However, a top-down indication of the level of investment can be obtained from Networking and Information Technology Research and Development: Supplement to the President’s Budget for FY2006,18 a report of the National Coordination Office for Networking and Information Technology Research and Development. It describes the networking and information technology research spending by its 11 participating agencies—NSF, NIH, DOE (Office of Science), NASA, DARPA, the National Security Agency, the Agency for Healthcare Research and Quality, Networking and Information Technology Research and Development, Committee on Technology, National Science and Technology Council, Networking and Information Technology Research and Development: Supplement to the President’s Budget for FY2006, National Coordination Office for Networking and Information Technology Research and Development, Arlington, Va., February 2005,
NIST, NOAA, EPA, and DOE/National Nuclear Security Agency—that provide the bulk of federal research in these areas. The report divides federal research spending into seven categories—high-end computing infrastructure and applications, high-end computing R&D, human computer interaction and information management, large-scale networking (LSN), software design and productivity, high-confidence software and systems, and social, economic, and workforce). The total research spending across these agencies and areas for FY 2006 is $2.1 billion, whereas for LSN—the area likely to contain the most telecommunications-related research—it is $328 million, or 16 percent of the total.

The numbers are not definitive: there might, for example, be some physical sciences work that supports telecommunications, and (similarly uncounted) physical sciences work that supports IT as well. Also, not all of the LSN budget supports networking research per se. For example, the biggest contributor to support for LSN is NIH, at least some of which appears to be for networks for health sciences research rather than for networking research itself. Considering funding for all agencies except for NIH funding, the FY 2006 spending on LSN is $230 million out of $1.7 billion, or 14 percent. Also, the second largest supporter of LSN research is NSF ($95 million); some of NSF’s LSN budget also supports research infrastructure rather than networking research, making the percentage for research itself even lower.

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