Clinton's Choice For Top NSF Post: Can He Make The Agency `Sing'?

Colleagues and other scientists familiar with him describe theoretical physicist Neal F. Lane, President Bill Clinton's nominee for the directorship of the National Science Foundation, as "open-minded," "straightforward," and a "consensus-builder." They also say that these and other attributes of the Rice University provost will be necessary to defend and advance basic research as budgetary constraints tighten around the science agency. If confirmed, Lane, 54, will replace Walter E. Massey, who left the foundation last March after a two-year stint to become senior vice president for academic affairs and provost for the University of California system. NSF, with an annual budget of nearly $3 billion, is one of the major sources for individual- investigator grants in the basic sciences. Presidential science adviser John Gibbons, who assisted the White House personnel office in its search to replace Massey, says Lane's academic background as well as the year he spent as director of NSF's physics division (1979-80) give him the well- rounded experience needed to head the agency. "I admire him and am delighted he's willing to come to Washington and help turn the commitments of this administration toward the continued strong support of basic science," says Gibbons. "And I hope he will provide the kind of leadership and energy within the NSF to make it sing."` "By providing financial support to our nation's scientists and engineers, the National Science Foundation fuels the engine of creativity that helps us to increase our economic potential and our base of knowledge," said Clinton at last month's announcement of Lane's nomination. "Neal Lane, with his considerable experience as a scientist and administrator, will provide the leadership necessary to foster the great talent, ingenuity, and potential of the American research community." Lane has been provost at Houston-based Rice since 1986, after serving as chancellor at the University of Colorado at Colorado Springs for two years. Upon receiving a Ph.D. from the University of Oklahoma in 1964, Lane joined the faculty of Rice in 1966 as an assistant professor of physics. He became a full professor in 1972 and served as chairman of the physics department at Rice from 1977 to 1982. Lane has published numerous papers. His most cited work appeared in Reviews of Modern Physics in 1980 ("Theory of electron- molecule collisions," 52:29); it has been cited in more than 300 subsequent papers. At press time, a date for Lane's Senate confirmation hearing had not been announced. Lane declined to be interviewed for this story. While at Rice, Lane was the thesis adviser to Lee Collins, a graduate student in atomic molecular theory. Collins, now a staff scientist at the Los Alamos National Laboratory in New Mexico, characterizes his former mentor as "a very effective leader," whose management style is one of reasoning and persuasion. "He's very sensitive to people. His style is not confrontational, but he has an agenda and strongly held beliefs," says Collins, who studied under Lane from 1973 to 1975. "Yet, he listens well and can usually bring a consensus about from a large number of divergent opinions. I've always been amazed at how skillful he is at managing situations within an academic community--that he can bring together such a diversity of opinion and exert leadership without commanding or trying to force his opinions on others." Atomic theorist Peter Milonni, also a staff member at Los Alamos, is a member of the National Academy of Sciences Panel on the Future of Atomic, Molecular, and Optical Sciences. Lane was a cochairman of the panel until recently resigning after the NSF nomination. Milonni says Lane is "conscientious, knowledgeable, and evenhanded; there's absolutely nothing negative I can say about him. "One reason I'm happy about Neal's appointment is I think he'll be objective and listen to people," Milonni says. "He doesn't `have an axe to grind. I don't think he's got one opinion he's going to stick to and not listen to anyone else. He's the kind of person whose mind can be changed by evidence." Another member of the NAS panel, F. Fleming Crim, a chemistry professor at the University of Wisconsin-Madison, calls Lane "a true consensus-builder." On a panel of physicists, chemists, astronomers, and electrical engineers, Crim says Lane "seemed to be good at hearing what people were saying. This was a group of people primarily concerned with small science. Neal seemed to understand the issue of individual-investigator science and be responsive to it." Crim says that in the coming years, NSF may have to fight to maintain its current funding levels as money from Congress becomes harder to secure. "The NSF is going to face some challenging and interesting times as it competes for part of the research budget," Crim says. He says NSF's mission to further basic science may also be challenged. "I think the whole issue of `Are we going to fund basic science in this country?' is one that will be actively questioned over the next few years," Crim predicts. "And the head of the NSF is going to be right in the middle of it." Presidential science adviser Gibbons agrees: "As budgets get tighter, Congress and the [Clinton] administration are going to have to wrestle harder with the issue of distribution of resources for basic science." Echoing those sentiments, former NSF director Edward A. Knapp also warns that NSF could be ruined if it is forced to focus on applied science. "If NSF becomes an applied science agency, they will not make it," says Knapp, who headed the agency from 1983 to 1984, during President Ronald Reagan's administration. Knapp is now director of Los Alamos' Meson Physics Facility. "The things that DARPA [the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency, which recently dropped Defense from its name] does so well, NSF just can't do. NSF has always supported basic science and doesn't have the staff for applied programs. "I would counsel Neal Lane," says Knapp, "to be very careful not to upset what NSF does so well." Gibbons notes that, important as it is, basic science is "just one of a number of things on poor Neal Lane's plate." He says that other issues, such as maintaining a "fresh flow of ideas" through NSF and explaining the rationale for basic science in a world "no longer overshadowed by the U.S.-Russia standoff," will also be of importance to the next foundation head.

Clinton's Choice For Top NSF Post: Can He Make The Agency `Sing'?

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