Prepared remarksofMarie Lynn Miranda, Ph.D.
Charles and Jill Fischer Provost
Professor of Applied and Computational Mathematics and Statistics
Director of the Children’s Environmental Health Initiative
University of Notre Damebefore theU.S. Senate Committee on Commerce, Science, and Transportation

regarding“Legislative Hearing on the Endless Frontier Act”
April 14, 2021

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Introduction
Madam Chair, Ranking Member Wicker, and Members of the Committee, on behalf of the
University of Notre Dame, I am honored to appear before you today to offer testimony regarding
the Endless Frontier Act.
Chair Cantwell, as a career scientist, researcher, and higher education administrator, I am
grateful for your commitment to scientific discovery and innovation, and your Committee’s
dedication to strengthening our nation’s innovation ecosystem. I am particularly appreciative of
your efforts and leadership in creating pathways for women and other underrepresented groups
to pursue STEMM (science, technology, engineering, mathematics, and medicine) fields.
I also extend greetings to my own Indiana Senator, Todd Young, who is working with Senator
Schumer to author this important legislation. Thank you for your leadership and longstanding
support and commitment to university research and learning.
I am particularly pleased to be here in person – something that might not have been possible amonth ago, but is today due largely to the tremendous U.S. federal government investments
made over many years in basic science and technology research conducted at our nation’s
universities. Those long-term, strategic investments in science and technology established theknowledge base and foundation that enabled pharmaceutical companies to develop and produce
several safe, effective vaccines to combat the COVID-19 pandemic in a timespan previously
unimaginable.
Background
I am a professor of applied and computational mathematics and statistics at the University ofNotre Dame, where I also serve as the Charles and Jill Fischer provost and direct the Children’s
Environmental Health Initiative (CEHI), which is a research, education, and outreachorganization committed to fostering environments where all people can prosper.
I have spent more than 30 years as a use-driven, or applied, researcher who deploys Bayesianspatial statistics to identify impacts of and solutions to environmental and social threats tochildren. I have applied science and technology to help understand and address complex, realworld challenges locally, regionally, and nationally.
In my own work and in my role as provost at the University of Notre Dame, I have witnessed
firsthand the power of the federal government’s substantial investments in basic science andtechnology to improve lives for individuals, communities, and our society more broadly. That is
our mission at the University of Notre Dame – to be a force for good in the world.

