rolling grants unrolled in this way; this figure is higher than for this round because of  short-term injection of cash from RCUK – the famous £14 Million – that ameliorated the cuts this year and the fact that this year’s grant funding had slightly more money in it than other years of the three-year cycle for historical reasons. A full report of last year’s grants round should be available on the STFC website soon.

UPDATE: It is there now.

Of course it remains to be seen what happens in practice, and how this compares with projections of this sort. I won’t be able to say much on this blog about the process from now on – for reasons of confidentiality – but I can assure everyone reading this that everyone on the AGP wants to fund excellent science and will do everything they can to make the system work in a way that achieves this in the fairest possible manner. It’s inevitable, though, that in these tough times some excellent research will not be supported. That’s the thing that makes these Panels so stressful.

Anyway, apart from my growing apprehension of the scale of the task in front of us, the trip to London was otherwise pleasant. A lovely train journey in the sunshine through the beautiful spring greenery of Wales and England was very relaxing, and I even got tomorrow’s lecture written on the way. The meeting took place in a cramped and stuffy room at the Royal Institute of British Architects, a building of such poor design that you might think RIBA would disown it. Come to think of it, no. It probably won an award. Crap buildings so often do.

Oh, and the caterers forgot to supply our lunch on time too. Eventually we got a few measly sandwiches at about 2pm. Not impressive. Still, the main meetings will all be in Swindon. What a delight.

The way home wasn’t such fun. One of the engines of the train conked out shortly after leaving Paddington so we couldn’t go at proper speed and I got back to Cardiff 20 minutes late. It was still sunny, though, and I’d just put some lovely new music on my iPod so I wasn’t too bothered.

Now my dinner’s ready. And this has been 700 words. That’s not particularly brief, even by my standards…

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Fears for the Future

Posted in Finance, Politics, Science Politics with tags , , on April 10, 2010 by telescoper

Just came back from a lovely cycle ride to find that my polling card arrived through my letterbox while I was out. Gordon Brown announced the election earlier this week, so it’s quite impressive how efficiently the electoral system swings into action.  It’s a pity so much else is screwed up.  Anyway, Parliament now goes into limbo and we have three weeks of heightened tedium to endure while the politicians try to convince us that, despite all the mess they’ve made of things so far, they do actually know what they’re doing.

I still don’t know how I’m going to cast my vote on May 6th (polling day). I can’t see myself voting for the incumbents – for more reasons than I have time to list. My experience of Thatcher’s Britain in the 1980s convinced me that I’ll never vote Conservative either. And the Lib Dems are just, well, a bit pathetic. I will vote. I just don’t know who I’ll vote for. I’ll have to look at my constituency’s history carefully to see if tactical voting might help. Perhaps more on that in due course…

Anyway, whatever the result of the election turns out to be, I’m pretty scared about what the next three or four years has in store.  The huge budget deficit that the government has built up saving the banks from collapse is going to have to be dealt with. The recent budget didn’t really do anything to tackle it, but everybody knows that was just a holding operation until the election is over. Whoever takes power afterwards will have to take serious measures to fix things. It won’t be pretty. Tax rises and public spending cuts are both inevitable as  the international bond markets threaten to downgrade Britains AAA credit rating. If that happens we will end up with runaway debts and increasingly expensive borrowing.  Don’t think we won’t go the way of Greece.

In the meantime our economy is carrying on as if it is in a trance. House prices continue to rise, the FTSE index is climbing, interest rates are at the astonishingly low level of 0.5%. It can’t possibly go on. Houses are clearly still overvalued, at immense social cost to people wanting to start a family. The stock market is gaining because investors are not getting any return from cash deposits, and companies are boosting their profits by sacking staff and cutting costs rather than generating new demand. As soon as interest rates go up again – which they surely must – I think there’s a good chance the stock market will fall again. If you don’t hold any shares yourself you may think that’s not important. However, it directly affects the pensions of millions of people, most of whom are not wealthy, because that’s where a lot of their pension schemes’ money is invested.

The most pressing issue is not who wins the election but whether there is a winner. If the election turns out indecisively – which at the moment seems quite likely – then we’re going to see turmoil on a scale that makes the banking nightmare of 2007 look like a tea party. And even if there is an outright winner, there’s no guarantee that they will have the gumption to even begin tackling the problem.

