Annual Report 2025

We defeated the odds.

On November 28, 2025, ScienceNews reported that more than 3,800 research grants from just two of the many federal sponsoring agencies were terminated or frozen. We were not immune. Here at the Kansas Biological Survey & Center for Ecological Research, a handful of principal investigators waited for grants recommended for funding to roll in, but those grants never came—and some are  still waiting for final decisions on proposals submitted more than a year ago.

The graph above, from KU’s Research Insights database, shows grant dollars our research center has brought to the University of Kansas each year since 2018. The dollars in this graph represent those that are managed by our administrative unit. The graph is an underestimate of funding our researchers help bring to KU because it does not include grants in which our researchers are collaborators (not lead principal investigators) that are managed by another unit at KU, for example, the Kansas Geological Survey.

There are three clear take-home messages from these data:

• First, the ultimate sponsors of the majority of our research are federal agencies. 
• Second, despite the upsets and setbacks, this research center and state agency had an unexpectedly and unprecedented good year in new grant funding. In fact, our principal investigators brought in more research funding for our research center last year than in any previous year: more than $8.5 million. 
• Third, we received more grant funding from the State of Kansas last year than in any previous year. In fact, we currently have more researchers than ever working on natural resource concerns in Kansas—with funding from the Kansas Water Office, the Kansas Dept. of Wildlife and Parks, the Kansas Dept. of Health and Environment, and the Kansas Dept. of Agriculture. Some of the new projects are highlighted in this report.

The funding success of our center’s researchers in 2025 encourages my optimism  that we will weather the uncertainty surrounding science—and that here at the Kansas Biological Survey & Center for Ecological Research we will continue to advance understanding of the vital interactions between humans and the environment, with a growing focus on Kansas.