I moved my sovereign in to combat with a spider on the same turn I first started to collect research points. When the turn ended, the dialog box popped up to tell me about research, and my sovereign ran in to combat and died, all while the dialog was still up. The combat results box appeared on top of the dialog, before I got to the research screen. After I closed the results window I could close the dialog, close the research window, and go back to the game.