Of course, as a scientist working in a University, I’m also concerned about what’s going to happen to my own livelihood after the election. The recent mess this government has made of science funding has blotted its record on this, which was previously not bad. However, the true scale of this country’s economic problems seems to be too much for our political leaders, both present and future, to cope with. I don’t see any of the parties having the vision to manage the current crisis as well as putting together a coherent plan to build a better future. I’m not the only person to think so, in fact, as a letter in The Times today from a group of distinguished astronomers made clear. Other nations (especially the USA and France) are all investing heavily in science as a means to secure future economic growth. We’ve already started cutting back, and don’t see any strong political voice to reverse that policy.

Of course people don’t just vote for their immediate self-interest. Science is important to me, and I think it’s important for the country too, but there are other issues. There’s more to life than economics too. This country has been in a post-Imperial sleepwalk for too long and it needs to snap out of it. We need to renew our political system, which has grown distant and unaccountable. We need to deal with a looming energy crisis. We need to develop a proper education system that is fit for the 21st century. And we need to deal with the problems of a rapidly ageing population. For these reasons, and more, I hope the next Parliament will contain politicians with the vision necessary to see this country through the tough times ahead. Unfortunately, I don’t think it will.

I’m just glad I’m no longer young.

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The Citation Game

Posted in Science Politics with tags , , , on April 8, 2010 by telescoper

Last week I read an interesting bit of news in the Times Higher that the forthcoming Research Excellence Framework (REF) seems to be getting cold feet about using citation numbers as a metric for quantifying research quality. I shouldn’t be surprised about that, because I’ve always thought it was very difficult to apply such statistics in a meaningful way. Nevertheless, I am surprised – because meaningfulness has never seemed to me to be very high on the agenda for the Research Excellence Framework….

There are many issues with the use of citation counts, some of which I’ve blogged about before, but I was interested to read another article in the Times Higher, in this weeks issue, commenting on the fact that some papers have ridiculously large author lists. The example picked by the author, Gavin Fairbairn (Professor of Ethics and Language at Leeds Metropolitan University), turns out – not entirely surprisingly – to be from the field of astronomy. In fact it’s The Sloan Digital Sky Survey: Technical Summary which is published in the Astronomical Journal and has 144 authors. It’s by no means the longest author list I’ve ever seen, in fact, but it’s certainly very long by the standards of the humanities. Professor Fairbairn goes on to argue, correctly, that there’s no way every individual listed among the authors could have played a part in the writing of the paper. On the other hand, the Sloan Digital Sky Survey is a vast undertaking and there’s no doubt that it required a large number of people to make it work. How else to give them credit for participating in the science than by having them as authors on the paper?

Long author lists are increasingly common in astronomy these days, not because of unethical CV-boosting but because so many projects involve large, frequently international, collaborations. The main problem from my point of view, however, is not the number of authors, but how credit is assigned for the work in exercises like the REF.

The basic idea about using citations is fairly sound: a paper which is important (or “excellent”, in REF language) will attract more citations than less important ones because more people will refer to it when they write papers of their own. So far, so good. However the total number of citations for even a very important paper depends on the size and publication rate of the community working in the field. Astronomy is not a particularly large branch of the physical sciences but is very active and publication rates are high, especially when it comes to observational work.  In condensed matter physics citation rates are generally a lot lower, but that’s more to do with the experimental nature of the subject. It’s not easy, therefore, to compare from one field to another. Setting that issue to one side, however, we come to the really big issue, which is how to assign credit to authors.

You see, it’s not authors that get citations, it’s papers. Let’s accept that a piece of work might be excellent and that this excellence can be quantified by the number of citations N it attracts. Now consider a paper written by a single author that has excellence-measure N versus a paper with 100 authors that has the same number of citations. Don’t you agree that the individual author of the first paper must have generated more excellence than each of the authors of the second? It seems to me that it stands to reason that the correct way to apportion credit is to divide the number of citations by the number of authors (perhaps with some form of weighting to distinguish drastically unequal contributions). I contend that such a normalized citation count is the only way to quantify the excellence associated with an individual author.

Of course whenever I say this to observational astronomers they accuse me of pro-theory bias, because theorists tend to work in smaller groups than observers. However, that ignores the fact that not doing what I suggest leads to a monstrous overcounting of the total amout of excellence. The total amount of excellence spread around the community for the second paper in my example is not N but 100N. Hardly surprising, then, that observational astronomers tend to have such large h-indices – they’re all getting credit for each others contributions as well as their own! Most observational astronomers’ citation measures reduce by a factor of 3 or 4 when they’re counted properly.

