Every February, the Engineering Deans Council holds a Public Policy Forum in Washington, D.C. During our last meeting, the conversation turned to problems that are facing engineering research and education in the U.S. I'm sorry to report that the consensus wasn't terribly heartening. Our nation relies on its technological edge to stay competitive, but we're producing fewer "technologists" at an alarming rate due to a broken K-12 education system, recent disincentives for interested foreign students to study at our universities, and a lack of sufficient research funding for the core physical sciences and engineering. While it is good to identify the issue, those of us in the field must also communicate the dire nature of the problem to the American public. To this end, I am writing a paper on "The Ecology of Technology," which will hopefully shed some light on the subject. The following is a sketch of this work in progress. I hope you will find this brief outline thought provoking. As always, I welcome your feedback.

David K. Campbell, Dean
Boston University College of Engineering

The Ecology of Technology

Mention of the word "ecology" conjures up such images as a coral reef, where a diverse collection of beautiful and exotic life forms coexist in a delicate balance that can be readily destroyed by pollution, eutrophication, or changes in temperature caused by global warming. By contrast, mention of the word "technology" stimulates visions of robust large-scale machines, hardened concrete, and integrated circuits of astonishing reliability. The two words seem polar opposites, so much so that a concept such as "the ecology of technology" appears to be an oxymoron. In fact, our technology—more precisely, the infrastructure that underpins and enables our technology—is an ecosystem every bit as delicately balanced—and, worryingly, just as easily destroyed—as any coral reef. The failure to recognize the interdependence of the various components of our technology is causing current political decisions to be made that threaten our future.

There are two broad areas of concern: The first challenge has to do with work-force issues. A shortage of technically trained individuals affects the ability of our nation to compete over the long term. We can address this in two ways.

First, we need to teach science, technology, engineering, and mathematics (the so-called STEM subjects) to our K-12 students in a way that will excite them and encourage further learning. We need to capture the minds of young female students and minorities, since both groups are under-represented in our technical work force. In addition, we need to properly train our teachers—a math-phobic instructor cannot impart the excitement, beauty, and power of math.

Second, we need to continue to attract the brightest graduate students to our universities. Concerns about homeland security and the threat of foreign terrorists have naturally led to tightening of immigration controls. These are essential steps, but they must be taken wisely, avoiding the simplistic solutions that could lead us down the path of xenophobia—a dangerous pastime for a nation of immigrants. Foreign graduate students, research scholars, and faculty play an enormous role in our research, and we cannot afford to place unreasonable barriers on their ability to enter the U.S.

Another area of concern is in support for engineering research, which produces the ideas and products that keep us ahead of our economic competitors and our potential military foes. Superior technology protects our soldiers on the battlefield and, when properly applied, can reduce civilian casualties in conflicts (e.g., "smart bombs"). Research also produces the technical work force that will lead in innovation and job creation. Since Americans will never work longer hours than the Chinese or for lower wages than are paid in India, we need to work smarter. I believe these points are widely recognized. What is less widely appreciated is that there is a dangerous imbalance in current government investment in research-the biomedical sciences are well funded, but investment in the physical sciences and engineering is relatively weak.

Without funding for the basic physical sciences and engineering, there will be no next generation of tools like the MRI, laser surgery devices, or x-rays. Unless we invest in these core-enabling disciplines to develop new ideas and produce new technologies, the miraculous promise of modern biomedical research-such as the human genome-will not be realized. Without the next generation of computer hardware to store and manipulate (and sophisticated software to interpret) the massive amounts of data, the information will be merely an uninterruptible collection of C's, A's, G's, and T's. Even today, there would be no safe commerce on the Internet without encryption techniques discovered in the past by mathematicians.

But there is a solution, and it is possible for us to fix this problem. We need to persuade our political leaders to provide stable funding for projects like the ingenious Glenn Scholar's Program that was proposed to retrain retired hi-tech individuals to teach STEM in public schools. We need to convince our leaders to increase research investments in the physical sciences and engineering and to avoid a knee-jerk reaction that could prevent the best and the brightest foreign students and scholars from contributing to our research and educational enterprise. To paraphrase an oil-industry advertisement from the 1970s—a nation that runs on brains can't afford to run out.