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WASHINGTON--The Department of Energy's troubled epidemiology program should double its research on the effects of radiation on workers and expand that research to encompass possible nonradioactive hazards, such as magnetic fields and industrial chemicals, an independent advisory panel has concluded. The DOE program is responsible for studying the health effects of radiation on humans, both by following the medical history of the survivors of the atomic bombs dropped on Japan at the end of Worl

UC Faculty To Weapons Labs: Begone Every decade or so, the University of California faculty has second thoughts about the school's relationship with the Department of Energy's weapons labs. So far, it hasn't made much difference - the university still manages the Los Alamos and Livermore national labs for DOE, as it has since the Korean War. But a recent rash of embarrassing environmental, legal, and ethical scandals at Livermore and other labs has added weight to a new faculty report recommend

If the editors of Poisk, a lively new science newspaper published in Moscow, need historical justification for their project, they can point to Lenin, who on his deathbed in 1922 called for a newspaper that would provide a forum for scientists. Or the editors can produce the letter Soviet physicist Pyetr Kapitsa wrote to Nikita Khrushchev in 1958 on behalf of his colleagues at the Soviet Academy of Sciences. Kapitsa, who would later win the Nobel Prize in physics, humbly wrote: "I would like t

The Liposome Solution The benefits of many drugs, especially those used to combat cancer, are compromised by their toxicity. Now a Berkeley, Calif., researcher believes he has developed a technology that overcomes this problem, thus making possible more successful treatments of cancer and other diseases - and changing the way pharmaceutical companies will do science. Kenneth Matsumura, director of the Alin Foundation's Immunity Research Laboratory, believes he has found a method of using liposo

They're fast, reliable, and tireless. Now they want a place at the bench. Can machines adopt the scientific method? PITTSBURGH--Repetitive lab work makes John Lindsey's mind wander. After a week or so of compound making - repetitive lab work at its worst - the Carnegie Mellon University chemist begins to think about automation. Robots. In particular, robots that can do his job. Lindsey has spent five years pursuing the construction of just such a machine - a compact and reliable robot that ca

New York Scientists Take French Partner Virogenetics, a newly opened vaccine research lab in Troy, N.Y., is an international marriage of scientific convenience - a partnership between a French vaccine manufacturer and a team of New York scientists from the state Health Department's Wadsworth Center for Laboratory and Research in Albany. Several years ago the New Yorkers, led by state research scientist Enzo Paoletti, developed a method, using recombinant DNA technology and the cowpox virus, tha

WASHINGTON--Deputy Director John Moore has left the National Science Foundation to become professor of economics and director of the International Institute at nearby George Mason University. His decision, in addition to creating a vacancy that President Bush must fill, may force the administration to speed up its timetable for deciding who will lead the science foundation in the 1990s. Moore, 54, holds an undergraduate degree in chemical engineering and a Ph.D. in economics. The former associ

Cold, Clear Nights and Cosmic Radiation Although the future of Antarctica is still uncertain (The Scientist, Nov. 13, 1989, page 2), scientists continue to brave the harsh weather conditions for the sake of research. The newest addition to the list of hardy researchers is a team of physicists from Purdue University, West Lafayette, Ind., and the University of Wisconsin, Madison. The team, organized by Purdue physicist James A. Gaidos, will travel to Antarctica in shifts until the end of Februar

Harold Furth could see the hard times coming. Oil prices were dropping and, with them, the prospects for funding research into alternative energies such as fusion, his specialty. So, like others in his field during the early 1980s, the head of the Princeton Plasma Laboratory started promoting his program as good basic research, rather than as the pursuit of a working fusion reactor. Meanwhile, researchers in pursuit of a malaria vaccine had their own troubles. Serious scientific obstacles h

PALO ALTO, CALIF.—It wasn’t very good news for the public.., or for the electric power industry. Researchers had found that sulfur dioxide emissions from power plants could aggravate the condition of asthmatics. But the Electric Power Research Institute (EPRI), which financed the research, didn’t flinch. EPRI was created in 1972 to support research on subjects that are important to the electric utility industry. Its $379 million annual budget comes entirely from contribut

WASHINGTON—Although the 1991 budget that President Bush will present to Congress next month is expected to propose bigger budgets for many science research programs, the sobering truth is that there isn’t going to be enough money available to support the programs. The budget, still in preparation and scheduled to be delivered January 8 to Congress, is expected to contain major increases in a variety of scientific projects already under way. The figures could be as large as $400 m

Imagine a research team 42,000 members strong. Ranging in age from 9 to 90, they’re up before dawn in their quest to outdo one another in a daylong data collection binge. Then contemplate a database with more than a billion entries. It spans 90 years and includes more than a thousand species of birds sighted in the Western Hemisphere. That’s the Audubon Society Christmas, Bird Count, the world’s largest and oldest wildlife survey. A statistician’s nightmare? Possibl