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The Decline in Vitamin Research Funding: A Missed Opportunity?

ABSTRACT: Background: The National Nutrition Research Roadmap has called for support of greater collaborative, interdisciplinary research for multiple areas of nutrition research. However, a substantial reduction in federal funding makes responding to these calls challenging. Objectives: The objectives of this study were to examine temporal trends in research funding and to discuss the potential consequences of these trends. Methods: We searched the NIH RePORTER database to identify NIH research grants and USASpending to identify National Science Foundation and USDA research grants awarded from 1992 to 2015. We focused on those that pertained to vitamin research. For the years 2000 to 2015, we examined funding trends for different vitamins, including vitamins A, B (one-carbon B-vitamins were considered separately from other B-vitamins), C, D, E, and K. Results: From 1992 to 2015, total federal research spending increased from ?$14 to $45 billion (2016 US dollars). Although vitamin research spending increased from ?$89 to $95 million, the proportion of grants awarded for vitamin research declined by more than two-thirds, from 0.65% in 1992 to 0.2% in 2015. Federal agencies awarded 6035 vitamin research grants over the time period, with vitamin A associated with the most research projects per year on average (n = 115) and vitamin K the fewest (n = 8). Vitamin D research projects were associated with the greatest average yearly project value ($34.8 million). Conclusions: Vitamin research has faced a disproportionate decline in research funding from 1992 to 2015. Insufficient federal research funding streams risk stalling progress in vitamin research and leaving important advancements unrealized.

SUBMITTER: Chambers JD

PROVIDER: S-EPMC5998363 | biostudies-literature | 2017 Aug

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature

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The Decline in Vitamin Research Funding: A Missed Opportunity?

Chambers James D JD Anderson Jordan E JE Salem Mark N MN Bügel Susanne G SG Fenech Michael M Mason Joel B JB Weber Peter P West Keith P KP Wilde Parke P Eggersdorfer Manfred M Booth Sarah L SL

Current developments in nutrition 20170405 8

Background: The National Nutrition Research Roadmap has called for support of greater collaborative, interdisciplinary research for multiple areas of nutrition research. However, a substantial reduction in federal funding makes responding to these calls challenging. Objectives: The objectives of this study were to examine temporal trends in research funding and to discuss the potential consequences of these trends. Methods: We searched the NIH RePORTER database to identify N ...[more]

PMID: 29955714

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Project description:RationaleBiological studies are conducted at ever-increasing rates by relying on proteomic workflows. Although data acquisition by mass spectrometry is highly automated and rapid, sample preparation continues to be the bottleneck of developing high-throughput workflows. Enzymatic protein processing, in particular, involves time-consuming protocols that can extend from one day to another. To address this gap, we developed and evaluated simple, in-solution tryptic enzymatic reactions that unfold within a few minutes, and demonstrate the utility of the methodology for the rapid analysis of proteins originating from cancer cell extracts.MethodsTryptic enzymatic reactions were conducted for 7-60 min, and the results were compared with that of a routine approach conducted for 18 h. No other reaction conditions were changed relative to the 18 h procedure. The reaction products were analyzed by nanospray high-performance liquid chromatography/tandem mass spectrometry (nano-HPLC/MS/MS), and the quality of the products was assessed in terms of peptide/protein identifications, sequence coverage, peptide length, missed-cleavage sites, quality of generated ions, and peptide hydrophilic/hydrophobic properties.ResultsThe results demonstrate that brief, and therefore incomplete, enzymatic processes lead to a large number of peptide fragments that improve protein sequence and proteome coverage, that the tandem mass spectra produced from these peptides are of high quality for reliable protein identifications, and that the physical properties of peptides are prone to supporting the development of alternative multi-dimensional separations and middle-down proteomics analysis strategies. The reproducibility of generating the same peptides within a few minutes of enzymatic digestion was remarkably close to that obtained from 18 h long reactions, and the combined results of short and long reactions increased proteome coverage by ~40%.ConclusionsWe demonstrate that partial enzymatic reactions conducted on short time-scales represent a valuable asset to proteomic studies, and propose their implementation either as simple, cost-effective, stand-alone protocols for substantially streamlining the analysis of biological samples, or as complementary protocols, for improving protein sequence and proteome coverage.

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The Decline in Vitamin Research Funding: A Missed Opportunity?

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The Decline in Vitamin Research Funding: A Missed Opportunity?

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