Last year was the year of elections and 2025 is going to be the year of decisions.

After many countries, including the UK, Ireland and the US, went to the polls in 2024, the start of 2025 will see governments at the beginning of new terms, forced to respond swiftly to mounting economic, social, security, environmental and technological challenges.

These issues would be difficult to address at any given time, but today they come amid a turbulent geopolitical context. Governments are often judged against short milestones – the first 100 days or a first budget – but urgency should not come at the cost of thinking long-term, because the decisions over the next few months will shape outcomes for years, perhaps decades, to come. This is no less true for science than it is for health and social care, education or international relations.

In the UK, the first half of the year will be dominated by the government’s spending review. Due in late spring, it could be one of the toughest political tests for UK science, as the implications of the tight spending plans announced in the October budget become clear. Decisions about departmental spending will have important implications for physics funding, from research to infrastructure, facilities and teaching.

One of the UK government’s commitments is to establish 10-year funding cycles for key R&D activities – a policy that could be a positive improvement. Physics discoveries often take time to realise in full, but their transformational nature is indisputable. From fibre-optic communications to magnetic resonance imaging, physics has been indispensable to many of the world’s most impactful and successful innovations.

Emerging technologies, enabled by physicists’ breakthroughs in fields such as materials science and quantum physics, promise to transform the way we live and work, and create new business opportunities and open up new markets. A clear, comprehensive and long-term vision for R&D would instil confidence among researchers and innovators, and long-term and sustainable R&D funding would enable people and disruptive ideas to flourish and drive tomorrow’s breakthroughs.

Alongside the spending review, we are also expecting the publication of the government’s industrial strategy. The focus of the green paper published last year was an indication of how the strategy will place significance on science and technology in positioning the UK for economic growth.

If we don’t recognise the need to fund more physicists, we will miss so many of the opportunities that lie ahead

Physics-based industries are a foundation stone for the UK economy and are highly productive, as highlighted by research commissioned by the Institute of Physics, which publishes Physics World. Across the UK, the physics sector generates £229bn gross value added, or 11% of total UK gross domestic product. It creates a collective turnover of £643bn, or £1380bn when indirect and induced turnover is included.

Labour productivity in physics-based businesses is also strong at £84 300 per worker, per year. So, if physics is not at the heart of this effort, then the government’s mission of economic revival is in danger of failing to get off the launch pad.

A pivotal year

Another of the new government’s policy priorities is the strategic defence review, which is expected to be published later this year. It could have huge implications for physics given its core role in many of the technologies that contribute to the UK’s defence capabilities. The changing geopolitical landscape, and potential for strained relations between global powers, may well bring research security to the front of the national mind.

Intellectual property, and scientific innovation, are some of the UK’s greatest strengths and it is right to secure them. But physics discoveries in particular can be hampered by overzealous security measures. So much of the important work in our discipline comes from years of collaboration between researchers across the globe. Decisions about research security need to protect, not hamper, the future of UK physics research.

This year could also be pivotal for UK universities, as securing their financial stability and future will be one of the major challenges. Last year, the pressures faced by higher education institutions became apparent, with announcements of course closures, redundancies and restructures as a way of saving money. The rise in tuition fees has far from solved the problem, so we need to be prepared for more turbulence coming for the higher education sector.

These things matter enormously. We have heard that universities are facing a tough situation, and it’s getting harder for physics departments to exist. But if we don’t recognise the need to fund more physicists, we will miss so many of the opportunities that lie ahead.

As we celebrate the International Year of Quantum Science and Technology that marks the centenary of the initial development of quantum mechanics by Werner Heisenberg, 2025 is a reminder of how the benefits of physics span over decades.

We need to enhance all the vital and exciting developments that are happening in physics departments. The country wants and needs a stronger scientific workforce – just think about all those individuals who studied physics and now work in industries that are defending the country – and that workforce will be strongly dependent on physics skills. So our priority is to make sure that physics departments keep doing world-leading research and preparing the next generation of physicists that they do so well.

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Incoming US President Donald Trump has selected Silicon Valley executive Michael Kratsios as director of the Office of Science and Technology Policy (OSTP). Kratsios will also serve as Trump’s science advisor, a position that, unlike the OSTP directorship, does not require approval by the US Senate. Meanwhile, computer scientist Lynne Parker from the University of Tennessee, Knoxville, has been appointed to a new position – executive director of the President’s Council on Advisors on Science and Technology. Parker, who is a former member of OSTP, will also act as counsellor to the OSTP director.

