I noticed the suggested constraint of the "resources available in the system a project is created in" and thought "Close, but not quite."

Research and development is done with known materials. In the beginning, a player's "known" materials list is limited to their initial system, but as they expand out, more and newer materials are going to be added to that list. Perhaps an early blueprint just needs some lowly old "steel". As that player expands out and learns of more materials, these new materials become integrated into the research process, and thus, more of these new materials become construction requirements. Now, instead of just needing lowly ol' steel, they need more advanced alloys of steel (unobtanium? j/k). So, much like how the modifiers extend previous research projects, new materials extend upon the established ones in the same way. Higher-tech solutions gradually build upon the requirements of older ones, adding ever more resources to the mix for their production.

Also in the same technode leafs work, (idea here) another modifier of new tech-advances could be reductions in resource requirements. Say you start out needing "200 units" of steel to build a frigate hull. Over time, via research, the production process adds another hundred units of titanium and carbon-fiber, but requires only 50 units of steel now.

In any case, all you'd need is to store a list of "known materials" which is derived from the seed used to build the universe the player is in, but that shouldn't be a problem.