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Since scientists operate in small worlds populated by people with common research interests, they repeatedly encounter one another in the literature as well as at conferences. The world I inhabited as a graduate student and for some years thereafter revolved around the study of antibiotics. I earned my doctorate in the department of microbiology at Rutgers, the State University of New Jersey, where antibiotics were the focus of interest. The chairman of the department was Selman A. Waksman. He

WASHINGTON—Leftist members of the peace movement here have challenged the commitment of renowned physicist Carl Friedrich von Weizsäcker to their cause, sparking a debate over the role of scientists in political issues. Weizsäcker, at 75 an elder statesman in the movement, was a key member of a small team of German scientists who worked unsuccessfully on controlled nuclear fission during World War II. For the past 40 years he has analyzed the dangers of nuclear war. Last fa

BOSTON—A growing number of scientific organizations are training researchers to appear on television and the other media. The American Association for the Advancement of Science has offered TV workshops since 1986. The University of Wisconsin gave its first one last fall. “Scientists are being increasingly called upon to provide information to the media, said Carol Rogers, head of the AAAS Office of Communications. “But they don’t really know how the media operate

WASHINGTON—The pending sale of Psychology Today to the owners of American Health marks more than the end of a costly and divisive episode in the life of the American Psychological Association. APA’s experiences with the magazine, according to its new owners and several psychologists closely connected to it, offer valuable lessons to any scientific association thinking about educating the public through a commercial magazine. “We have a better chance of serving the vision of

{WantNoCacheVal} Four Obstacles to Technology Transfer Washington--Limited oppotunities for proprietary research, an inability to copyright and license software and institutional red tape are major obstacles in transferring technology from federal laboratories to U.S. industry according to a new report from the General Accounting Office. The report examined 10 laboratories operated by six government agencies, raging from the Air Force’s Lincoln Laboratory to the National Institutes of H

DUBLIN—The Irish government has stepped up its canipaign to strengthen biotechnology by providing more money for university research and the marketing of commercial products. The $2.4 million awards will add three universities to an existing network of three centers set up last year. In addition, a company called BioResearch Ireland has been created to seek commercial contracts with overseas companies, in particular from the United States. “What we are trying to do is to commercia

{WantNoCacheVal} EC Hopes to Reverse Brain Drain RICHARD STEVENSON LONDON—Stanford University wanted to create a program in organic geochemistry. Simon Brassell, a young research fellow at Bristol University, was looking for a better career opportunity. Unfortunately for Europe, it was a good watch: Brassell is now an associate professor of applied earth sciences and geology at Stanford. That combination of plentiful resources overseas and tight budgets at home has meant a continuing

LONDON—John Hamlyn’s laboratory walls at the University of Maryland are plastered with pictures of the English countryside of his youth. The 34-year-old physiologist says he would like to return there some day, “but not in the foreseeable future. ” Hamlyn received his Ph.D. in physiology from Glasgow University and planned to return to the United Kingdom after some training abroad. But during a 1981 visit home he “was appalled at the state of science” in hi

RICHARD STEVENSON LONDON—Stanford University wanted to create a program in organic geochemistry. Simon Brassell, a young research fellow at Bristol University, was looking for a better career opportunity. Unfortunately for Europe, it was a good watch: Brassell is now an associate professor of applied earth sciences and geology at Stanford. That combination of plentiful resources overseas and tight budgets at home has meant a continuing brain drain of the region’s scientific

Conferences serve many purposes, both professional and social. They aim to foster efficient information exchange, offer the opportunity to investigate employment possibilities, and provide a chance for old friends to get reacquainted. With a certain regularity and for a brief time a far-flung community comes together. I am not the only one to have noticed, however, that many conferences serve younger professionals poorly. Graduate students and recent postdocs—the people who have the most

Editor’s note: Last November 30, we published an Opinion piece by Alexander Kohn, professor of virology at Tel Aviv University. In the article, Kohn questioned the wisdom of inserting the CD4 gene from HIV into cell lines, especially HeLa cells. Such research could, Kohn suggested, expand the host range of HIV In this response, Howard M Temin, of the McArdle Laboratory for Cancer Research, tries to lay Kohn’s concern to rest. We invite further comment. Alexander Kohn and the headl

It’s not easy, at first sight, to discern signs of ideological harmony between biologists who are working toward the environmental dissemination of genetically altered organisms and “activists” who are deeply apprehensive about the idea. Look more closely, however, and one argument appears as a possible basis for unity: the need for far greater investment in the ecological research necessary for prudent development of this novel range of technologies. As reflected in the ag