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It is common to conceive of researchers dividing up into curiosity-driven versus use-driven
scientists and engineers. In fact, a virtuous cycle exists between the two. Curiosity-driven
researchers elucidate critical insights into basic science questions that drive new opportunities foruse-driven researchers. In turn, use-driven researchers highlight new challenges for curiositydriven researchers to take up. And in fact, many scientists and engineers are both use-driven andcuriosity-driven.
While I am primarily a use-driven researcher, I rely heavily on basic science or curiosity-driven
research. Use-driven researchers and curiosity-driven researchers interact constantly, discussing
problems, challenging each other, and sharpening each other’s work. When I wrote mydissertation, I had to use a mainframe computer to analyze the 40,000 observations in my dataset,and I could only implement the analysis at the county level. Back then, 40,000 observations was
big data!
In contrast, for the past 20 years, I have worked on childhood lead exposure, specificallyinterested in using spatial analysis to identify houses where children are most likely to be
exposed to lead, and then remediate houses to prevent future exposure. Federal investments inbasic science research on geographic information systems, as well as computational power andspeed, made it possible for me to analyze millions of observations on my desktop computer. In
addition, new insights from theoretical statisticians made it possible to implement our models at
the individual tax parcel level.
Housing departments use CEHI’s detailed models to prioritize housing rehabilitation dollars,
working with property owners to make homes lead-safe. Health departments use the samemodels to drive lead screening programs, resulting in one county, for example, experiencing a
600% increase in its ability to identify children with elevated blood lead levels at no additional
cost.
These models have been replicated for communities across the United States. As a result, wehave protected thousands of children from potential harmful effects of lead exposure, including
learning and behavioral disorders, poor hearing, attention deficits, and other negative
neurological effects.
While the scope of the Endless Frontier Act is broad, as requested, I will focus this testimony onopportunities to strengthen the nation’s research enterprise and increase diversity of the science,technology, engineering, mathematics, and medical (STEMM) fields.
Federally funded research: the foundation of American innovation and security
It is unfortunate that many Americans neither see nor appreciate the myriad, intricate
connections between basic, curiosity-driven research and its end uses, developments, andproducts. Instead, many view the amazing technologies that surround us – self-driving vehicles,
rovers on Mars, mobile phones that do everything from navigate our world to monitor our health– as the unexpected next new products to shape our world.
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The truth, of course, is that nearly all of the technological innovations that enable our modern
society emerge from a deliberately built foundation of federally funded research conducted overmany years at universities or federally funded research laboratories. While many Americans may
not fully appreciate this connection, our peers, competitors, and potential adversaries around theglobe certainly do.
The initial large-scale investments in federally funded research were a conscious post World War
II decision related to the Cold War. Other nations watched as U.S. government investments inscience, sustained in part through National Science Foundation (NSF), created a global
superpower and shaped a society and economy that have been the envy of the world for multiple
generations. The American system awards funding competitively, balancing a centralized source
for funding with the incredible entrepreneurial spirit that characterizes our researchers. Thissystem aligns fully with American democratic values.
Other nations are now making similar investments with similar ambitions at a pace that exceeds
the United States, especially expenditures in critically important areas such as artificial
intelligence, quantum computing, and other advanced technologies. According to data from an
April 2020 Congressional Research Service report, U.S. investments in research anddevelopment funding declined from 69 percent of the world’s total in 1960 to 28 percent in 2018.
Interestingly, the U.S. decline is not the result of cuts in U.S. investments. Rather, the decline in
U.S. global leadership in this area is the result of even greater investments by the governments ofother countries that recognize the importance of R&D to their innovation and competitiveness. 1
That targeted funding is having direct results. For example, since the mid-2000s, increased
investments by China in science and technology have led to steady growth in the number ofscientific journal articles published by Chinese researchers, a key measure of scientificinnovation. China is now the largest single global producer of scientific journal articles,
surpassing the U.S. in 2016. 2
Education as a foundation of innovation
Sustainable economic development in general is not easy to achieve, and innovation-based
economic development is an even greater challenge. However, as noted in the World Economic
Forum’s 2019 Global Competitiveness Report, “In most advanced and emerging economies,
technology adoption and innovation have become priorities for governments and companies
alike as a source of value creation, productivity growth, and improved living standards.

1

Congressional Research Service, Global Research and Development Expenditures: Fact Sheet
Updated April 29, 2020. https://fas.org/sgp/crs/misc/R44283.pdf, 2020.
2

National Science Foundation, Science and Engineering Indicators 2018, Outputs of SE
Research: Publications, https://nsf.gov/statistics/2018/nsb20181/report/sections/academicresearch-and-development/outputs-of-s-e-research-publications, 2018.
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Technology can also improve access to basic services, working conditions, health outcomes andeconomic security.” 3 Even prior to the COVID-19 pandemic, the nature of jobs and work has
been changing at a rapid pace, enabled by advances in computer science and engineering,
advancements in learning sciences, and new conceptions of work and workplaces.
Linked to this rapid pace of change is an unprecedented opportunity to expand access toemerging new industries and occupations, enhance productivity and quality of work life, andincrease workforce participation. U.S. regions with successful innovation-based “ecosystems”
share in common well-defined links between colleges and universities, a skilled workforce,
investments in technology and infrastructure, and an entrepreneurial culture that drives a region
to capitalize on its economic strengths.
Moreover, America’s need for both basic, curiosity-driven research and applied, use-driven
research is greater than ever today because the challenges and competition we face as a society
and nation are greater and more complex than ever. Our societal and technical challenges also
require greater collaboration between research fields, increased diversity of perspectives andskills, and a much larger and broader talent pool entering STEMM fields. The Endless Frontier
Act represents a major effort to address these concerns, and I commend its authors and theCommittee Members for their renewed commitment to confront these challenges.
Strengthening our U.S. innovation ecosystem necessarily begins with education and efforts toencourage young Americans to pursue rigorous academic courses, and it continues with efforts totransfer technology and knowledge created in research universities to industry, which brings
these innovations to the marketplace. Complementary to these technology transfer initiatives arecollege and university programs that support regional industry innovation, which creates jobs,
boosts regional economies, and addresses regional concerns.
Thinking outside the pipe
It is popular to refer to the STEMM pipeline as a metaphor for producing a STEMM-enabled
workforce. Referring to it as a pipeline, however, implies that there is only one intake point andone outtake point, with potential leaks along the way. In fact, members of the STEMM
workforce travel different paths. My own research path moved from mathematics to economics
to toxicology to statistics. I encourage people to think about multiple pathways, rather thanpipelines.
Some paths are smooth and direct; some are circuitous and must traverse rough terrain. Somelead to STEMM PhDs and some to STEMM bachelor or associate degrees. Some have only one
entry point; some have many. We need all these paths to build the STEMM enabled workforce
our country needs for national security, for national competitiveness, for national prosperity, andto solve our most challenging societal problems.