I think of the citation game as being a bit like the National Lottery. Writing a paper is like buying a ticket. You can buy one yourself, or you can club together and buy one as part of a syndicate. If you win with your own ticket, you keep the whole jackpot. If a syndicate wins, though, you don’t expect each member to win the total amount – you have to share the pot between you.

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The Stitch-up Continues…

Posted in Science Politics with tags , , , , on April 1, 2010 by telescoper

Interesting news from the Science and Technology Facilities Council (STFC). Following the retirement of Professor Mike Edmonds from his post of Professor of Astronomy at Cardiff University – enabling yours truly to take his office! – he decided to resign his position on STFC Council. Yesterday, STFC announced that he would be replaced on its highest-level governing body, not with one person but with three, taking the membership of the Council to 12.

The new trio consists of  Mr Will Whitehorn (President of Virgin Galactic), Dr Michael Healy (President of the navigation business division of Astrium), and Mrs Gill Ball (Finance Director at the University of Birmingham). Given the catastrophic shambles of STFC’s current financial situation, the last appointment seems to make good sense. On the other hand, what on Earth is going on with the first two?

The new UK Space Agency came into existence today, 1st April 2010 – no joke. This is supposed to take overall control of all our national space activity, including commercial ventures as well as those parts (such as the subscription to the European Space Agency and funding for space instrumentation) previously under the control of STFC. Since space has now been hived off into another organisation altogether, why does  STFC now have  two commercial space gurus added to its Council?  The only explanation I can think of is that the STFC Executive is going to focus even further on space exploration rather than on basic research. These appointments were made by the Science Minister, Lord Drayson, who was the driving force behind the creation of the new UK Space Agency and they strongly suggest that he wants the emphasis within STFC to move in the direction of space exploration, to the likely detriment of the rest of science.  The implications for the future of observational astronomy and particle physics are deeply worrying.

Even more worryingly for those of us involved in basic research, note that one of the few scientists on Council has been replaced by three people whose interests lie elsewhere. In fact the number of independent scientists on Council has thus been reduced from 5 to 4. You can draw your own conclusions about what this means for the future of pure science in the rump of STFC…

Other interesting news this week is that the government has conjured up £100 million for the Diamond Light Source. I don’t want for one moment to give the impression that in the slightest bit negative about this facility or the new investment in it. It is immensely valuable for research across a  wide spectrum of scientific disciplines, and I was very glad to hear of the new investment. The extra funds will enable it to increase the number of beamlines from 10 to 32 which will represent a huge increase in its productivity.

But, while the cash injection for the Diamond Light Source is clearly to be applauded, it does provide a contrast with other areas within STFC’s remit  whose research budgets have been pared to the bone. In the last grant round, for example, one-third of all the astronomy rolling grants (6 out of 18)  up for renewal this year have been axed, and the others cut back severely. All the evidence suggests that there is no interest in reversing  the cuts in the STFC management, and that they will actually get very much worse over the next few years.

Since STFC blundered into financial meltdown in 2007, there have been two main theories as to what happened; remember that this was before the Credit Crunch took hold, so the black hole in STFC’s initial budget was nothing to do with the subsequent recession. One was that the STFC Management made a mess of their submission to the Comprehensive Spending Review and that it was all down to ineptitude. The other theory is that there was a definite plan at a high political level – probably in the Treasury – to rein back expenditure on fundamental research in favour of more “applied” disciplines. The shortfall in STFC’s finances was thus manufactured to achieve precisely what it has achieved. Depending on which of these theories you believe (if either), then the STFC Chief Executive is cast either as a bumbling incompetent or as a willing stooge of the Whitehall mandarins (although to be fair the two are not mutually exclusive).  The more the sorry saga of STFC pans out, the more I believe it was all a deliberate stitch-up. I think the most recent developments corroborate my view in depressingly convincing fashion.

STFC came into the world in 2007 with an estimated budget shortfall of £80 million. Had the £100 million I mentioned above appeared sooner, and had it gone into STFC’s general budget rather than being, as it is, ring-fenced for the Diamond Light Source then the carnage inflicted on science research could have been avoided. Instead, STFC squeezed its research grant line until the pips squeaked. Now that they’ve done this job, and got away with relatively little organized opposition from the scientific community, suddenly the money appears. It looks to me like the budget deficit was engineered to achieve precisely the outcome that has occurred.

