WASHINGTON—Resolution of the dispute between American and French researchers over credit for discovery of the AIDS virus and the development of blood tests for the antibody has delighted the science community. But the related decision to create an international AIDS research foundation is being viewed with skepticism by many experts in the field. Under the agreement, announced March 31 by President Ronald Reagan and French Prime Minister Jacques Chirac, the U.S. Department of Health and Hu

WASHINGTON—At 1:30 p.m. today, around the corner from the White House, high school students plan to set loose one thousand balloons with self-addressed information cards. They will join 224,000 balloons launched simultaneously around the country by students from 600 schools, in one of the more visible displays of National Science and Technology Week '87. Sponsored by the National Science Foundation and funded largely by corporate donors, Science Week is observing its third year. Its messag

WASHINGTON—More than four months after the Institute of Medicine issued its well-publicized report on AIDS, the disease is still outpacing federal efforts to contain and understand it. "Since the report came out, a lot has happened as far as the epidemic spreading, but very little has been done to implement the strongly felt recommendations of the panel," said June Osborn, dean of the University of Michigan School of Public Health and a member of the group that prepared the report. The nec

NEW YORK—A 200-gallon aquarium isn't much to brag about. But the tank, together with workstations, microscopes, displays and a helpful staff, have made quite a splash at the new New York Hall of Science in Queens. The aquarium is one of more than 100 exhibits at the museum, which formally reopened its doors last fall after a five-year, $9 million renovation and a summer-long dress rehearsal. Like the museum itself, the aquarium exhibit is designed to "bring the microscope into the macrosco

WASHINGTON—A recommendation that Congress look into taking responsibility for pre-college education programs away from the National Science Foundation has caught the attention of the science community. But the suggestion from retiring Rep. Donald Fuqua (D-Fla.) that the Department of Education could better handle the job is viewed more as an attempt to stir up science educators than to take the Foundation out of the business of elementary and secondary school science. In a brief discussion

WASHINGTON—There is no single survey of American attitudes to-ward science that compares with the British and French polls. How-ever, the National Science Board of the National Science Foundation regularly reviews existing surveys in its biennial Science Indicators, an assessment of the overall state of American science and technology. The 1985 edition reports: Forty-seven percent of 943 respondents to a 1985 survey said they had a “great deal of confidence” in scientific le

WASHINGTON-The drive to quadruple federal funding for AIDS research to $1 billion annually faces an uncertain future within the Reagan administration and in Congress. A star-studded joint committee of the National Academy of Sciences and the Institute of Medicine has urged the massive increase after an intensive six-month study. Its report, issued late last month, also chides the National Institutes of Health for not enlisting enough university researchers in its effort to better understand the

The new gallium arsenide computer chips, with processing speeds nearly 10 times faster than silicon, provide plenty of food for thought to an electronics industry hungry for success. But observers still have little to chew on when they try to measure the chips' impact. The American Society of Mechanical Engineers wants to enrich the meal. It has joined with Nobel laureate Wassily Leontief of New York University's Institute for Economic Analysis on a model to help people evaluate the economic imp