Comment from josh dubnau

I am a Professor in the Department of Anesthesiology and the Department of Neurobiology and Behavior at Stony Brook University. I have had continuous NIH funding for almost 25 years. My research has been funded by NIMH, NINDS and NIA. I also was the recipient of a Transformative R01. My research focus is on fundamental mechanisms that underlie neurodegenerative disorders such as Alzheimer’s disease, frontotemporal dementia and amyotrophic lateral sclerosis. My lab’s work has been at the forefront of proposing and developing a novel hypothesis that has been impactful in development of ongoing clinical trials for several neurodegenerative disorders. My lab currently holds two R01 awards from NIA. I also am a co-PI on an R01 with a colleague at Texas A&M. These NIH awards currently support the efforts of 5 PhD candidates, 4 postoctoral researchers and one technician. I have already submitted a comment on 10 of the sections, but wanted to comment additionally on this section: §200.206—Federal Agency Review of Risk Posed by Applicants This section would allow the government to preclude any particular applicant from receiving awards based on political appointees' evaluation of that applicant’s adherence to some ill-defined set of past behaviors, based on ‘publicly available information’. As written, this rule change appears to bar individual applicants from applying based on political appointees assessments of the applicant’s political beliefs. This would have a chilling impact on free speech. Josh Dubnau, professor Stony Brook University School of Medicine