Paul and Marcia Wythes Center on Contemporary China, Princeton University, Princeton, NJ 08544.
Department of Biostatistics, Harvard University, Boston, MA 02115.
Proc Natl Acad Sci U S A. 2023 Jul 4;120(27):e2216248120. doi: 10.1073/pnas.2216248120. Epub 2023 Jun 27.
The US global leadership in science and technology has greatly benefitted from immigrants from other countries, most notably from China in the recent decades. However, feeling the pressure of potential federal investigations since the 2018 launch of the China Initiative, scientists of Chinese descent in the United States now face higher incentives to leave the United States and lower incentives to apply for federal grants. Analyzing data pertaining to institutional affiliations of more than 200 million scientific papers, we find a steady increase in the return migration of scientists of Chinese descent from the United States to China. We also conducted a survey of scientists of Chinese descent employed by US universities in tenured or tenure-track positions (n = 1,304), with results revealing general feelings of fear and anxiety that lead them to consider leaving the United States and/or stop applying for federal grants. If the situation is not corrected, American science will likely suffer the loss of scientific talent to China and other countries.
美国在科学技术方面的全球领导地位得益于来自其他国家的移民，尤其是近几十年来来自中国的移民。然而，自 2018 年“中国倡议”启动以来，潜在的联邦调查令华裔美国科学家感到压力增大，他们现在更倾向于离开美国，而不太愿意申请联邦拨款。通过分析与 2 亿多份科学论文所属机构有关的数据，我们发现从美国返回中国的华裔科学家的回国移民呈稳步增长。我们还对在美国大学担任终身教职或终身教职轨职位的华裔科学家进行了调查（n=1304），结果显示，普遍的恐惧和焦虑感使他们考虑离开美国和/或停止申请联邦拨款。如果这种情况得不到纠正，美国科学可能会失去人才，而这些人才可能会流向中国和其他国家。