3

World Economic Forum Global Competiveness Report,
http://www3.weforum.org/docs/WEF_TheGlobalCompetitivenessReport2019.pdf, 2019.

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While we need PhD-trained researchers to develop new cybersecurity systems, we also needpeople with associate and bachelor degrees trained to run those systems on a daily basis. While
we need PhD-trained researchers to predict and model natural disasters, we need large STEMMenabled multidisciplinary teams to use that research to react in real time on the ground in disasterzones.
We are also vulnerable when it comes to STEMM talent. The ability of the U.S. to meet thedemand for individuals with the knowledge, skills, curiosity, and creativity necessary to enter
STEMM-intensive careers is hindered by the lack of women and underrepresented minority
populations in STEMM fields.
We must also think broadly about the need to bring our entire talent pool to this issue. For
example, women comprise 51.5 percent of our population and 47 percent of the labor force.
However, in computer science, only 19 percent of those awarded bachelor’s degrees in 2016
were women – down from 27 percent in 1997. 4 Similarly, underrepresented minorities comprise
27 percent of our population and 30 percent of the labor force, but only 9 percent of those with
science and engineering doctorate degrees.
Unfortunately, 39 percent of U.S. high schools are unable to offer physics, a foundational course
for STEMM fields. The inability to offer physics and other science and mathematics courses
relates directly to the lack of qualified teachers, primarily in low resource, smaller schools. So,
nearly two in five high school graduates, regardless of their academic ability, interest, or
motivation, will start college facing a much tougher path for pursuing STEMM degrees. 5
At Notre Dame, we established a STEMM scholars program in 2018 to support students who
intend to pursue STEMM careers but arrive at our university without the benefit of multiple
Advanced Placement courses or other STEMM enrichment opportunities. This program has beenvery successful in helping these students succeed in their courses and persist in STEMM
disciplines, without the emotional burden of feeling less qualified than others.
Modernizing university technology transfer programs
The Endless Frontier Act seeks to strengthen America’s economic competitiveness andefficiency by producing innovative technology through research and commercialization grants.
Achieving these goals will require commercialization of innovations that emerge from theseresearch investments, much of which will go to universities.

4

National Center for Educational Statistics, Women, Minorities, and Persons with
Disabilities in Science and Engineering, 2019.
5

