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Thousands of new college graduates have been rubbing shoulders with some of the science community's heaviest hitters during the past month and a half, thanks to the hallowed tradition of the honorary degree. Adding luster to commencement ceremonies at campuses throughout the United States this year have been such luminaries, for example, as Torsten Wiesel, Anthony Fauci, Walter Massey, Gertrude Elion, Stanley Cohen, D. Allan Bromley, and Maxine Singer. These and dozens of other men and women

Academy members, with high hopes for his administration, expect Alberts to boost NAS's image and influence Members of the National Academy of Sciences say they are eagerly anticipating the presidency of Bruce M. Alberts. The University of California, San Francisco, molecular biologist assumes leadership of the 1,683-member honorary body--as well as the chairmanship of the 1,200-employee National Research Council (NRC)--on July 1. "The academy is going to change under Alberts because

Douglas Bennet, the Clinton administration's newly confirmed assistant secretary of state for international organization affairs, says that after nearly a decade of severed ties between the United States and the United Nations Educational Scientific, and Cultural Organization (UNESCO), renewal of the relationship is now "definitely a possibility." Bennet's assessment comes at a time of increasing activity on the part of those strongly favoring renewed U.S. involvement in UNESCO. Recently, di

Strong pressure is being brought to bear on Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) officials to reverse a May personnel action at the National Institutes of Health. That move, to reassign fraud investigators Walter Stewart and Ned Feder to new jobs, effectively ended the pair's controversial scientific misconduct research at the institutes. Tactics to influence administrators have included a 33-day protest fast by Stewart and letters supporting the two men and their work from prominent m

Swiss Cheers AAAS Takes A Stand NYAS Sits It Out All Together, Now New American Research Swiss Cheers The 1993 Rolex Awards for Enterprise--50,000 Swiss francs and a gold Rolex chronometer--were recently presented in Geneva to five researchers. Notable among the recipients is Forrest M. Mims III, who attracted considerable publicity a few years ago over his dismissal as a columnist for Scientific American because of his belief in creation (Forrest M. Mims III, The Scientist, Feb

A news story you might be reading in 2003: LOS ANGELES--A bidding war broke out yesterday for the rights to publish a scientific study identifying a master gene that con~trols aging. In the end, the journal Genes & Proteins topped offers from four other journals and agreed to pay the authors of the breakthrough paper $137,000--a new record for a scientific paper sold at auction. "With this money, we'll be able to hire a couple of postdocs, and that will help speed up the work in our lab," R

With the bomb-building out and global economic competitiveness in, Los Alamos, Sandia, and Livermore alter focus The end of the Cold War, coupled with President Clinton's desire to make federally funded research a better engine for national competitiveness, has left the Department of Energy's three weapons laboratories searching for new missions. While weapons development is down, nuclear nonproliferation research is growing, as are environmental and energy research. And Cooperative Research

The job market for this spring's science graduates at all levels may well be one of the tightest in decades, university career development experts say. Many also point out, however, that this year's recruitment patterns indicate that employment prospects are no longer experiencing the precipitous decline of the past several years. "Things seem to be finally leveling off and starting to go forward a bit," says Steven Kravinsky, director of career placement for the sciences, business, and libera

Berkeley Oceanographer Is Second Woman To Receive NSF's Alan T. Waterman Award Foundation Honors Radiation Pathologist For Lifetime Of Environmental Research Biological oceanographer Deborah L. Penry, an assistant professor at the University of California, Berkeley, has become the 18th recipient of the National Science Foundation's Alan T. Waterman Award for outstanding research by a scientist under the age of 35. The award, which includes a $500,000, three-year research grant, was prese

For the first time since 1983 and only the second time in the 36- year history of the prestigious Gairdner Foundation International Awards, all recipients of this year's prizes are United States- based researchers. Traditionally, the awards have had a decidedly international flavor; over the years, winners have included scientists from 12 different nations, spanning four continents. This year, the Willowdale, Ontario-based organization will honor five American researchers in the fields of ge

International Finance Summer Colleagues Developing Third World Science Good News For Runts Running Strong Mind Reading Chance Encounters Super Forecast The Missouri Botanical Garden has signed an agreement with Madagascar's Central Bank allowing the St. Louis-based institution to purchase up to $750,000 worth of the country's international debt at 50 cents on the dollar. The agreement, reached this spring with Paris-based ING Bank--which holds Madagascar's national debt--will release fun

Soon after finishing school, most new science graduates will utilize the entire spectrum of traditional job-seeking methods-- such as help- wanted ads, networking, university placement services, and assistance provided by scientific societies--to begin the next stage of their career. Another method that has been gaining in popularity over the years is the science job fair--a large conference of company representatives accepting resumes and interviewing for new employees. Although these event