John H. Marburger III

During the height of the national ruckus over anthrax mailings and feared terrorist attacks this past October, the US Senate quietly confirmed John H. Marburger III as scientific adviser to President George W. Bush, and director of the Office of Science and Technology Policy (OSTP). Bush broke records for heel dragging in nominating a candidate and then demoted the position from assistant to the president, granting less face time with the chief of staff.1 Add to this the fact that the OSTP was recently moved to an office several blocks from the White House and one has considerable reason to believe that scientific advice in the US government has been devalued. Marburger, a physicist and self-proclaimed lifelong-Democrat, has insisted on numerous occasions that his access to the president and his staff is "adequate," and that having to talk directly with the president would be "an indication that something is seriously wrong." On top of already pressing issues such as climate change, stem cells, and cloning, that have given Bush more than his share of grief, Marburger has stepped in to advise on topics largely unthought of prior to the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks. Yet, Neal Lane, science adviser under President Bill Clinton, says Marburger is well suited to the job, calling him a consensus builder. His record tells a similar story as Marburger twice defused potentially volatile situations on Long Island, NY. He mediated a battle between community advocates and state officials over the Shoreham nuclear power facility and helped clean up the Department of Energy's once poorly managed Brookhaven National Laboratory. Former New York Governor Mario Cuomo asked Marburger to head a fact-finding commission on Shoreham—the nuclear power plant that sparked quite a commotion but never a watt of electricity. David Sprintzen, who founded the Long Island Progressive Coalition in 1979 and often butted heads with those at local energy concerns, sat in on the commission. While giving Marburger high marks for his performance, Sprintzen says he played the part of scientific sidearm, "We always felt that his agenda was to provide information but to give the governor a certain cover so that the governor could inevitably do what he wanted to do." Marburger came to direct Brookhaven in 1998 after the former management was sacked for a number of environmental travesties, including a years-old tritium leak found to be contaminating groundwater.2 His open management style attracted praise as he created a community advisory council, opening communication between scientists and residents. "He had a tremendous sense of what was involved in relating to the community," says Sprintzen, "and what was involved in operating—as he called it—big science in the post cold war era when you could no longer hide behind secrecy of national defense and guaranteed money." Though Marburger has expressed favor for nuclear energy, his environmental record at Brookhaven could be seen to clash with the Bush administration's stances. James Tripp of Environmental Defense says, "He certainly cared a lot about the environment of the Brookhaven National Laboratory and the environmental resources of Long Island." But he adds that Marburger is a cool and objective scientist first, "He doesn't come across as a strong advocate for [a] position on any particular issue." The science adviser lists climate change among his top three priorities, along with balancing the science budgets and, of course, terrorism. "I'm really anxious that we take full advantage of the technical talent of the United States in the war against terrorism," says Marburger, who is developing ties between the National Academy of Sciences and a number of academic associations to funnel technical advice to the newly created Office of Homeland Security. Marburger says he likes the new office adorned with pictures of Bush, Vice President Dick Cheney, and a plastic model of the International Space Station, and likens the tenor of federal work to the multitask academic setting he became accustomed to as president of State University of New York, Stony Brook, from 1980 to 1994. "It's a very diverse job. There are things happening in real time," he says. "The people that I've met and had to deal with at the White House are result-oriented people who are here because they want to work as a team." And that emphasis on accountability, so closely associated with the Bush administration, is something Marburger hopes to instill in government-funded science. The administration wants the scientific community to show evidence of high performance at budget time. "[Although] language like that tends to be a little ominous to scientists, I happen to think that it's possible to have some way of telling whether your investment is paying off," Marburger says. Robert McGrath, physicist and provost at Stony Brook that helped instate Marburger as director of Brookhaven, points out, "The problem with making benchmarks in fundamental research is that the lag between when you're doing the work and when there may be some benefit is so long and so hard to track." But McGrath mentions the performance-based management contract Marburger worked under at Brookhaven as an example that it can be done. The desire to make science accountable emerges as Marburger talks about such pressing issues as stem cell research. "Right now the ball is in the science court," he says. Bush made the first move toward rapprochement, Marburger says, by allowing federal funding on 64 established stem cell lines. "He's established a path forward that permits this work to go ahead to a new stage.... There aren't any more policy questions at least for a while until science brings us to the next step." Brendan A. Maher can be reached at bmaher@the-scientist.com. References 1. B. Maher, "President picks science adviser." The Scientist, 15[14]:15, Aug. 9, 2001. 2. "Under new management," The Scientist, 12[1]:31, Jan. 5, 1998.

John H. Marburger III

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