DEPARTMENT OF COMMERCE (DoC) PERSPECTIVE 



General Description of the Current Relationship: 



Throughout its history, the Department of Commerce (DoC) has built and enjoyed mutually beneficial relation- 

 ships with the nation's research-intensive universities. The nature of this collaboration is currently undergoing a 

 major transformation, in response to two global trends: 



(1) growing international awareness of the strong links between technological advance, technology transfer, 

 and economic prosperity, and 



(2) increasing evidence that population growth, technological advance, and increased per capita resource con- 

 sumption are interfering with the normal functioning of the Earth system. 



In areas as diverse as climate prediction, biotechnology, high-performance computing, and advanced manufac- 

 turing technologies, DoC agencies are seeking increasing assistance and input from the university community. At the 

 same time, constrained agency resources and pressures for high-level fiscal review and greater accountability have 

 stressed the relationship. 



The relationship is most strongly reflected in the activities of the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Ad- 

 ministration (NOAA) and the National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST). Agency scientists hold adjunct 

 faculty positions and have created strong working-level relationships between agency and university scientists on 

 numerous important collaborative projects. 



In addition to these person-to-person interactions at the working level, the DoC agencies and the university 

 community support several institutional arrangements that merit particular attention. Foremost among these is the 

 National Sea Grant College Program, modeled after land-grant colleges and their interactions with USDA. Under 

 these auspices, the twenty-nine Sea Grant Colleges and institutions now serve as the core of the program, which 

 operates a network of over 200 participating university and marine research institutions throughout the nation. 

 NOAA supplies two-thirds of the base funding of this program; states provide the remaining third. 



The National Undersea Research Program (URP) also coordinates NOAA and selected RIU's in order to pro- 

 vide university researchers important access to manned and unmanned submersibles worldwide. 



The Cooperative program for Operational Meteorology Education and Training (COMET), established by 

 NOAA's National Weather Service and the University Corporation for Atmospheric Research (UCAR) enables 

 NOAA to tap the expertise of neariy sixty universities in a fair, effective manner to train and educate its operational 

 forecasters. In the modernized National Weather Service, a number of Warning and Forecast Offices will be collo- 

 cated on university campuses, fostering opportunities for research and training on both sides of the NOAA-university 

 interface. 



In the 1960's NIST established a Joint Institute for Laboratory Astrophysics on the University of Colorado Cam- 

 pus, bringing together researchers from both government and the university to a single installation for collaborative, 

 long-term research on a single topic under joint sponsorship. Hugely successful, this model has since been widely 

 emulated by NOAA's Environmental Research Laboratories, which have created seven such institutes. NIST and the 

 rest of NOAA have since established other such institutes. Today hundreds of university scientists and graduate stu- 

 dents work side by side with their federal counterparts in these unique institutions. 



A significant fraction of the NOAA research budget — over 40% — is allocated extramurally. 

 Public Benefits from Research-Intensive Universities/Federal Government Relationship: 



The relationship between the Department of Commerce and research-intensive universities has resulted in a 

 continuous stream of benefits to the American public: 



31 



