Size doesn't matter when it comes to the impact of research grants.
Grant size does not strongly predict scientific impact, according to a study published in PLOS ONE. The authors used four measures — publications, citations, highly cited papers and citations of the most-highly cited paper — to score the impact of 374 researchers funded between 2002 and 2006 by the Natural Sciences and Engineering Research Council of Canada. Grant sizes explained less than 30% of the variation (J.-M. Fortin and D. J. Currie PLOS ONE 8, e65263; 2013). Co-author David Currie, a biologist at the University of Ottawa, says, “Some very poorly funded people manage to do a great deal.”
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PLOS ONE article: Big Science vs. Little Science
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Bang not based on buck. Nature 499, 117 (2013). https://doi.org/10.1038/nj7456-117b
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1038/nj7456-117b