Impact on the NSF portfolio: Ethics, ELSI and STS
Supervisor: Sandra Soo-Jin Lee, PhD (Professor of Medical Humanities and Ethics; Columbia University
Team Members: Janet Shim, Shawneequa Callier, Dasha Franklin, Tomas Sanabria, Linden Chi James
Project Background
The Future of Bioethics project examines how federal disinvestment since January 2025is reshaping the U.S. bioethics field across research, training, clinical practice, governance, and policy engagement. Aims 1 and 2 of the project aims to identify the domains of ethical inquiry most affected by federal policy shifts and how they are being affected, and Aim 3 turns to sustainable models going forward. The question this project takes up is: what has been the scope of NSF investment in ethical and social inquiry into science, and how is that portfolio being affected by 2025 actions? NSF has historically supported a distinct strand of ethics and social inquiry into science that complements NIH’s bioethics portfolio, including the Science, Technology, and Society (STS) program, Ethical and Responsible Research (ER2), Cultivating Cultures for Ethical STEM (CCE-STEM), and ethics components embedded in the National AI Research Institutes and the Convergence Accelerator. These mechanisms have shaped a community of scholars and a body of work that is not readily substitutable through NIH or other channels. While our team has mapped the NIH portfolio in some detail, the parallel picture at NSF: what has historically been funded, and what has been paused, reorganized, or terminated since January 2025 remains less well understood.
Research Questions/Objectives
• What ethical and social inquiry into science has NSF historically supported, and how does the current pattern of program reorganizations, paused awards, and terminated funding lines compare to what we are seeing at NIH? (Aim 1)
• Which NSF-supported research domains are most affected by 2025 changes, and which fields of inquiry are at risk? (Aim 1, Aim 2)
• What does the loss of NSF support reveal about the specific ELSI and STS infrastructure that has historically been distinct from NIH-supported bioethics and that may not be substitutable through other mechanisms? (Aim 3)
• What is the historical scale and trajectory of NSF investment in ELSI and STS over time, and through what funding mechanisms (investigator-led grants, programmatic awards, training programs, embedded ethics)?
• Which active NSF awards have been terminated, paused, or had funding modified since January 2025, and how have affected PIs, institutions, and professional communities (4S, ASBH, AAAS) characterized and responded to these changes?
Methodology
Systematic award-level data collection through NSF Award Search complemented with NSF program announcements and solicitation archives for tracking program-level changes; NSF news and press releases; cross-referenced university research office announcements about cancelled or paused awards; academic listservs and the 4S/STS communities; and Inside Higher Ed and the Chronicle for institutional impact stories. For each focal program, develop a structured profile documenting: program history, scope, and stated objectives; typical award size, duration, and award counts over time; recent program announcements, modifications, or discontinuations; specific active awards affected since January 2025 with dates, mechanisms, and stated rationale.