Science Education Policy, Problematizing the STEM Pipeline Metaphor: Is the STEM Pipeline
Metaphor Serving Our Students and the STEM Workforce?, 2014.
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To achieve the goals of the Endless Frontier Act, universities need to remake their technology
transfer and commercialization operations. More specifically, they should shift away from thenearly ubiquitous model of relying on tech managers, who usually have deep technicalknowledge and little business experience, to commercialize university discoveries. Twenty yearsof data have shown this approach does not work.
For example, despite tens of billions of dollars spent on university research each year, 95 percent
of all intellectual property discovered in universities goes unlicensed. 6 Of the intellectual
property that is licensed, 72 percent takes place at only 37 universities. Furthermore, only 13
percent of tech transfer offices are self-sustaining. 7 Why? Technologies that emerge fromuniversities are very early-stage and full of risk for potential licensees, so potential investors arehesitant to invest. Traditional tech transfer offices lack the skills and processes to de-risk atechnology sufficiently enough that the right funders, founders, entrepreneurs, advisors, mentors,
or corporate partners will engage.
To address this issue, university commercialization operations should put in place a rigorous andreplicable de-risking process. At the University of Notre Dame, we have implemented a stagegated, milestone driven methodology to de-risk technologies and make them more attractive forcommercialization.
Implementing such a process drives success in a number of ways. First, it allows thecommercialization office’s staff to specialize in key areas, including IP and technology, business,and startups. Second, it ensures the staff applies the right resources in the right amounts at theright times for the right projects. Finally, it turbocharges the speed with which technologies
move from discovery to market.
Over the past five to eight years, a small number of universities have started using a variant of
this system and the results are impressive. They have created hundreds of startups, tens of
thousands of jobs, and billions of dollars in value. Research funding alone will not achieve thegoals of the Endless Frontier Act. New and inventive commercialization processes will be
required.
Expanding innovation at the national, state, and regional levels
U.S. business research and development activities are presently concentrated in a relatively small
number of states. In 2018, of the $441 billion in R&D performed in the U.S., most went to
California (33%), followed by Washington (7%), Massachusetts (6%), Michigan (5%), Texas(5%), New Jersey (5%), New York (4%), Illinois (3%), and Pennsylvania (3%).

6Nature: https://www.nature.com/news/universities-struggle-to-make-patents-pay-1.13811,
2013.
7

AUTM (formerly the Association of University Technology Managers) Report,
https://autm.net/surveys-and-tools/databases/statt, 2019.
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While the particular focus of EFA legislation is to address and advance America’s national
security and global competitiveness, I applaud its efforts to provide targeted investments anddevelopment of additional, broadly distributed technology hubs or centers throughout the UnitedStates, including in promising “Heartland America” places like Indiana.
Indiana is well positioned to serve as one of these state tech hubs, as we have rich collaborations
across the three major research universities; Purdue University, Indiana University, Notre Dame,and with the Crane Naval Surface Warfare Center and the Indiana State government’s Indiana
Economic Development Corporation (IEDC). We also have a highly active organization
coordinating the corporate relationships in the State, the Central Indiana Corporate Partnership(CICP). The CICP has become a major catalyst for growing the industrial competitiveness of thecompanies in the State in areas such as (see list of EFA foci). In fact, a recent report that we
commissioned from the Brookings Institution identified existing strengths and related
opportunities in a manner that is generally consistent with the tech hub framework.
As of 2019, Indiana has the nation’s third-highest rate of employment in these R&D and
STEMM-worker intensive industries. Indiana’s advanced industries employ 10.5% of the
Hoosier workforce (323,600 individuals), while producing 25% of the state’s GDP and 60% of
the state’s exports. And because of long supply chains and multiplier effects, the state’s
industries are indirectly responsible for another 700,000 jobs.
Our state’s advanced industry mix makes clear that Indiana’s economy is largely driven byadvanced manufacturing. Among Indiana’s advanced industry workers, 76% are employed inadvanced manufacturing. These workers produced 79% of the state’s advanced industry output—
amounting to roughly 20% of the state’s contribution to GDP. 8 Furthermore, the life sciences area particularly significant contributor to the state’s advanced manufacturing sector. Specifically,
pharmaceutical and medical device production together employ almost 15% of all Hoosieradvanced manufacturing workers and are responsible for more than 25% of all Hoosier advanced
manufacturing output.
The South Bend–Elkhart (SBE) Region is at the locus of three emergent trends within the global
economy: the shift to a digital environment in industry; the growing polarity of innovation andinvestment; and the renewed emphasis on applied and experiential learning models to better
equip the future workforce.
While these developments present potential challenges, they also signal opportunity. The growthof wireless technologies, artificial intelligence and robotics, data analytics, and digital sensor
technologies—often referred to as the fourth industrial revolution—have accelerated the pace ofinnovation and increased the need for highly skilled expertise.

