Obama’s budget request falls flat

What a difference a year makes. In April 2013, US President Barack Obama unveiled a budget proposal that set out plans to map the human brain and to capture an asteroid that could be towed near to the Moon for astronauts to study. But that sense of ambition is absent from Obama’s plan for fiscal year 2015, which was released on 4 March, frustrating scientists and policy analysts who hoped for a show of support from the White House after years of pressure to reduce government spending. Read more.