All this coziness between industry and academia makes some observers very uncomfortable. At the chancellor's 1999 fall conference, the topic was the changing culture of university research, and nematology professor Bruce Jaffee voiced one of the main concerns-that academic research is becoming less basic and more applied. "Our goal is to find the truth and tell the truth and improve our understanding of how the world works. But in the corporate boardroom, Value One is to satisfy the bottom line. And in the corporate-dependent laboratory, the important questions are those that produce products fast and make money within a few years," he said, adding wryly, "and the questions that don't are-academic." In a 1998 report, the National Science Foundation agreed that academic research, while still predominantly basic in nature, is increasingly connected with potential practical applications. Harvard University researcher David Blumenthal and colleagues reported in 1996 that life-science faculty members who had research relationships with industry were twice as likely as those who did not to say that they had taken commercial considerations into account when choosing research topics. Although the university has written policies and procedures for faculty, "there is no bright line separating legitimate scientific inquiry from conßict of interest," said Ray Rodriguez, professor of molecular and cellular biology. "It relies on the good judgment of faculty members to protect the academic freedom of their labs and of other faculty members." And many faculty note that research agendas are shaped by all funding sources, not just private ones. "Federal agencies constantly inßuence research directions as they reject or OK grant proposals," said John Harada, professor of plant biology. Alan Olmstead, director of the campus's Institute of Governmental Affairs, is more blunt. "By far the greatest threat to academic freedom has always been government," he said. "They tell us, 'We want these results, we want them for nothing, we want to tell you what the results are, and we want them yesterday.' " Blumenthal and colleagues also found grounds for another common concern-that industry money stißes scientific communication. They reported in 1997 that among life-science faculty members with industrial research support, about one in 10 said they had sometimes refused to share research results with other university scientists and about one in five said they had delayed publishing results by more than six months to protect their scientific lead, to protect a funder's commercial interests or to slow the dissemination of undesired results. (At the University of California, said Vice Chancellor of Research Kevin Smith, a sponsor may delay a publication only if it needs to review the content for proprietary information or to decide whether tofile for patent protection and then may delay for only 60 to 90 days.) Unconscious research biases? Some people fear that corporate funding will bias researchers, even unconsciously, toward conclusions that are positive for the sponsor. Faculty who test drugs and vaccines are seen as particularly at risk, with some supporting evidence. A University of Toronto study published in the New England Journal of Medicine in 1998 found that physicians who wrote journal articles in support of a new class of heart drugs were far more likely than neutral or critical authors to havefinancial relationships with the drugs' makers. One further concern about industry money is that not everyone gets it. Of the millions in corporate dollars that ßowed to Davis research last year, not one went directly to any of the arts, humanities, social sciences, or ethnic and cultural studies departments, widening what music department chair Wayne Slawson calls "the extreme imbalance [of resources] between the science sides of UC Davis and the other sides of UC Davis." Those who support industry collaborations emphasize the university's role as economic engine and say the university also gains these benefits: o Financial support for graduate students and postdocs, "so they can do research without having to take part-time jobs," said Peter Rock, dean of mathematical and physical sciences. "With the Novartis funds, UC Berkeley's biology department tripled their fellowships to 30. We offered five," said Mark McNamee, dean of biological sciences. Vice Chancellor Smith, whose chemistry lab has supported as many as 30 researchers at a time, said, "I've spent 22 years here trying to make sure I raise the money for my graduate students to have salaries. Once you do that-have to feed some mouths-it's on your mind all the while." o An education that introduces students to the private workplace, "so that they are learning to be first-rate researchers and at the same time learning to understand the world outside the academy. They see their major professors marrying their science with issues of intellectual property, patent-seeking and conßict of interest," said Robert Ringle, Purdue University executive vice president for academic affairs, who was the keynote speaker at the chancellor's fall conference. Carnie Tran, a Davis genetics major aspiring to medical school, expected to work last summer at a semiconductor plant. Instead, she and fellow genetics major Corazon Victa were given fellowships funded by Novato biotech firm Glyko and spent the summer in Ray Rodriguez's lab on two projects-testing a new agricultural technology for Glyko and exploring a Rodriguez theory about sugar production in germinating cereal seeds. "I learned a lot about time management and how to be productive," Tran said. "The experiments made us plan ahead a lot." Victa added, "And we've improved our analytical skills. In the beginning, we just did what we were told to do. As time went by, we started suggesting experiments of our own." o Access to corporate intellectual property, a particularly urgent need in the biological sciences, as the private sector outstrips universities in reading and understanding the genetic sequences of many organisms. Access to Novartis' proprietary gene databases was "essential to Berkeley's cutting-edge research," Gordon Rausser, dean of the UC Berkeley College of Natural Resources, has said. "With the advent of genomics, universities are looking for ways to form relationships because we need what industry has," McNamee said. o The chance to pursue some research gambles. "We'd like to see some funds available to support risk-taking research-high-risk, innovative research in a shared interest," McNamee said. "This is something that's very hard to do on government grants." As the Berkeley-Novartis collaboration ends itsfirst year, it's still too soon to know its lasting impact on the research culture at UC and other public universities. At Davis, faculty teams are making two significant new overtures to industry-one of them partially inspired by the Novartis alliance. One is a proposal for a joint research venture between industry and Davis researchers specializing in materials science, Rock said. The venture, which would bring industry scientists to work on the Davis campus and send faculty to work in company labs, plus provide substantial support for student researchers, is in the "very early stages" of development, he said. The other overture is the Plant Biotechnology Initiative, in which 33 researchers from seven departments have united to explore partnerships with one or more large corporations. Led by McNamee and plant biology chair Deborah Delmer, the group has already entertained delegations from some of the world's major biotechnology companies and is expecting visits from more. Delmer declined to put a dollar figure on the amount of investment being sought, but said the group hopes for funding that would support a substantial number of basic research projects over aboutfive years. "No matter how large an investment is eventually made by a company, it will still be a very small part of our overall basic research funding for the plant sciences on this campus," she said. Through such an initiative, the campus would receive money for research and student support and might gain access to corporate databases, McNamee said. The company would receive the benefits of the cam- pus's broad intellectual and experimental strengths in areas ranging from plant biology to agriculture to nutrition. It would also benefit practically by having to negotiate only one deal with the group instead of 30-plus deals with individual faculty members. "What happened between Novartis and Berkeley focused our minds wonderfully," Delmer said. Noting that "while almost all of us feel a certain uneasiness at venturing into new territory," Delmer said the faculty involved want to explore the potential upsides of a multi-project collaboration. She concluded: "We are sensitive to the concerns of the public. The university is not a business, nor should it be. But that does not mean we should reject interaction with the private sector in ways that can enhance our ability to do what we do best-basic research. When we weigh the positives of industry partnerships vs. the potential downsides, we don't have serious worries."