for work at institutions other than 

 those in which thev obtained their 

 degrees. Thus, they not onlv broad- 

 ened their own training but contrib- 

 uted greatly to the interchange of 

 ideas and methods between labora- 

 tories. In the immediate postwar 

 period, an increase in the number of 

 these fellowships would be especially 

 important in re-establishing in scien- 

 tific work many men who had com- 

 pleted their formal education before 

 joining the armed forces and would 

 thus be ineligible for aid under the 

 G.I. Bill of Rights. The fellowships 

 should also be helpful in certain 

 fields of pure and applied science 

 where a combination of skills is re- 

 quired and where the cost of a 

 thorough training is prohibitive un- 

 der present conditions. 



4. Senior Research Felloivships 



Although scholarship and fellow- 

 ships such as those described above 

 have operated successfully on a fairly 

 large scale in the past, fewer oppor- 

 tunities exist for similar aid to the 

 mature investigator. One of the foun- 

 dations has for several years gi\'en 

 special attention to this field, and 

 shortly before the war the National 

 Research Council instituted the 

 Welch Fellowships in Medicine for 

 men of relatively advanced though 

 hardly mature academic status. In 

 the opinion of the committee, how- 

 ever, much more needs to be done to 

 enable really experienced investiga- 

 tors to develop and utilize their tal- 

 ents most effectively. The problem, 

 in fact, appears to be far beyond the 

 means of private resources. Research 

 workers who have reached the status 

 of assistant professor or above tend to 

 remain in their own uni\ersities and 



their time available for research tends 

 to become increasingly broken up. In 

 theory, the sabbatical year gives an 

 opportunity for intensive research or 

 travel, but in recent years universities 

 have been less and less able to grant 

 such freedom from academic routine. 

 The resulting immobility of the sen- 

 ior staff serves to isolate the intel- 

 lectual life of a university from that 

 of its fellows, and the indi\'iduals 

 concerned, lacking outside stimula- 

 tion, may incline more and more to 

 perfunctory performance of routine 

 duties. The tendency of American 

 universities to select full professors 

 and department heads from within 

 their own staffs only aggra\'ates these 

 undesirable conditions. 



Fellowships large enough to meet 

 the salaries of advanced academic 

 personnel for periods of intensive re- 

 search work at their own institutions 

 or at other universities would be an 

 effective means of attacking these 

 problems. Such grants offer an espe- 

 cially powerful tool for building up 

 research in institutions that are just 

 beginning to develop the research 

 spirit, either by enabling their facul- 

 ties to receive advanced training else- 

 where or by bringing distinguished 

 workers to them from other institu- 

 tions. An accompanying grant to 

 cover the use of research facilities 

 should be made to the institution 

 selected by the recipient of the fel- 

 lowship. 



Efforts should also be made to 

 encourage mature scientists in indus- 

 try and government to avail them- 

 selves of the opportunity pro\ided in 

 this program to do fundamental re- 

 search in universities of their own 

 choice. This should help in part to 

 speed the transition between pure re- 

 search and its practical applications. 



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