Possibly ending five years of budget fights, the US House of Representatives has passed a two-year budget bill, the New York Times reports.
If law, the bill would increase federal spending by $80 billion over the next two years, it adds, and would suspend the debt ceiling through March 2017.
Nature News notes that how the extra $25 billion for each of the two years in discretionary funding would be divvied up is unclear, but it says that a two-year budget could help ease some concerns over science spending. Joel Parriott, the director of public policy at the American Astronomical Society, says this increase could help science funding agencies.
"I'm hopeful given our champions on both sides of the aisle," he adds.
Indeed, Nature News says that the National Institutes of Health could make out with more in funding as the Senate's fiscal year 2016 spending bill has called for a $2 billion increase for the agency.
The Senate is expected to pass the budget bill, the Times adds.