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The Scientist has asked a group of experts to comment periodically upon recent articles that they have found noteworthy. Their selections, presented herein every issue, are neither endorsements of content nor the result of systematic searching. Rather, the list represents personal choices of articles the columnists believe the scientific community as a whole may also find interesting. Reprints of any articles cited here may be ordered through The Genuine Article, 3501 Market St., Philadelphia,

James E. Darnell, Jr., Vincent Astor Professor at the Rockefeller University, has been appointed vice president for academic affairs, a new position at the school. Darnell, 59, was named to the position by President-Elect David Baltimore and will become the university's chief academic officer. He will assume the post July 1. Darnell has been a professor at Rockefeller since 1973 and says he looks forward to his new position. His new duties include more responsibility for the university's facu

John Kenneth Hulm, chief scientist emeritus at the Westinghouse Electric Corp., has been appointed to the U.S.-Japan Joint High Level Advisory Panel by Allan Bromley, the president's assistant for science and technology. The advisory panel is composed of 20 distinguished U.S. and Japanese scientists and engineers from industry and academia. Formed in 1988, the panel provides advice to both governments on their science and technology relationship. Hulm, a physicist who is internationally recogni

New joint effort doesn't erase differences in how the two agencies view the long-term impact of getting proposals on the wire WASHINGTON -- The National Institutes of Health and the National Science Foundation have teamed up to study how the government might develop a system for scientists to submit their grant applications via modem. University grants administrators predict that such submissions are inevitable, and speculate about the possibility of a single application for all federal grants

Let's Talk--To Each Other A recent report by a five-person task force of the Carnegie Commission on Science, Technology, and Government called on the executive branch of government to consolidate its advice to the president on the environment, energy, and the economy. A subset of the 22-member commission, created in 1988 to recommend ways that the government could make better use of the country's scientists and engineers, suggests how to encourage White House-level panels "to look beyond the sh

Technology Import "There's a perception that the Soviets and the East Europeans don't have the [advanced] technology, and that's a fallacy," says John Ziker, a research associate at Kiser Research Inc. in Washington. For more than a decade Kiser Research, founded by John W. Kiser III, has been proving the fallacy by importing a broad range of industrial technologies from Eastern Europe and the Soviet Union. One of its latest projects involves self-propagating high-temperature synthesis of exo

WASHINGTON -- The National Institutes of Health has begun to withdraw its financial ties to Thereza Imanishi-Kari, the Tufts University immunologist accused of failing to support data in a 1986 Cell paper on gene expression. The decision parallels a new NIH investigation into the case that agency officials say has produced "mounting evidence of inconsistencies" in her work. The latest chapter in the controversy, involving a paper whose coauthors include Nobel laureate David Baltimore, unfolded

NSF's Bassam Shakhashiri finds new support in his once-lonely campaign for funds to train the next generation of researchers WASHINGTON - After nearly six years of stoking the boiler at the National Science Foundation, Bassam Shakhashiri believes that the train with increased funding for science education is finally leaving the station. And his message to the scientific community is simple: Either climb aboard and lend a hand or be left back at the gate. As NSF assistant director for science a

Research stalls as a commercial agreement on the technology's future eludes Cytogen and the University of Pennsylvania Last year, two University of Pennsylvania biologists crossed the species barrier in a big way. Little did they know that their feat would lead to crossfire between their institution and the company that sponsored the work. Nor did they anticipate that continued scientific progress would be a casualty of this skirmish. Last July, Jean Richa and Cecilia Lo announced in Science (

As the U.S. approaches a shortage of trained personnel, the government seeks to broaden the ranks of scientists WASHINGTON -- The federal government is stepping up its efforts to draw more minority students into science. But administrators both inside and outside the government say it's too early to know whether the new programs will be any more effective than previous programs, which were built on a desire to eliminate discrimination and improve opportunities for minorities. The new measures

Salem-Teikyo University in West Virginia awaits an influx of Asian students as it links up with a Florida biotech institute Wayne England, a fungus physiologist and chairman of natural sciences at Salem-Teikyo University, has had a longtime interest in shiitake mushrooms. But it was only last year that he thought about learning Japanese. That's when Teikyo University bought Salem (W.Va.) College and announced that some 500 Japanese students would be arriving over the next three years beginning

Taxing Grants . . . And Patience You've got to give Pittsburgh city officials points for creativity. In their zest to find new sources of tax revenue, they recently targeted the research grants of scientists at Carnegie Mellon University and the University of Pittsburgh as long-overlooked cash cows. In an article in the Pittsburgh Press (Feb. 25, 1990), director of finance Ben Hayllar was quoted as saying the city intended to investigate whether research grants from private corporations were su