Kratsios, with a BA in politics from Princeton University, was previously chief of staff to Silicon Valley venture capitalist Peter Thiel before becoming the White House’s chief technology officer in 2017 at the start of Trump’s first stint as US president. In addition to his technology remit, Kratsios was effectively Trump’s science advisor until meteorologist Kelvin Droegemeier took that position in January 2019. Kratsios then became the Department of Defense’s acting undersecretary of research and engineering. After the 2020 presidential election, Kratsios left government to run the San Francisco-based company Scale AI.

Parker has a MS from the University of Tennessee and a PhD from Massachusetts Institute of Technology, both in computer science. She was founding director of the University of Tennessee’s AI Tennessee Initiative before spending four years as a member of OSTP, bridging the first Trump and Biden administrations. There, she served as deputy chief technology officer and was the inaugural director of OSTP’s National Artificial Intelligence Initiative Office.

Unlike some other Trump nominations, the appointments have been positively received by the science community. “APLU is enthusiastic that President-elect Trump has selected two individuals who recognize the importance of science to national competitiveness, health, and economic growth,” noted the Association of Public & Land Universities – a membership organisation of public research universities — in a statement. Analysts expect the nominations to reflect the returning president’s interest in pursuing AI, which could indicate a move towards technology over scientific research in the coming four years.

• Bill Nelson – NASA’s departing administrator – has handed over a decision about when to retrieve samples from Mars to potential successor Jared Isaacman. In the wake of huge cost increases and long delays in the schedule for bringing back samples collected by the rover Perseverance, NASA had said last year that it would develop a fresh plan for the “Mars Sample Return” mission. Nelson now says the agency had two lower-cost plans in mind – but that a choice will not be made until mid-2026. One plan would use a sky crane system resembling that which delivered Perseverance to the Martian surface, while the other would require a commercially produced “heavy lift lander” to pick up samples. Each option could cost up to $7.5 bn – much less than the rejected plan’s $11 bn.

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Before Donald Trump takes oath for a second term as US president on 20 January, the US scientific community is preparing for what the next four years may look like. Many already have a sense of trepidation given his track record from his first term in office. There are concerns, for example, about his nominations for cabinet and other key positions. Others are worried about the role that SpaceX boss Elon Musk will play as the head of a new “department of government efficiency”.

Neal Lane, a senior fellow in science and technology at Rice University’s Baker Institute and science adviser to former president Bill Clinton, told Physics World that he doesn’t see “any good news for science, especially any fields or studies that seem to be offensive to important segments of Trump’s supporter base”. Lane says that includes research related to “climate change, reproduction, gender and any other aspects of diversity, environmental protection and justice, biodiversity, public health, vaccinations, most fields of the social sciences, and many others”.

John Holdren, who was science adviser to Barack Obama and is a member of Harvard University’s Kennedy School and the Woodwell Climate Research Center, is equally pessimistic. “The stated intentions of president-elect Trump and his acolytes concerning energy and climate policies are deeply dismaying,” he says. “If history is any guide, Trump will also try to put a large crimp in federal research on climate science and advanced clean energy.”

We saw budgets for science agencies go up [under Trump] due to a variety of factors, so that’s something we hope for again

Jennifer Grodsky

During his first term in office between 2017 and 2021, Trump tried to ban immigration from Muslim-majority countries and created the China Initiative that led to charges against some US scientists for collaborations with colleagues in Chinese universities. He also famously used a Sharpie pen to change the apparent course of hurricane Duran on a National Weather Service map, resulting in consternation from researchers.

When COVID-19 emerged, he suggested ineffective and possibly dangerous treatments for it and had a fraught relationship with Anthony Fauci, who was then in charge of the country’s response to the pandemic. Lane says that the administration is likely to continue “to downplay evidence-based science in setting policies and allow misinformation” to be published on agency websites. “That would result not only in damage to the integrity of US science, but to the trust the American public places in science,” Lane adds. “Ultimately, it could affect people’s lives and livelihoods.”

On the other hand, under Trump’s stewardship, the COVID-19 vaccine was developed at record-breaking speed, and while it took 18 months in office before he nominated a science adviser, his pick of meteorologist Kelvin Droegemeier was generally applauded by the scientific community. Funding for science also increased during Trump’s first term. “We saw budgets for science agencies go up due to a variety of factors, so that’s something we hope for again,” says Jennifer Grodsky, Boston University’s vice-president for federal relations.

