oooh, +1
you might argue that appending an "(unresearched)" would be more verbose, but that would be another text string, so I'd go with the asterisk.
actually, considering that all standard equipment is basically "researched", maybe it would be better to enclose the unresearched stuff in asterisks? otherwise almost all the stuff would have asterisks.
this way, the list in the beginning might be:
Pistol
Pistol Clip
Rifle
Rifle Clip
*Plasma Pistol*
what do you think?