I predict that after the election, the STFC budget will be slashed once more and that astronomy and particle physics research will again bear the brunt as STFC increasingly focusses on space exploration. The exodus of talented scientists from Britain that has already started and is sure to accelerate over the next year or two will take decades to reverse. It’s time for those responsible to come clean.

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Alternative Logo for UKSA

Posted in Science Politics with tags on March 27, 2010 by telescoper

As you all know, this past week saw the launch of the new UK Space Agency amid much fuss and fanfares. This occasion allowed the government to trumpet the creation of the new organization as a success story in the media and thus draw attention away from the continuing devastation visited on scientific research in astronomy and space science in the United Kingdom.

I’m not the only one to have expressed reservations about the quality of the new outfit’s logo which, though clearly intended to present a thrusting, dynamic, reach-for-the-skies image, ends up looking more like something from Dad’s Army. Apparently it cost £10,000 – surprisingly cheap by the standards of graphic designers these days – which perhaps explains why it isn’t very good, although even expensive ones can be rubbish too.

In order to improve the public profile of the fledgling organisation, and out of my own deep sense of public spiritedness, I’ve decided, at no expense to the taxpayer, to commission my own alternative logo by a highly skilled graphic designer of my acquaintance. I’m proud to be able to unveil it here. I think it conveys more accurately the nature of the new agency.

The broad coloured swathe represents the red tape involved in creating yet another new quango and reorganising everything else that relates to it. This leads initially to a period of increased paperwork presenting the appearance of greater activity until, shortly after the next election, everyone realises it is achieving nothing at all, its funds are cut (along with everything else), and, overwhelmed by the weight of its own bureaucracy,  it comes crashing back to Earth.

Badges featuring the new logo can be purchased from me, at the modest price of £74.99 each.

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Cut and Thrust and Nip and Tuck

Posted in Finance, Science Politics with tags , , , , , , , on March 26, 2010 by telescoper

This week we received the not-altogether-unexpected news that the budgets of Welsh universities will be cut next year. The Higher Education Funding Council for Wales (HEFCW) has announced its detailed allocations for 2010-11 and all but one institution will receive a cash cut.  Cardiff University faces a cash cut of 1.74%. Lampeter is the exception, but it gets a cash increase of only 0.32%. After taking inflation into account, even they get a real terms decrease. So it’s real cuts across the board for Welsh Higher Education, with a total of about £30 million in funding taken away.

In fact, it appears that the total amount of money available to HEFCW for next year is level in cash terms compared to last year. The total amount it has distributed in recurrent grants has, however, decreased by about 2% on last year. As far as I understand it, the discrepancy between the income and expenditure is partly explained by the diversion of some funds into a new Strategic Implementation Fund(SIF) to enable HEFCW to meet the goals outlined in the Welsh Assembly Government (WAG) document stating its vision for Higher Education, entitled For our Future. Some elements of SIF are included with the current allocation, but other’s are not, hence the  cash cuts seen here.In future, a larger proportion of the budget will move from recurrent, formula-based funding towards initiatives more closely aligned with the WAGs or, more likely, wasted on window-dressing and increased bureaucracy.

We’ll have to see what the impact of the new SIF arrangements will be in the longer term. In the short-term, however, the cuts (though obviously regrettable) are by no means a shock and will probably appear entirely insignificant after the General Election and the real cuts start, probably more like 20% than 2%…

The situation in Wales contrasts with Scotland where the Higher Education has grown by 1% for 2010/11.  Some Scottish universities, such as Edinburgh with a cash increase of 2.2%, have done pretty well. A small number of others, such as Stirling have been cut by 3.3% in cash terms.

Allocations for English universities were announced by HEFCE last week. There the situation is more mixed, partly to do with HEFCE rejigging its formula for research funding to concentrate it even more than last time (something that HEFCW – wisely, in my view – decided not to do..). It seems about half the 130 institutions in HEFCE’s remit get a cash increase, although when inflation is factored in the number with a real increase is much smaller. Among the universities with big cash cuts are Reading (-7.7%) and the London School of Economics (-6.3%).

As far as I understand the situation, these figures don’t include the fines for over-recruitment recently demanded by Lord Mandelson and may not take into account cuts in capital allowances, so things may be a lot worse than they appear at first sight.

However, to complicate things  a bit more, this week’s budget announced new funding for Science Technology Engineering and Mathematics (STEM) subjects, corresponding to an increase in numbers of about 20,000.This is only for England, as Higher Education in Wales and Scotland is not part of the remit of the Westminster government. One advantage of this for those of us in Wales is that we can’t be affected by pre-election tinkering in the same way England can.

