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Ever since President Reagan took office, the NIH budget has been a political football—artificially low requests handed off by the president have crossed the goal line as sizable increases in the final appropriations measure passed by Congress. But that tradition could end this year. The Reagan request for a small 6.8% increase over this year’s budget is being taken seriously on Capitol Hill, and it appears likely that the final figures for NIH will be only slightly higher. In June,

More research money may be going to AIDS, but other immune deficiences are still underfunded and under-researched, says Marcia Boyle, president of the Immune Deficiency Disease Foundation. To encourage work on the primary immune deficiencies, the foundation is starting a faculty development award of $20,000 for each of three years to go to a young researcher in the first three years of a faculty appointment. The award will be funded by pharmaceutical supplier Cutter Biological, a subsidiary of

International Data Acquisition & Control Inc. (IDAC) recently released a chromatography system that includes a data acquisition peripheral, data acquisition software, and chromatography software, all of which work with Apple Macintosh computers. Called IDAC-Chrome, the system provides five methods of analyzing integrated data. Points can be withdrawn and refitted to find the optimum calibration, which can be performed using both internal and external standards. Based in Amherst, N.H., IDAC sel

Methods for quantifying radioisotopes on membranes, gels, and microtiter trays are fundamental to molecular biology and related research areas. Until recently, these methods were difficult, tedious, and time-consuming, requiring the scientist to expose the plates to X- ray film for periods ranging from a few hours to a week or more. But a new method for identifying and classifying bacteria by imaging the radioisotope distribution has been developed by the Department of Reproductive Physiology

In early 1987, when research team around the world began reporting higher and higher superconductivity temperatures, several scientists at E. I. du Pont de Nemours & Co in Wilmington, Del., were touched by the fervor spreading throughout the scientific community. It was the spontaneous outpouring of enthusiasm by this group of bench scientists—rather than a sudden profit-motivated decision on the part of DuPont senior management—that resulted shortly thereafter in the company’

The highest salaries for young physicists in the U.K. are paid for jobs associated with the electricity-generation industry, according to a recent survey conducted by the London-based Institute of Physics. The survey, based on 1988 salary data supplied by 5,430 respondents, revealed that physicists between 25 and 29 earn a median salary of £15,380 ($26,146) in that industry, compared to £14,700 ($24,990) in communications technology, and £14,500 ($24,650) in computer science.

How will startups get needed capital if the licenses they grant can be voided during court proceedings? WASHINGTON—Steven Mendell says he isn’t worried about the future of his company, Xoma Corp. The seven-year-old Berkeley, California, biotechnology startup firmed up its funding by going public in 1986 and has an agreement with the pharmaceutical giant Pfizer Inc. to help it develop a line of monoclonal antibody-based products to treat septic shock infections. But Mendell, Xoma&

Brookhaven National Lab’s High Flux Beam Reactor got a major boost last month when a Department of Energy committee recommended that a proposed $20 million upgrade of the reactor be included in next year’s budget. A DOE official says that the project “has a good shot” of making it into the president’s 1990 budget request, which will be submitted next January. The upgrade will allow the 23-year-old reactor to remain the nation’s primary neutron source for th

No one believes that science is always objective. But how much are the ideas, experiments, and even conclusions of science shaped by the surrounding culture? Social scientist Kalim Siddiqui, director of the Muslim Institute in London, wants to know. So he has invited Islamic scientists working outside the Muslim world— he estimates there are 500,000 of them—to attend a conference in London this winter to examine the question. Siddiquis own opinion is that modern science is ‘l

The dispute itself isn’t unique: three scientists are accused of stealing trade secrets after they left a research institute for positions in industry. But this dispute is taking place in China, where the outcome may have an important impact on the future of entrepreneurship in a state-controlled economy. The China Research Institute for Printing Science and Technology has accused three senior researchers of taking with them their work on advanced typesetting software when they accepted

{WantNoCacheVal} Imreg Rushes To Gain Approval Each day, more than a dozen clerks rustle through stacks of patient records as they photocopy, compile, and review an estimated 28,000 documents. The documents record data from clinical testing of what could, if approved by the FDA, be a new treatment for AIDS patients. The clerks are part of a small, highly motivated team employed by Imreg Inc., New Orleans. The tiny company is heatedly engaged in filing a new drug application for its promising I

California, home to almost one-third of the nation’s biotech firms, is eager for more. The state’s universities and venture capitalists have proven successful at nourishing nascent companies; now its Department of Commerce is joining the effort. Its advertising slogan, placed this spring in four magazines for scientists, urges: “Come to California and bring your genes.” But it isn’t all slick public relations—the agency also offers a free, 200-page report p