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With bears loose on the world’s major stock markets, academic, corporate and government scientists who seek cover face a forest of question marks. On Wall Street, where tremors from the recent precipitous plunge in share prices still ripple through the world economy, analysts predict an end to the easy credit and abundant capital that fueled recent growth in some science-based U.S. industries. While not everyone is predicting a recession, the prevailing mood is one of extremecaution,

WASHINGTON—Members of Congress debating funding for the Superconducting Supercollider have elicited a promise from the chairman of the House science committee for “a full review” of the cost of various large-scale science projects being contemplated by federal officials. Rep. Robert Roe (D-N.J.) made that pledge during debate last month on his bill to authorize $1.1 billion in the next three years for construction of the SSC. But anticipated across-the-board spending cuts

WEST BERLIN—East Berlin’s Humboldt University and West Berlin’s Technical University are less than three miles apart. But the Wall makes scientific communication almost impossible. What applies to the two Berlins is equally true for the two (Germanys. “Just inviting people to give a talk at a seminar simply did not work out,” said Dietrich Dörner a professor of psychology who studies machine intelligence. His attempt last summer to invite a colleague faile

NEW YORK—Venture capitalist William J. Kane remembers “Flex Infusion Inc.” all too well. He spent nearly 40 hours investigating the nascent company’s product, people and plans—and then didn’t invest a dime. “We liked what we saw, got good feedback on the attractiveness of their technology and the potential of the applications,” said Kane, 31, a senior associate at Harvest Ventures Inc. here. "But we were still uncomfortable with the rate of gr

Agricultural scientist M.S. Swaminathah, often called the architect of India’s green revolution, has helped to transform his native country from a net food importer to one that today exports and stores its surplus grain. In addition to shaping agricultural development in the Third World, Swaminathan has taken an active interest in rekited issues involving environmental conservation and women’s roles in effecting and adapting to technological change. After receiving his Ph.D. from

As a schoolboy in England in the 1950s and ‘60s, I was first introduced to reference publishing by Kaye and Loby’s Tables. Here you could find all the “right” answers to experimental demonstrations in physics and chemistry, such as the viscosity of various mineral oils and Young’s modulus for steel, which then seemed rather remote from everyday life. And we used four-figure logarithm tables all the time. What a gold mine they were for publishers: in public examin

WASHINGTON—In what one observer called “its strongest international response in years,” the U.S. scientific community played a role in the ouster late last month of the unpopular government-appointed head of the University of Chile in Santiago. The National Academy of Sciences, the American Association for the Advancement of Science, the Institute of Medicine and the American Association of University Professors sent letters to Chilean President Gen. Augusto Pino- chet and

WASHINGTON—Almost five months after President Reagan announced the intention to nominate him, plasma physicist Robert Hunter waits in San Diego for word of his confirmation hearing to become director of the Office of Energy Research at the Department of Energy. The office, overseen since April by acting director James Decker after the departure of Alvin Trivelpiece, is the focal point for several of the hottest issues on the nation’s science agenda, including the Superconducting

LONDON—secrecy and the deliberate exclusion of information from the West are hadly damaging Soviet science, according to Academician Vitali Goldanski. In a strongly worded article in the general circulation monthly magazine Ogonyok (Little Flame), Goldanski recalled the harm caused by the misguided biological theories of Lysenko and drew attention to the problems faced by his colleagues in keeping abreast of outside developments. “In higher technical colleges everywhere,”

WASHINGTON—The American Psychological Association has beefed up its commitment to its scientific members as part of an internal realignment that intended to better serve the needs of an unusually diverse membership. A steady rise since the 1950s in the number of practitioners—those who provide health care directly to the public—has slowly tipped the balance against the academics and researchers who once dominated the 95-year-old association. As a result, that group has grown

WEST BERLIN—The chief funding agency for West German university scientists has proposed an ambitious expansion of its budget for the next three years. “The 1990s could become a time of blossoming for the German universities,” said Hubert Markl, president of the Deutsche Forschungsgemeinschaft (DFG).” The DFG, the German counterpart to the US. National Science Foundation, administered a budget of $600 million last year. That figure represents about 5 percent of the mo

LONDON—Squibb Corporation, the U.S. pharmaceutical company, plans to spend $32 million over the next seven years at Oxford University on basic neuroscience research. The agreement is one of the biggest between industry and academia since Hoechst announced its $50 million, 10-year investment in molecular biology at the Massachusetts General Hospital in 1982. Squibb is the first company to respond with cash to a workshop, organized jointly by the university and Britain’s Medical R