Biophysical Society Bulletin | March 2026

Public Affairs

Fiscal Year 2027 Work Begins As of the time of writing, we are mere days away from the continuing resolution funding the US federal government expiring. However, the planning for fiscal year 2027 has begun. Stakeholders, such as BPS and our coalition partners, have begun sub mitting our funding request levels for agencies funding scientific research. The White House is expected to release a budget re quest in early February, but recent years have seen them released closer to March or April, which leaves House and Senate ap propriators beginning the process on their own. The White House has already released the priorities for scientific research and development to focus on artificial intelligence, quantum science, nuclear energy, and biotechnology, but it remains to be seen if there will be another round of drastic proposed cuts to science when the President’s Budget Request is officially released.

NSF Undertakes Major Organizational Restructuring In December, the National Science Foundation (NSF) announced a significant restructuring, raising questions within the research community about its impact on the $9 billion federal science agency. The changes were prompted by a directive from the White House Office of Personnel Man agement requiring supervisors to be career federal employees and to manage no more than 10 direct reports. The NSF had long relied on temporary “rotators”—scientists on loan from universities—to serve as supervisors, often overseeing much larger teams. To comply, the NSF promoted career pro gram officers into supervisory roles and eliminated roughly three-quarters of its 350 rotator positions, most of them program officers. The reduction also allowed the agency to shrink its approximately 1,700-person workforce in response to a separate White House directive. As part of the reorganization, NSF’s Office of Legislative and Public Affairs and Office of the General Counsel now report to the Chief Management Officer (CMO) rather than directly to the NSF Director. The CMO role, created in July 2024 by then-Director Sethuraman Panchanathan , is held by Micah Cheatham , who previously oversaw administrative functions such as budget, grants management, and human resourc es. The position has since expanded to include oversight of compliance with executive orders and White House policy directives.

The restructuring also alters NSF’s scientific organization. The agency has eliminated discipline-based divisions within its directorates and replaced them with smaller units known as sections, some temporarily labeled generically to meet supervisory requirements. In several cases, these sections are grouped into broader thematic areas, such as the Biology Directorate’s new focus areas of foundations of life, living systems, and bioinnovation and infrastructure. The long-term effects of the restructuring on NSF’s operations and research portfolio remain unclear. NIH Agrees to Review Previously Halted Grant Applications after Lawsuit Settlements The National Institutes of Health (NIH) has agreed to review certain grant applications that were frozen, denied, or with drawn in 2025, according to settlement agreements reached with plaintiff researchers and state attorneys general. Under the settlements, the NIH will reevaluate affected applications by using its standard review procedures and will assess each application “in good faith,” as outlined in a joint stipulation filed with the court. In exchange, the plaintiffs in both cases agreed to dismiss their remaining legal claims. The agreements stem from lawsuits filed in 2025 after the NIH terminated hundreds of research grants and halted the review of additional applications. The affected grants and

March 2026

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