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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

Author: PETER J. SMITH Department of Earth Sciences Open University Milton Keynes, U.K. The Cleopatra structure on Venus, 100 kilometers in diameter, has the morphology of an impact crater but the distinctly different depth-diameter ratio of a volcanic crater. It is not yet possible to decide whether it is a very strange impact crater or a very strange volcanic crater. A.T. Basilevsky, B.A. Ivanov, "Cleopatra crater on Venus: Venera 15/16 data and impact/volcanic origin controversy," Geophys

Volume 4, #11The Scientist May 28, 1990 FUNDING BRIEFS Date: May 28, 1990 DOD Help For Small Businesses The Department of Defense's Small Business Innovation Research Program is preparing to fund about 1,300 Phase I awards for fiscal year 1990, covering a wide variety of research projects. Awards up to $50,000 each are available as seed capital for U.S. research firms that qualify as small businesses. There are three phases of the SBIR awards. During the six months allotted for Phase I, awardee

Volume 4, #11The Scientist May 28, 1990 FUNDING BRIEFS Date: May 28, 1990 DOD Help For Small Businesses The Department of Defense's Small Business Innovation Research Program is preparing to fund about 1,300 Phase I awards for fiscal year 1990, covering a wide variety of research projects. Awards up to $50,000 each are available as seed capital for U.S. research firms that qualify as small businesses. There are three phases of the SBIR awards. During the six months allotted for P

Although many of the research community's major awards honor investigators' lifetime achievements, there are only a few that recognize researchers early on in their careers. One of the most prestigious of these honors, the National Science Foundation's Alan T. Waterman Award, was recently presented to Mark E. Davis, professor of chemical engineering at Virginia Polytechnic Institute and State University. The prize, first awarded in 1976 and named after the first director of NSF, is given for o

Marjory Stoneman Douglas, an environmentalist who recently celebrated her 100th birthday, was an honored guest at a ceremony last month to dedicate a bronze sculpture by Philadelphia artist Eric Berg at the entrance to the Everglades National Park Royal Palm Visitor's Center in Florida. The life-size statue, which depicts a Florida panther, also honors landscape architect Ernest F. Coe (1886-1951), who conceived the idea of an Everglades national park in 1928. It is estimated that fewer than 5