To determine the return on investment, it is critical to ascertain costs associated with the basic research and development that gave rise to a particular technology. However, the path that research takes is determined by the results of series of experiments, and the best science can veer dramatically from the plan. Therefore, the factors that make scientifically curious minds appropriately alter research plans also make determining a starting point for assigning costs to a particular technology difficult.

An inventive technology is most likely one piece of a very large research project; and, it may be tangential to the main focus as well. For example, technical obstacles are common impediments in biomedical research; they frustrate, but they also inspire. Overcoming the obstacle may lead an investigator to develop an alternative technology, which may or may not be a distinct piece of research. Rather, it may be a necessary sidestep within the larger project, and the costs of development are, for the most part, very difficult to isolate.

In addition, biomedical laboratories generally conduct their research with multiple complementary goals. Within an overarching research mission, a laboratory is typically divided into separate units, each of which is responsible for conducting research on a particular piece of a broad hypothesis, and each of which receives a variable piece of the laboratory budget as progress warrants. Some projects are designed to develop fundamental data or techniques that are necessary for a particular line of investigation; these techniques can be, and often are, useful for a number of unrelated studies.

Attempting to determine the costs of biomedical discovery is also complicated by the fact that new research almost always builds upon the work of predecessor scientists. Determining what part of a preceding budget or what part of a multi-purpose technique contributes to an inventive technology is, at best, extremely difficult, if not impossible.

1. Which of the following is mentioned in the passage as an obstacle to calculating the return on investment of a particular technology?

(A) it is difficult to project the possible revenue potential of a new technological development
(B) accounting of laboratory budgets is difficult due to the infrequency of the grant bestowment cycle
(C) new biomedical technologies offer many benefits to humanity that can not be quantified monetarily
(D) a technology may be developed as a means to an end, not as the result of a specific path of research
(E) variable costs may be imposed upon research and development that builds upon existing patentable technology



2. Why does the author mention "scientifically curious minds" in the last sentence of the first paragraph?

(A) to describe a desired component of research and development that also obstructs the calculation of return on investment
(B) because research and development projects are generally dominated by scientists
(C) to demonstrate one of the negative personality traits commonly found in biomedical researcher laboratories
(D) to introduce them as a result of several factors related to the costs of biomedical discovery
(E) as evidence of the success of previous efforts to assign costs to newly developed technologies



3. The author views the attempt to quantify the costs and benefits of a newly developed technology as

(A) a necessary compromise
(B) a repetitive task
(C) an arduous undertaking
(D) an unqualified disaster
(E) a short-term phenomenon