As director-general of the Commission's Directorate-General for Science, Research and Development, Paolo Fasella is fighting to ensure the future of European collaborative research on the scale enshrined in the Framework program. Fasella, past president of the International Union of Biological Science, also sits on the councils of the European Molecular Biology Laboratory and the European Science Foundation. A 1954 graduate of the medical school at the University of Rome, he has been a professor of biochemistry at the University of Rome since 1971. He was interviewed in Brussels on May 13 by Bernard Dixon, European editor of The Scientist. This is an edited version of their talk.
The greater value of science today means it has become more important to the EEC— which, after all, is an economic organization. It also stems from the blurring of the distinction between science and technology. While technology is more dependent upon science these ...
