Insert Where Science Museum Professionals Meet Statistics bear out a growing recognition of science museums as a major source of science education in the United States. According to estimates from the Washington, D.C.-based Association of Science-Technology Centers (ASTC), the number of people passing through the turnstiles of science museums annually has risen from about 50 million in 1987 to close to 80 million in 1994. And ASTC officials speculate that the number could be as high as 125 mi

Association of Science and Technology CentersDepartment F1025 Vermont Ave., N.W., Suite 500Washington, D.C. 20005-3516 Fax: (202) 783-7207 E-mail: 74531.33@compuse rve.com James L. Peterson, president Bonnie VanDorn, executive director 467 total members, including 370 institutions--science and technology centers, nature centers, aquariums, zoos, planetariums, natural history museums, and children's museums-- science professional societies, and exhibit design firms For a complete listing of m

Named Winner Of Mallinckrodt Prize For Nuclear Medicine Author: Karen Young Kreeger Thomas Behr, 29, a research fellow at the Newark, N.J.-based Garden State Cancer Center who is on leave from the University of Erlangen-Nuremberg, Germany, has received the 1995 Mallinckrodt Prize. The award is given by the German Society of Nuclear Medicine for the best research in that field. He received the prize, which consists of an honorarium of 15,000 DM (approximately $10,000), in late March at the socie

Workers Author: Karen Young Kreeger Executives and educators associated with bioscience industry labs are enthusiastic about a recently released report outlining skill standards for technicians aspiring to work in the industry. They say the standards will serve as a framework for training programs aimed at giving workers more transferable skills, allowing them to move with more ease within the volatile bioscience job market. The report, released last month and entitled "Gateway to the Future:

The inclusion of eight investigators from the Howard Hughes Medical Institute (HHMI) on the list of 60 newly elected members of the National Academy of Sciences (NAS) may mark a new record for the academy. Although precise data are not available, NAS officials speculate that this is the largest number of new academy members associated with the same organization. The Chevy Chase, Md.-based institute's strong showing comes as no surprise to NAS home secretary Peter Raven, who cites HHMI research

IMAGE group's DNA libraries are made freely available to other researchers, as long as they, too, pass on information to the public. In less than two years, a research initiative begun by four geneticists has grown from an ad hoc collaboration to an international cooperative effort to freely share complementary DNA (cDNA) clone libraries. To date, in excess of 100,000 clones from the Integrated Molecular Analysis of Genome Expression (IMAGE) Consortium have been sent to more than 40 facilities

COLLABORATIONS: Harold Slavkin observes that "the growth area for oral medicine is at the interface with other kinds of science. Harold Slavkin, director of the Center for Craniofacial Molecular Biology at the University of Southern California (USC) School of Dentistry and the George and Mary Lou Boone Professor of Craniofacial Molecular Biology, has been appointed director of the National Institute of Dental Research (NIDR). Slavkin, 57, will assume the position in July, replacing Harald Loe,

Irene Ann Chen, 17, a senior at La Jolla High School in San Diego, captured first place in the 1995 Westinghouse Science Talent Search. She received a $40,000 college scholarship at the award ceremony in Washington, D.C., in March. TOP OF HER CLASS: Irene Chen of La Jolla High School plans to use her $40,000 Westinghouse scholarship award to study molecular biology. Chen, who is first in her graduating class, says she was "definitely" surprised that she garnered the top honor, noting that her

Situated equidistant from Raleigh, Durham, and Chapel Hill, N.C.--smack in the middle of the Research Triangle--sits the only National Institutes of Health institutional campus outside of the Washington, D.C., Beltway. The National Institute of Environmental Health Sciences (NIEHS) is currently responsible for nearly 50 percent of all federally funded research on such subjects. It commands a diverse research agenda that covers populations and geographical boundaries far beyond the triangle or t

In Recognition Of His Work On Health Risks From Lead Clair C. Patterson, 72, a professor of geology at the California Institute of Technology's division of geological and planetary sciences, has been awarded the 1995 Tyler Prize for Environmental Achievement. Patterson was presented the honor--a gold medal and $150,000--on April 28 at a ceremony in Los Angeles. EMPHASIZING EDUCATION: William Wiley hopes to establish Sigma Xi as an intellectual resource for teachers and legislators at various c

Government and private labs are springing up to accommodate expanded use of genetic evidence, but retraining existing workers. In less than a decade since DNA analysis brought forensic science into a new era, the growth of the discipline--as an evidentiary tool as well as an industry--has been massive, as more and more high-profile cases hinge upon the evidence it provides. Yet the phenomenal expansion of its use in courts around the United States is not translating into new entreprene

Sixteen individuals--one woman and 15 men--from a variety of disciplines in science, engineering, and mathematics are being honored for their scientific and humanitarian achievements at the 132nd annual meeting of the National Academy of Sciences (NAS), scheduled for April 24 in Washington, D.C. Five of the 16 are already NAS members. Also taking place at the convocation will be the election of new academy members and the induction of new members elected last year (N. Sankaran, The Scientist, J