The Scientist - Home

LWERMORE, CALIF.—The Reagan administration once again has reached into industry to fill a key science policy position with the nomination of Robert 0. Hunter Jr. to head the Energy Department's Office of Energy Research. President Reagan announced June 23 that he will nominate Hunter for the position, which oversees $2 billion worth of energy research programs. The Senate, which must confirm the appointment, will set a date for hearings once the nomination is officially submitted. Hunter

Peter Ward, a marine biologist at the University of Washington in Seattle, is fascinated by the chambered nautilus, the lone survivor of an entire subclass of molluscs that emerged some 500 million years ago. In the course of thinking about how to open this world to the public—whom he calls "the real supporters of science"—Ward received a flyer describing a new publishing venture by the New York Academy of Sciences. The result is In Search of Nautilus, one of the first in a series d

WASHINGTON—False assumptions, deficient data, lack of guidelines and a bureaucratic handoff all figured in a federal advisory panel's decision last month not to recommend approval of tissue plasminogen activator (TPA), widely touted as biotechnology's first "blockbuster" drug. The Food and Drug Administration (FDA) panel's action stunned Genentech Inc., the South San Francisco company that had hoped to begin marketing the blood clot-dissolving drug this summer. The company said it hopes to

WASHINGTON—Behind Donald Fredrickson's forced resignation June 2 as president and lifetime trustee of the Howard Hughes Medical Institute lies a tale of budget overruns and unorthodox purchasing procedures that HHMI trustees and officials say stem from his wife's active and inappropriate role at the institute. "It's big and it's bad," said HHMI chairman George Thorn about the results of the six-month review conducted by the New York law firm of Paul, Weiss, Rifkind, Wharton & Garrison, abo

Japan's effort to launch an international program in basic biological research has stalled again amid continued confusion over its specifics, according to U.S. and Japanese sources familiar with the project. The latest setback to the Human Frontier Science Program came earlier this month at the Venice economic summit, where Prime Minister Yasuhiro Nakasone had been expected to unveil an official proposal. Instead, final details of the program remain under wraps, and the seven leaders of major in

Long before NSF Director Erich Bloch began beating the drums for multimilliondollar interdisciplinary research centers, foundation officials quietly embarked on a program to provide seed money for smaller cooperative research efforts between universities and industry. The program, which since 1979 has stimulated the creation of more than 40 such centers at schools around the country, offers valuable lessons in how to build industrial ties without sacrificing the quality of scientific research on

Chemist and exobiologist Cyril Ponnamperuma was born in Ceylon (now Sri Lanka) and took a degree in philosophy at the University of Madras. He went on to study chemistry at Birkbeck College in London under crystallographer J.D. Bernal, a pioneer in studies of the origin of life. After receiving a Ph.D. in 1962 from the University of California, Berkeley, Ponreamperuma joined NASA'S Exobiology Division and kiter became chief of its chemical evolution branch. Since 1971 he has directed the Lab ora

WASHINGTON—National Science Foundation officials are hoping that an arranged marriage between Duke University and the National Institutes of Health will extend NSF's engineering research centers into the life sciences and provide a model for other joint ventures by federal research agencies. But progress has been slow because, as with most such marriages, the couple was the last to know. This spring the National Science Board agreed to spend up to $32 million over the next five years to cr

LONDON—Joe Bradwell and his party of 25 were due to leave England this week on the latest in a series of highly unusual scientffic excursions. Their destination this year is the Karakoram range of mountains in the Himalayas, where they will continue studies on altitude sickness that have im proved strategies for combating this condition—and earned them a considerable reputation for self-experimentation. It is 11 years since A.R. (Joe) Bradwell got together with fellow physicians John

LONDON—Prime Minister Thatcher's landslide victory in Britain's general election June 11 means that U.K. science is unlikely to receive more money from her Conservative government. Instead, the scientific community is bracing for changes designed to make better use of existing funds. The state of British science rarely surfaced in a campaign pre occupied with welfare and defense. Although both main opposition parties—Labour and the alliance of the Liberals and Social Demo crats̵

WASHINGTON—In eight months as presidential science adviser, William Graham has built a staff that has extensive defense and technical experience but few ties to the mainstream academic community. His latest appointment is the Department of Energy's Beverly Berger, who took over April 1 as assistant director for life sciences in the Office of Science and Technology Policy (OSTP). She replaces Robert Rabin, who returned to the National Science Foundation after 18 months at OSTP to coordinate

WASHINGTON—The bandwagon on Capitol Hill to boost American competitiveness has breathed new life into proposals to place federal science agencies under one roof. In recent weeks, Rep. George E. Brown Jr. (D-Calif.) has reintroduced bills to create a federal Department of Science and Technology and a new agency, the National Policy and Technology Foundation, to coordinate research and efforts to translate knowledge into products. Brown has introduced similar measures in the past, without n