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Indiana GPS Project Report, https://indianagpsproject.com/, 2021.
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Companies that succeed in this transition will be, first and foremost, enterprises still producing
tangible products, but doing so within a data-based, digital environment with connectivity fromthe shop floor through the supply chain and customer base. Regions at the forefront of digitaltransformation, in turn, offer some of the most compelling career and economic opportunities fora well-trained workforce, thereby concentrating talent, investment, and innovation.
In response to these emerging economic demands and need for a coordinated solution, funded bya $42 million grant from the Lilly Endowment, Notre Dame and the South Bend Elkhart
Regional Partnership launched the LIFT Network and iNDustry Labs to more effectively andproactively serve the businesses in the South-Bend Elkhart region with a regional innovation
hub. The LIFT Network and iNDustry Labs link the faculty expertise, student talent, and R&D
capabilities at the University and throughout the region with the regional companies embarking
on the digital transformation journey to become more productive, resilient, and skilledorganizations in the digital economy.
Recommendations
I offer the Committee seven recommendations to create greater access to STEMM pathways, topromote increased collaboration between and among curiosity- and use-driven researchers, andto ensure the full potential of the Endless Frontier Act is achieved.
1. Create funding mechanisms that encourage research institutions to collaborate with middle
schools and high schools at scale, including supporting the professional development of
middle and high school science teachers, developing innovative STEMM curricula, andinviting students for meaningful STEMM on-campus experiences. Separately fund a fullscale analysis of the effectiveness of different approaches.
2. Seed fund the development of wrap-around services for first-generation students and thosefrom low resource backgrounds to ensure they can prosper in STEMM fields. Separately
fund a full-scale analysis to assess effectiveness of different interventions, preferably as
randomized controlled trials.
3. Fund the development and maintenance of networks designed to provide mentorship,
research rotations, internships, shadowing programs, support systems, and careeradvancement in STEMM fields at all levels, especially as they are relevant to gender, racial,ethnic, income, and geographic diversity.
4. Dramatically expand funding for NSF Graduate Research Fellowships (GRFs) and ResearchExperiences for Undergraduates (REUs), programs that are incredibly effective at attracting
and retaining young scholars in STEMM. Craft and fund similar programs for high school
students and masters-level students.

95. Create funding mechanisms that promote collaboration between researchers in different
fields and between use-driven and curiosity-driven scholars. These mechanisms should also
include grants designed specifically to develop the databases that will accelerate use-driven
research.
6. Provide funding that extends the length of current grants to address the impacts of COVID19 on research. Such funding is critical for keeping women and minority scholars in
STEMM.
7. Implement funding incentives to help universities transform their tech transfer offices intobusiness-oriented, de-risking operations that better promote commercialization of federally
funded research.
8. To maximize the return on federal investments in regional technology hubs, consider
regional readiness, including vibrancy of partnerships, existing structures for universityindustry partnerships, and local/regional support in workforce development programs.
Conclusion
Keeping our nation secure, prosperous, and economically competitive in a dynamically changing
world depends upon a tremendous investment in science and technology research. That
investment is a necessary one, and it is one our peers, competitors, and adversaries are making.
That investment will also allow us to address our most pressing societal challenges and continue
to fulfill the great promise of the American experiment. Our generation must make thiscommitment, as previous generations did for us, to secure a prosperous future for our children
and grandchildren.
As a university provost, with a landscape view of research at Notre Dame and across higher
education, I have come to believe that the three most powerful drivers of innovation are
curiosity, purpose, and profit. The Endless Frontier Act has the potential to tap deeply into all
three of these drivers.
While I am proud that my research group’s work has helped protect children across the country
from lead exposure, it would be vanity for me to take credit for those impacts. The National
Science Foundation funded my graduate education, and federal funding fuels my research. So thecredit really goes to all of you, senators, and to your colleagues in the House of Representatives,for your longstanding commitment to science and scientists.
I will close with a personal story of the powerful synergy between curiosity-driven and usedriven research, the role of commercialization, and a single, but important, good outcome.

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In the 1950s, curiosity-driven botanists and cultural anthropologists were fascinated by the
Madagascar rosy periwinkle. Eventually, an extract of the plant was used by Eli Lilly to develop
vincristine, a chemotherapeutic that increased the survival rate from childhood leukemia from 10
to 90%. From the same plant, they also developed vinblastine, one of the four chemotherapeutics
that was used to save my daughter Viviana’s life when she was diagnosed with Hodgkin’s
Lymphoma three years ago. She is now a healthy and happy college sophomore, studying
chemistry.
Again, I commend this Committee for their dedication to this effort and thank you for theopportunity to testify today.

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