And the nominees are…

In Trump’s first term, various members of his presidential staff and cabinet managed to dissuade him from pursuing some more unorthodox ideas related to science and medicine. And when they failed to do so, Congress acted as a hard brake. The Senate has a constitutional responsibility to advise the president on (and consent by a simple majority to) presidential nominations for cabinet positions, ambassadorships and other high offices. Since the new Senate will take office on 3 January with a Republican majority of 53 to 47 Democrats, many Trump nominees will likely be ready to take office when he becomes president on 20 January.

Most nominees for posts, however, are fully behind Trump’s desire to “drain the swamp” of Washington’s “politics as usual” and have some non-mainstream views on science. Stanford University health economist Jay Bhattacharya, for example, who has been picked to lead the National Institutes of Health, was a vocal critic of the US response to the COVID-19 pandemic who stated that lockdowns caused irreparable harm. Vaccine sceptic Robert F Kennedy Jr, an environmental lawyer, has been chosen to head the Department of Health and Human Services while Marty Makary, a Johns Hopkins University surgeon and cancer specialist who shares many of Kennedy’s attitudes about health, is tagged to lead the Food and Drug Administration.

While the nominees to head environmental and energy agencies come from more mainstream candidates, they could – if approved – implement significant changes in policy from the Biden administration. Trump wants, for example, to open protected areas to drilling and mining. He also aims to take the US out of the Paris Accord on climate change for a second time – after Biden rescinded the first removal.

As a sign of things to come, Trump has already nominated Lee Zeldin as administrator of the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA). A former Republican Congressman from New York and a critic of much environmental legislation, Zeldin says that the EPA will “restore US energy dominance” while “protecting access to clean air and water”. But his focus on pro-business deregulation is set to dismay environmentalists who applauded the Biden administration’s EPA ban on several toxic substances and limitation on the amounts of “forever” chemicals in water.

Swimming against the tide of a hostile White House will not be easy

John Holdren

When it comes to energy, Trump has nominated Chris Wright, founder and chief executive office of the Denver-based fracking company Liberty Energy, to head the Department of Energy. While Wright accepts that fossil fuels contribute to global warming, he has also referenced scientific studies that support his claim that climate change “alarmists” are wrong about the impact of a warmer world. If approved, Wright will participate in a new National Energy Council that Department of the Interior nominee Doug Burgum will chair. A software company billionaire and current governor of North Dakota, Burgum has mirrored Wright in accusing the “radical left” of engaging in a war against US energy to reduce climate change.

Lane predicts that the Trump administration will even try to privatize agencies within government departments, potentially including the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, which is part of the US Department of Commerce. “That could result in forcing people to pay to get timely weather reports,” he says. “To find out, for example, where a hurricane is headed or to receive better tornado warnings.”

Space Force

A different threat to science comes from Musk’s department of government efficiency, which he will run together with the biotechnology billionaire Vivek Ramaswamy. As the owner of SpaceX, Starlink and Tesla, Musk – currently the world’s richest person – asserts that the department can cut $2 trillion from the roughly $6.5 trillion annual US government budget. While some are sceptical of that pledge, scientists fear the effort could target science-related agencies. The Department of Education, for example, could be shut with several prominent Republicans, including Trump, having already called for its elimination.

Another possible target for budget cuts is NASA, which is already in financial trouble, having been forced to postpone the next lunar Artemis mission to April 2026 and the planned crewed Moon landing to mid-2027. Trump has nominated Jared Isaacman – a billionaire associate of Musk – as the agency’s administrator. Co-founder of the aerospace firm Draken International, Isaacman developed and financed September’s Polaris Dawn mission, in which he and three other private astronauts were taken into orbit by Musk’s SpaceX rockets. If confirmed in office, Isaacman is expected to expand existing links between NASA and the commercial space sector.

Another impact of Trump’s second term could be collaborations between US and foreign scientists. A return to the China initiative that Biden rescinded seems possible, and Trump has promised to continue the hard line against immigrants that marked his first term in office. Some university leaders have already warned overseas students not to travel home during the winter break in case they are not allowed back into the US. “New executive orders that may impact travel may be implemented,” a statement by the leadership of Massachusetts Institute of Technology noted. “Any processing delays could impact students’ ability to return to the US as planned.”

