Feinberg Prof. Ricky Hill was celebrating their birthday late last month the day they began to hear “rumblings” about cancellation of LGBTQ-focused research.
Last week, second-year biomedical engineering Ph.D. student Juliana Feng received an official stop-work notice from her lab the day after reading about the orders in a New York Times article. The same day, McCormick Prof. Ashty Karim monitored his inbox all day in anticipation for the next wave of stop-work order emails.
Over 100 Northwestern research projects have been halted in the last three months due to recent stop-work orders issued by the Department of Defense, as well as federal funding freezes, review delays and cuts. Researchers across a variety of fields expressed shock and uncertainty as years of work came to a sudden stop.
“Our research is our passion, and helping people is our passion,” Karim said. “No rationale was given for these particular (orders). Why are you targeting making medicines for people? Why are you targeting water quality for all people?”
Board of Trustees Chair Peter Barris and University President Michael Schill announced Thursday that the University will continue to fund research paused by the federal funding freeze or under a stop-work order, but will not support projects previously terminated by the federal government.
Feng works in the Lucks Laboratory under McCormick Prof. Julius Lucks, which received a DOD stop-work order.
She said the lab has two main functions: understanding the basic biology of how different sensing mechanisms interact and applying that knowledge to engineer a usable tool that reacts to contaminants in water.
Sixth-year Ph.D. candidate in molecular biology Laura Hertz works on the basic biology side of Lucks Lab’s research, which she said is now severely underfunded.
Hertz’s projects have been on pause due to delays in the National Institutes of Health grant review process since the new Trump administration came into office in January. She said the abnormal part of the delayed reviews was the “extent to which that freeze was applied” and how long it lasted.
Hertz said her work looks into the structure and shape of RNA and how it functions, helping other researchers develop small molecule drugs, medicines and other biotechnology.
The lack of NIH funding, she said, caused her to shift priorities in her work from the fundamental biology and biophysics research to contributing to the engineering and implementation side of the lab.
But the recent stop-work order sent to the Lucks Lab primarily affected that engineering side where Feng researches.
Feng said the lab aims to “democratize knowledge about water,” developing deployable biosensors that are accessible for both military use and household water testing, so anyone can know what’s in their water. The research under the DOD grants was being tested in field trials conducted in households on the South Side of Chicago.
The lab operates under several grants, so funds were reshuffled in an effort to continue the research, Feng explained.
Other projects do not have the same variety in funding, such as Hill’s work at the Institute for Sexual and Gender Minority Health and Wellbeing. As a research assistant professor, they mainly focused on queer health research, which they said is often left out of medical conversations and research.
Hill officially received notice their NIH grant funding was terminated on March 21. They said they received notice of their job termination — alongside many others — last week after over eight years at NU. All four of their projects were also terminated, they added.
“There’s no scientific reason for these grants to be canceled,” Hill said. “People just don’t like queer people, as we’re unfortunately seeing.”
One project was “2GETHER,” which Hill said was supposed to be a five-year education program on relationship communication for those with queer or non-dominant identities. They said their studies found that strong communication about relationship goals and expectations can help improve health outcomes, such as reducing HIV transmission.
Another project focused on family building in relationships among queer women and transgender people. They said the interviews for the project looked into whether or not they wanted to start a family and structural barriers they might face.
“To have to tell people, … ‘Sorry, this country doesn’t care about you anymore,’ is just psychically damaging,” Hill said.
Karim said he received two stop-work orders on projects he was working on directly. One project worked to develop technology to respond quickly to emerging threats, such as pandemics.
“If we come across an emerging threat, how do we identify what medicine to make? Then, how do we make it on demand?” Karim said. “So, we have a cell-free technology that allows you to make medicines where and when you need them.”
His other project works on engineering biological mechanisms to sense and respond to the environment, such as evaluating water purity.
Karim said his projects benefit defense efforts but also can be used for the larger public. Now, he said, he’ll have to continue to hit the long term goals of this project through other research projects and grants.
“Blips (when) we can’t work on the science cause long-term snowballing effects of new technologies that will come out,” Karim said. “It actually decreases the United States’ competitive advantage of being a beacon for innovation.”
Both Feng and Karim said they are unsure of potential cuts to come because the grants from the stop-work orders do not seem to add up to the reported $790 million funding freeze, so they are concerned that some programs may not have been notified yet. Karim added he doesn’t see an indication for why certain projects are targeted, as the projects under the order have spanned across all types of research.
Hill said they believe the University’s choice to not stand up for the queer community is an indication that they will not stand up for others — including students. Hill said the halting of research is “censorship in the truest form.”
“This is just one sweep of research cuts,” Hill said. “This is only the beginning.”
Clarification: This article has been updated to better reflect Feinberg Prof. Ricky Hill’s position.
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— NU to continue funding research impacted by stop-work orders
— More than 100 NU graduate projects receive stop-work orders from Department of Defense
— NIH nixes at least 10 NU research projects related to LGBTQ+ health issues
