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The development of composite materials has advanced tremendously since the days when artisans hand-forged high- and low-carbon irons or steels to make a lighter, tougher samurai sword. Today's advanced composites are manufactured in a variety of ways to produce stronger, lighter-weight, and more heat-resistant substances than the metals they replace. Composed of thread-like fibers of graphite, boron, or aramid embedded in a matrix of resin, metal, or other material, advanced composites have hu

Volume: 3, #3The Scientist February 6, 1989 NATIONAL LAB BRIEFS Plasma Lab Chilled By DOE If the last three months are any indication, it's going to be a tough year for the Princeton Plasma Physics Laboratory. In November Robert Hunter, director of DOE's Office of Energy Research, dropped a bombshell by withdrawing $12.5 million of the $20 million that the lab had already committed to remodeling the Tokamak Fusion Test Reactor to make possible higher energies. Hunter is said

TI: 1990 FEDERAL SCIENCE BUDGET HIGHLIGHTS DT: February 6, 1989 PG: 3 TY: NEWS (The Scientist, Vol:3, #3, pg. 3, February 6, 1989) (Copyright, The Scientist, Inc.) ---------- (in millions of dollars) AGENCY 1989 1990 % Funded Requested Change NATIONAL INSTITUTES OF HEALTH Major Organizations: NCI 1,571 1,646 +5 (Cancer) NHLBI 1,045 1,082 +2 (Heart,Lung,Blood) NIDR 130 136 +4 (Dental) NIDDK 559 582 +4 (Diabetes, Digestive, Kidney Diseases) NINDS 480 502 +4 (Neurological Disease) NIAID 743 8

A feud is brewing between the two health agencies that should be collaborating on the federal effort to combat cancer and AIDS. On one side are gung-ho researchers at the National Cancer Institute who want to test novel therapies as quickly as possible; on the other are the go-slow regulators at the Food and Drug Administration who insist on safety. FDA's detailed regulations governing clinical trials are so frustrating to researchers, grumbles Bruce Chabner, head of NCI's division of cancer t

The budget pledges more money for science, but whether this will translate into support for individual scientists remains. WASHINGTON, D.C.--For scientists who depend on funds from NSF and NIH, one important implication of President Reagan's final budget is a new emphasis on raising the size of individual grants. But it's not all good news: The budget, barring radical surgery by Congress, may fund fewer new grants than might be expected. And Reagan's desire to spend more on interdisciplinary c

University departments of chemistry and physics are suffering because of declining numbers of students. So what should they do to attract more bright young minds? One answer, says Alan McClelland, NSF deputy director of the science and engineering education division, is emphasizing the potential financial payoffs of a degree in chemistry or physics. At the Council of Scientific Society Presidents' recent annual meeting, McClelland argued that the fields of biology and computer science have con

For the past two years, intrepid astronomer Arthur Vaughn has been trying to save the Mount Wilson Observatory and its 100-inch Hooker telescope (The Scientist, June 27, 1988, page 5). The Carnegie Institute had planned to close the historic facility in 1985, when its interest shifted to a new observatory in Las Campanas, Chile. And federal money to keep the observatory open wasn't available in a time of declining budgets for astronomy. So Vaughn, who believes that the 85-year-old facility sti

Are the difficulties of doing both clinical and basic research hampering the progress of medical science? Sir David Weatherall is a worried man. When the Muffield professor of Medicine at Oxford University gazes out at the unsolved problems of medical science, he sees deadly diseases like cancer and circulatory problems still killing people by the millions around the world. And he fears that the diseases may remain scourges because of a failing of the scientific community. "The reason that we

The EPA has incurred the wrath of the biotechnology industry with its draft of new biotech regulations. Both the Industrial Biotechnology Association (IBA) and the Association of Biotechnology Companies (ABC) took a gander at the draft regulations at an EPA Biotechnology Science Advisory Committee meeting December 21 and promptly fired off press releases expressing their ire. The draft regulations - which were to be formally proposed at the end of January - represent a step backward for the EP

Physicist George Pratt's invention has found its niche, but it didn't happen easily. Pratt, a professor in MIT's department of electrical engineering and computer science, had devised an ultrasound method that could be used to test bone strength. The patented technology was initially licensed to Equine Biomechanics and Exercise Physiology Inc. (Unionville, Pa.) for use in the examination of horses' legs. When that idea fizzled, EQB licensed the technology to businessman Thomas Sherwin, preside

Three years ago, Dennis Darnall was comfortably and, one would have thought, firmly entrenched in the groves of academe. As professor of chemistry at New Mexico State University and director of the school's science research center, he held a position of high rank. And thanks to federal and state grants, he even had the opportunity to indulge in his scientific passion: devising ways that algae could be used to recover metal from industrial wastewaters. A scientist's paradise? Not for Darnall; he

A key experiment has been approved, but many researchers worry that slipping genes into humans is premature. BETHESDA, MD.--Maybe W. French Anderson wouldn't be in the center of a slow-burning controversy if it weren't for the letters. But he can't escape them. Several times a week, new correspondence lands on his desk on the seventh floor of Building 10 at the National Institutes of Health in Bethesda. The letters come from all across the United States and from dozens of foreign countries, a