I’m sure the news of new funding is very welcome to my colleagues across the border, but it does look to me like a bit of sticking plaster that looks likely to fall off after polling day.

Anyway, it looks to me like these results are going exactly with the form book. Scotland has always valued Higher Education more strongly than England, and Wales has usually trailed along in third place.  The real struggle hasn’t yet started, however, and we have to wait anxiously to see how hard the axe will fall once the election is over.

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Spazio Commerciale

Posted in Science Politics, The Universe and Stuff with tags , , , , , on March 23, 2010 by telescoper

So here we are then. The United Kingdom has its own brand new Space Agency, courtesy of Lords Mandelson and Drayson (or Peter and Paul as they’re known to their fans). It was launched today at a glitzy do in Westminster attended by everyone who’s anyone in space science, which obviously doesn’t include me. There’s even a new logo.

According to the BBC, the new agency will be “muscular”, but I’m not really sure what that means. Perhaps brains might be more useful than brawn in this context (unless it’s Werner Von, geddit?) In fact I’m not at all sure what the new agency is about at all. The UK is already part of the European Space Agency (ESA) and a big slice of the new agency’s budget will presumably be eaten up by the ESA subscription. Much of what we do in space exploration and astronomy is dictated by decisions at the ESA level so I don’t think the new UK Agency will have much impact on that. On the other hand, the only current UK space agency is the British National Space Centre (BNSC), which is an organisation notable only for its irrelevance. I’m not even sure whether it exists at all as anything other than a logo and an accommodation address above a chip shop in Swindon.

It’s somewhat easier to see what the new UK Space Agency isn’t about. The accompanying press release doesn’t mention astronomy at all, so it’s clearly not going to help us lowly scientists who would like to use space observatories to do interesting science. It seems that it is primarily aimed at commercial space activities, and the science bit will continue to be managed mismanaged by the Science and Technology Facilities Council.

I’ve got nothing against the commercial exploitation of space, in principle, although it did provoke my feeble attempt at an Italian joke in the title of this post. The French, Germans and Italians spend much more than we do and this is obviously an area of great potential growth. I don’t object to the government using public money to help the space sector grow, either. In principle. The problem is that in these tough times the money has to be taken from somewhere else in the budget. Many of us were still hoping that the government might intervene to reverse the awful cuts we’ve suffered in physics and astronomy recently, but hiving space science off into a separate pot will probably make life even tougher for those of us left with the rump of STFC. I fear it means even less money in future going into fundamental science, and our decline is therefore set to accelerate even further.

There have always been tensions within the astronomy and space science community. Space exploration has scored many recent triumphs – such as the joint ESA-NASA Cassini-Huygens probe – but there are always difficult questions about the scientific value for money involved in sending things pottering around our backyard in the  solar system compared to, e.g., building observatories (either in space or on the ground) that can see things across the other side of the Universe. It’s difficult to see what the implications of the new agency are for this, but it seems likelyto me  that increasing amounts of public money will go on exploration at the expense of observation. I’m biased, of course, but I think there’s a lot more interesting science in the distant universe than there is nearby. In fact there’s more of everything further away than there is nearby! We may end up killing off ground-based astronomy in order to put a British flag on the Moon. That would be very sad.

But maybe this is too pessimistic. We don’t know yet how things will be divvied up between the new agency and the old STFC. Will there be any science  in UK Space, or will it be entirely commercial? Perhaps new missions and experiments will be funded through that route while exploitation continues to be  (under)funded by STFC?

Or maybe, since the new agency comes into existence on 1st April 2010, it’s all just an elaborate joke?

And while I’m being facetious, I wonder how many of you are thinking that the new logo looks like it was taken from the opening credits of Dad’s Army? I wonder if that choice was awfully wise, Captain Mainwaring?

STFC Chief Executive Keith Mason is very keen on the new outfit and is looking forward to working with it.  I know what Private Frazer would have said. We’re doomed.

PS. Andy Lawrence was there, and invites you to pump him  in the debriefing room over at the e-astronomer.

PPS. The new agency has now got a wikipedia page. It says there that the space agency will take over responsibility for space technology and instrumentation funding from other research councils. Presumably exploitation of space missions will either remain the responsibility of STFC or there won’t be any at all, which may amount to the same thing.

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