Blue-Sky Research

Description
As with the very best of pure science, researching this tech might not necessarily help with such base, tangible concerns like guiding the shuttle home or keeping the volunteers alive. However, any breakthroughs you make will make a revolutionary contribution to the field and the associated glory will be yours alone to reap. The rest of your team will never even need to know should you choose to invest a little of the agency's resources in your own pet project...

Cost
?? - You can use any research to create this, and keep adding to it throughout the game

Impact
You can put as much research as you want towards Blue-Sky Research. You personally gain prestige equal to the prestige you would have got for publishing the research (but note that you don't ACTUALLY publish the research, so the field activity counter doesn't increment and you don't get a bonus for being the first person to use research in this way). At the end of the game the Director of Research with the most personal scientific prestige can be rest assured that they cannot possibly lose their job.

Future Research
Oh, the myriad of possibilities the Blue-Sky Research will open up! Unfortunately, none of them are relevant to Bringing Them Home, so you will have to wait to get stuck in here