Government Briefs

NIH To Tap Alumni To Lobby Money, not memories, is the idea behind an effort by NIH officials to build a national alumni association. “Our primary goal is to promote the best interests of the NIH as the leading biomedical research institute in the world” through a grass-roots lobbying effort aimed at state and national legislators, says Abner Notkins, director of the intramural research program at the National Institute of Dental Research. Since last year, at the end of the NIH centennial celebrations, NIH officials have recruited 450 members for a Washington chapter, raised $50,000, and published a newsletter. Last month they sent out invitations to 6,000 potential members, and they hope eventually to track down another 14,000 alumni whose current addresses are unknown. “It’s terribly important that this concept of an alumni association take hold,” former Connecticut Senator Lowell R Weicker, Jr. told alumni at their spring meeting in Bethesda, Md. Weicker is the head of a new group, called Research! America, with the similar goal of building up public support for medical research (The Scientist, April 17,1989, page 1). “The one thing we can’t do is think this matter will spak for itself.” For more information on the alumni association, contact Harriet Greenwald, 9101 Old Georgetown Road, Bethesda, Md., 20814, or call (301) 530-0567. Side By Side, But Worlds Apart Last month’s congressional hearing on potential conflict of interest in science featured a rare joint appearance by the heads of the two federal agencies that fund the majority of academic science. But NIH Director James Wyngaarden and NSF Director Erich Bloch demonstrated contrasting styles and opinions on the issues being explored by Rep. Ted Weiss (D-N.Y.), chairman of the human resources subcommittee of the House Government Operations Committee Wyngaarden, a veteran of past congressional grillings on his agency’s oversight of the research it funds, appeared relaxed and unperturbed at the day-long investigation into whether the U.S. public was benefiting fully from the multibillion-dollar federal investment. Bloch, in contrast, was visibly upset at being compelled to listen to other witnesses discuss specific cases that did not involve his agency. During one hearing break, called because of a floor vote, Wyngaarden chatted casually with acquaintances while Bloch earnestly inquired about the agenda for the rest of the hearing and was assured by committee staff that his presence was vital. Their differences also extend to substance. Weiss asked what each witness thought about Japanese participation in an MIT program that allows private companies to buy access to ongoing research. Wyngaarden said that such participation “raises serious questions,” and in a private conversation he called the $50,000 membership fee an example of “simple greed” by the university. But Bloch sees nothing wrong with the arrangement, because “we’re not giving something to the Japanese that we are not offering U.S. firms as well.” Being Treated Like Royalty NIH is the king of the hill when it comes to generating royalties from licensing agreements on inventions by federal scientists. The General Accounting Office reported last month that NIH. has collected $3.9 million of the $4.6 million inroyalties received by a dozen federal agencies during a recent two-year period. The Agricultural Research Service, with $213,000, and NASA, with $181,000 were a distant second and third, respectively. The figures come from a GAO report to Congress on how federal agencies have implemented a 1986 law creating commercial products from breakthroughs in the lab. At the same time, GAO notes that all of the NIH royalties cited in its report accrue from agreements made prior to the law, primarily the AIDS testing kit developed by Robert Gallo and colleagues at the National Cancer Institute.

Government Briefs

The Scientist Staff

NIH To Tap Alumni To Lobby

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