美国科学基金会被批研究项目太古怪

A Republican senator's report on the National Science Foundation criticizes the group for projects including a $500,000 study involving a shrimp on a treadmill。

Sen. Tom Coburn, R-Okla., authored a report criticizing the foundation's spending on projects that also include $1.5 million to build a laundry-folding robot, a $300,000 study on whether Facebook's FarmVille game promotes personal relationships and even a $400,000 study on Jell-O wrestling。

"We have 12 different agencies doing pure research, and we're duplicating and we're not sharing the information across," Coburn said。

The National Science Foundation responded to the report with a statement saying its projects "have advanced the frontiers of science and engineering, improved Americans' lives."

Agency officials noted their projects have assisted in the creation of barcodes as well as Web site Google。

美国一名共和党参议员近日提交报告，批评美国国家科学基金会“胡闹”，包括花费50万美元研究虾米在跑步机上的运动能力。

这位名叫考博恩的议员在署名报告中还斥责该基金会把150万美元用于研究“能叠衣服的机器人”，把30万美元用于研究“脸谱网的虚拟农场游戏能否改善人际关系”，用40万美元研究“在果冻里摔跤的技能和注意事项”等。

考博恩在接受采访时说，“我们有12家不同的机构在做纯学术研究，他们彼此并没有共享信息，而是在做低水平的重复劳动。”

而美国国家科学基金会则在声明中回应，他们的研究项目“促进了美国尖端科技和工程的发展，改善了人民生活”。

基金会官员则称研究项目促成了条形码的发明，也促成了像谷歌这样著名网站的诞生。