We call on the UK Biotechnology and Biological Sciences Research Council (BBSRC) to reconsider its intention to cut funding for neuroscience by around 20% (see http://go.nature.com/u4mgyq and http://go.nature.com/8ig9oy).

The neuroscience currently funded by the BBSRC must survive a rigorous committee selection process. According to the research council, the cut is being imposed not because the neuroscience funded is less than excellent, but because it does not address BBSRC priority areas.

Yet neuroscience research is crucial in every BBSRC priority area. In public health, it can improve the understanding of mental illness, age-related cognitive decline, and diet and exercise factors (through the neural basis of food selection and motivation, respectively). It can improve animal welfare by giving insight into the mental state of farm animals, and is relevant to food security — for example, by controlling crop predation through knowledge of the neural basis of insect behaviour.

The BBSRC funds so much of this research because of the high quality of British neuroscience and because its researchers have consistently proved that they can compete for funding.

So far, the BBSRC has been admirably responsive to research excellence on the ground, and open to going where scientists lead. This imposition of funding priorities from the top is a regrettable change.