In 2019, the journal Memory and Cognition devoted a special issue in recognition of five decades of research inspired by the theory. In 1977, he received the American Psychological Association’s Distinguished Scientific Contribution Award. National Science Foundation Atkinson was nominated by U.S. President Jimmy Carter to be director of the National Science Foundation (1975–1980). Among his achievements was the negotiation of the first memorandum of understanding between the People’s Republic of China and the United States, an agreement for the exchange of scientists and scholars. It became part of a more comprehensive agreement on science and technology between China and the United States signed by Chair Deng Xiaoping and President Jimmy Carter in January 1979. Convinced that building a closer relationship between industry and research universities was crucial to the future of American science, Atkinson took a series of steps that have had far-reaching consequences: (1) Established the NSF Industry-University Cooperative Research Program at a time when collaborative research between private companies and universities, now widely accepted, was rare. (2) Initiated a special program at NSF to fund research on the relationship between investments in research and economic growth, an early contribution to the field of economics called “new growth theory.” (3) Elevated engineering to a full directorate at NSF. (4) Advocated with the Congress for legislation that gave companies a tax credit for investing in their own research and for supporting university research. (5) Initiated a series of policy studies that led to the 1980 Bayh–Dole Act, which transferred intellectual property rights in federally sponsored research from the U.S. government to universities. During Atkinson’s tenure at the NSF, skeptics in both Congress and the media mounted frequent attacks on government funding for basic research as little more than subsidizing idle curiosity about trivial topics at the taxpayers’ expense. This trend was aptly symbolized by Senator William Proxmire’s Golden Fleece Awards for waste and fraud in public programs, several of which were awarded to NSF. As NSF director, Atkinson defended basic research, the value of which Senator Proxmire ultimately acknowledged. He promoted the long-term importance of fundamental intellectual inquiry and led the NSF in conducting some of the early studies on the contributions of basic research to productivity and economic growth. UC San Diego Atkinson was chancellor of the University of California San Diego from 1980–1995, where he instituted a major administrative reorganization of the campus and began a sustained