Economics presented on September 20. 2002.

The genetic engineering made possible by the discovery of recombinant DNA has played an increasingly important role in agricultural research. The present study employs a knowledge production model to assess the efficacy of, and relationship between, basic and applied research in agricultural biotechnology, allowing for both compiementarity and substitutability between these two research endeavors. Practical measures of basic and applied research outputs, and a paper trail characterizing the information flows between them, are constructed using a unique database on agricultural biotechnology patents and patent-cited scientific publications. Results suggest university bioscience research and graduate education are mostly complements, or in some cases slight substitutes, for one another. Highly ranked universities are less efficient than are their lower-ranked counterparts in producing not only graduate students but the bioscience that is cited in agricultural biotechnology patents. University R&D expenditures have been inoptimally allocated Abstract approved:?J2 between post-doctoral fellows and non-post-doctoral inputs. Higher returns to R&