More senior figures in Scottish universities have expressed fears of a brain drain in the event of a Yes result.
Concerns about loss of funding for major research projects could see leading scientists depart for universities in England and overseas where financial support is more secure.
Professor Jim Naismith, head of biomedical sciences research at St Andrew’s University, predicted expertise will drift away.
“It will start slowly but there will be a clear drift,” he stated. “It’s not just the people who leave we won’t be able to bring people in from outside.”
Professor Richard Cogdell, director of the Institute of Molecular, Cell and Systems Biology at Glasgow University, said: “I have had contact with staff who have said ‘if it’s a yes vote, then I would be looking to leave’.”
Professor David Weller, director of the Centre for Population Health Sciences at Edinburgh University, explained 80% of his centre’s work was in collaboration with other UK researchers and cancer charities.
“There’s just no way if Scotland was a separate country that kind of arrangement could be sustained,” he said.
“There are huge concerns in the area I work in.”
The issue was highlighted this week by Professor Sir Philip Cohen, who fears Dundee University, which attracts hundreds of millions of pounds in research income, could seriously suffer.
It is where he set up Europe’s largest collaboration between academic and the pharmaceutical industry to develop drugs to treat cancer, rheumatoid arthritis and Parkinson’s.
He believes the European Union funding from which Dundee richly benefits would be jeopardised should Spain veto an independent Scotland’s EU membership.
St Andrews University chancellor Sir Menzies Campbell, the Liberal Democrat MP for North East Fife, said: “I cannot conceal my concern about the possible consequences of any reduction in the essential financial support for research in universities which is presently available through our membership of the United Kingdom.
“At the very least there is damaging uncertainty as evidenced by Sir Philip Cohen’s intervention in the debate.”