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An underlying goal of Britain's Technology Foresight programme has been to change the culture of British science while protecting the basic research base.

Many believe that the programme has succeeded on both counts. Foresight has certainly altered the British scientific landscape. And the programme has also benefited science itself. Having learnt to talk to business, scientists have found an alternative source of income, useful at a time of ever-tightening government budgets.

Foresight priorities are now guiding many of the funding decisions of all six of Britain's research councils. Two in particular that have used Foresight to increase significantly their involvement with industry are the Engineering and Physical Sciences (EPSRC) and Biotechnology and Biological Sciences Research Councils. Seventy per cent of EPSRC's research spending is now aligned with priorities identified by Foresight.

Others, such as the Natural Environment Research Council, have realigned many of their ‘directed’ research programmes to follow Foresight-style priorities. For example, the council recently launched a multidisciplinary Urban Regeneration and the Environment initiative to investigate how environmental and ecological research can be harnessed for urban regeneration.

The Particle Physics and Astronomy Research Council, despite a tightly defined research agenda, is also enthusiastic about the possibilities of widening the applications of particle physics and astronomy-related technologies.

Indeed, whatever their initial reservations, many senior staff from the research councils now believe that the success of Foresight has played an important role in helping the Office of Science and Technology to protect their budgets against major cuts, and that it may also help to persuade the government to increase funding for science in its forthcoming Comprehensive Spending Review.

Each research council says that decisions on ‘response mode’ funding remain untouched by the Foresight culture. And many researchers remain wary of their research becoming targeted towards specific social goals.

But few deny that university scientists in Britain increasingly feel that high-quality grant applications tilted towards wealth creation and the quality of life have a better chance of being funded than those that are simply good science.