You have to keep in mind that some people, like me, have 'Tech Trading' turned off!
It looks like a couple of people here are talking about Research depending on Tech Trading. How about we just talk about how to get the best Research going in order to keep up with the AI, regardless of 'Trading'. Also, NLC's are only available to certain political parties?
I myself had a terrible time figuring out how the AI was doing so damn well on Research compared to me the first couple of games too! In other words I was in the same boat as you waitingtoconnect. Then my next game I decided that since I had espionage going on upon one of my oppenents, and it was up to the Expert Level(or whatever the highest is called) AND I had a scout by their home planet, I'd have a look around by viewing their planet and the area. From that I agree with what Supreme Shogun and Richrf says...
Also a factor, but not mentioned yet, mining bases on research resources. Do your enemies (Terrans) have them? Do you have any ? These affect your empires research ability by increasing it with each additional mining module.
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Don't research techs that take a LONG LONG time (anything above 8 turns for me) unless you really need it.
Don't specialise research too deep into a tech tree, for most part a balanced approach is better, particularly for infrastructure techs. There is not much point researching all the way to stockmarkets or discovery spheres when you are stuck at base factories, since it takes ages for you to build stockmarkets.
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As Supreme Shogun more or less said, if you can, seek out and find a Research Resource to mine before someone else get it!
Build and Economic Starbase near your home planet(s). And then upgrade them with the Social and Research production modules! You should do this as soon as you can really. AFTER sending out constructors to mine resources.
Your first constructors should be sent out to grab any mining resources that you scouted out. Then the next one should be sent to 'upgrade' the mining process. I believe +2 is the first upgrade. To get the next upgrade may require you to have researched a certain tech. Anyway...
Next is to build an Economic Starbase near your home planet and then the next should be to install the module that gives it the Social and Research bonus to planets within it's range. +2 is the first one again, and again, this can be upgraded but I think it may require a tech to be researched first. THIS is what my opponent was doing. He had Research Academies with a Technological Capital on his home planet WITH Economic Starbases nearby(as in more than one!) with the Economic modules installed on them that give Social and Research bonuses to planets within it's range.
The other part of researching goes with what Richrf said imo. Don't be too specialized. While researching some other techs let yourself get some expansion done while building some research facilities and get the research 'resource mine' upgraded. Then go for researching 'Research Centers'. While letting your current Xeno Research facilities get upgraded start building some Research Centers, and research some other techs. Then after a while research 'Research Academies'. Then eventually the same for 'Invention Matrix'. It's a balancing act, especially since getting Research Academies and Invention Matrix can take a while. You want to get those as soon as you can but you should try to have a fair degree of researching power available to you so that they do not take too awful long.
A good thing to might be to get some trade routes going asap so that you're on good relations with your neighbors. This way you might be able to leave yourself militarily weak by preventing races from wanting to start invading you in the first place, while you build up an underlying research and economic powerhouse. Believe me, there is some incentive into wanting to have trade routes continue! But leaving yourself militarily weak, and the length of time you leave yourself weak will depend on who your neighbors are and what's going on with them.
This is what I did in my current game playing as the Terran Alliance. I was so tired of being so far behind in the research wars. But I took a hint from what I saw my opponent doing in the last game from my espionage. So, I went for the trade routes and good economy while building a up a very good underlying research powerhouse(still too a little while to get that Invention Matrix researched!) but left myself very weak militarily for a good while. I was worried! But I was surrounded by good neighbors. The Drengin Empire and Yor Collective were on the other side of the galaxy from me. The Korx weren't too awful far away but they were in a corner with just a very few planets and my nearest neighbor, the Altarian's, were interested in keeping the Korx at bay and eventually assimilating them. There may have been some luck involved with my not getting picked on. Anyway, as Richrf stated, there is a balancing act to do to.