As the Biden administration departs and Trump is sworn into office on 20 January, many scientists will be hopeful, but unconvinced, that science is heading in the right direction. For Holdren, the next four years simply promises to be a rocky time. “Swimming against the tide of a hostile White House will not be easy,” he adds. “Let us hope all who understand the challenge will rise to it.”

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NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory (JPL) has announced another round of staff layoffs. The move, which began in mid-November, involves about 325 people, representing 5% of the lab’s employees. It follows layoffs in February of about 530 JPL staff and 140 of the lab’s outside contractors. According to JPL director Laurie Leshin, the second reduction in employees is occurring “across technical, business and support areas of the laboratory”.

JPL, which the California Institute of Technology runs for NASA, carries out many of the agency’s planetary exploration projects. These include the Europa Clipper mission, which launched in October, and the Perseverance and Curiosity Mars rovers.

The earlier layoff at JPL stemmed from uncertainty over its budget for 2024. Indeed, the Mars Sample Return (MSR) has impacted JPL’s financial flexibility. The mission has experienced a series of delays and other problems and in October 2023 a NASA review board noted that the craft’s original price tag of $4bn had risen to $5.3bn. By April 2024 the estimated price had soared to $8-11bn and the date of the samples’ arrival on Earth extended to 2040.

US Congress has not yet settled on NASA’s budget for financial year 2025, which began on 1 October, but projections of likely spending on specific NASA institutions and programmes convinced JPL’s leadership to downsize. “With lower budgets and based on the forecasted work ahead, we had to tighten our belts across the board,” Leshin wrote in a memo to employees.

Leshin notes that the number of layoffs is lower than that projected a few months ago “thanks in part to the hard work of so many people across JPL”. She points out that the election of Donald Trump to the US presidency earlier this month had no impact on the layoff decision. “[Even] though the coming leadership transition at NASA may introduce both new uncertainties and new opportunities, this action would be happening regardless of the recent election outcome,” she adds.

Leshin has reassured the lab’s staff that the current layoff should be the final one. “I believe this is the last cross-lab workforce action we will need to take in the foreseeable future,” she wrote. “After this action, we will be at about 5500 JPL regular employees. I believe this is a stable, supportable staffing level moving forward.”

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The European Union should more than double its budget for research and innovation in its next spending round, dubbed Framework Programme 10 (FP10). That’s the view of a report by an expert group, which says a dramatic increase to €220bn is needed for European science to be globally competitive once again. Its recommendations are expected to have a big influence over the European Commission’s proposals for FP10, due in mid-2025.

The EU’s current Horizon Europe programme, which runs from 2021 to 2027, has a budget of €95.5bn. In December 2023, the Commission picked 15 experts from research and industry – led by former Portuguese science minister Manuel Heitor – to advise on FP10, which is set to run from 2028 to 2034. According to their report, Europe is lagging behind in investment and impact in science, technology and innovation.

It says Europe’s share of global scientific publications, most-cited publications and patent applications have dropped over the last 20 years. Europe’s technology base, it claims, is more diverse than other major economies, but also more focused on less complex technologies. China and the US, in contrast, lead in areas expected to drive future growth, such as semiconductors, optics, digital communications and audio-visual technologies.

The experts also say the “disruptive, paradigm shifting research and innovation” that Europe needs to boast it economies is “unlikely to be fostered by conventional procedures and programmes in the EU today”. They want the EU to set up an experimental unit to test and launch disruptive innovation programmes with “fast funding” options. It should develop programmes like those of the US advanced research projects agencies and explore how generative AI could be used in science.

Based on analysis of previous unfunded proposals, the report claims that FP10’s budget should be doubled to €220bn to “guarantee funding of all high-quality proposals”. It also says that funding applications need to be simplified and streamlined, with funding handed out more quickly. It also calls for better international collaborations, including with China, and disruptive innovation programmes, such as on military-civilian “dual-use” innovation.

Launching the report, Heitor said there was a need “to put research technology and innovation in the centre of European economies”, adding that the expert group was calling for “radical simplification and innovation” for the next programme. Europe needs to pursue a “transformative agenda” in FP10 around four interlinked areas: competitive excellence in science and innovation; industrial competitiveness; societal challenges; and a strong European research and innovation ecosystem.

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