February 1995

After 22 years at the National Cancer Institute (NCI) the last six as director Samuel Broder will retire in April to become chief scientific officer at IVAX Corp., a Miami-based pharmaceutical company, at a salary reported to be about twice his current pay of $120,000. There is more than money behind Broder's December decision to leave, however. His is a portrait of a scientist frustrated with the politics of government service and increasingly estranged from scientific colleagues, cancer patie

Questions remain about the low-key director's handling of clinical research, Congress, and scientific misconduct Not yet two years into his tenure as head of the National Institutes of Health, Harold E. Varmus is getting high marks from many scientists for his low-key, but thorough efforts to rejuvenate the agency's biomedical research effort. Initiatives to sharpen the basic science being done on campus and to streamline the peer review of proposals from outside researchers are bringing new

A marketing partnership between the Arthritis Foundation and McNeil Products stirs controversy among rheumatologists Last fall, the Arthritis Foundation, Atlanta, and Fort Washington, Pa.-based McNeil Consumer Products Co.--a Johnson and Johnson Inc.-affiliated pharmaceutical firm best known for producing Tylenol--teamed up to market a line of nonprescription analgesics called Arthritis Foundation Pain Relievers. According to foundation officials, a minimum of $1 million from sales of the pr

National Science Foundation officials have set an ambitious goal for the agency and the scientific community--to make women an equal part of the United States scientific work force by the turn of the century. For its role in the effort, NSF has appropriated $7 million in each of the last two fiscal years, toward expanding its programs to train, encourage, and retain women in science. The funding figures, which officials hope to maintain in the current budget process, represent a 200 percent in

The 1994 Bower Award and Prize in Science--the most lucrative United States science prize--will be presented in May to Chen Ning Yang, a Nobel Prize-winning theoretical physicist. The $250,000 award is bestowed annually by Philadelphia's Franklin Institute to a "distinguished scientist for outstanding work in the life or physical sciences." Yang is being honored for his work in forming the Yang-Mills theory, which is widely held by physicists to be as basic a contribution to science as Albert

Denis B. McWhan, Chairman of Synchrotron Light Source Assumes Associate Directorship at BNL Academic Psychologist and Health Policy Analyst, Terrie T. Wetle, New Deputy Chief Of National Institute of Aging Obituary -- Bernard Nathan Fields Denis B. McWhan, who served as the chairman of the Brookhaven National Laboratory (BNL) National Synchrotron Light Source (NSLS) since 1990, assumed the position of associate director for basic energy sciences at the Upton, N.Y., laboratory on January 1.

Table of Contents New Medium, Same Message Cybermanners Dead Sea Detectives Presidents With Disabilities Holiday Cheer The late media maven Marshall McLuhan has arrived in virtual form on the Internet as Project McLuhan. The project's aim, according to Nelson Thall, president of the Marshall McLuhan Center for Global Communications, Ontario, Canada, is to revitalize and update McLuhan's work to take advantage of and address the communications power of the tens of millions of interlinked com

As the new Republican majority takes its place in Congress, we're beginning to see a fundamental questioning of a wide range of basic assumptions about how our government works. For example, I anticipate a serious examination of exactly what taxpayers should expect from the "technical experts"--scientists and engineers--whose research they fund. So, as one of those engineers, I propose that we must be prepared for that examination with a clear and honest account of our reasons for expecting su

There has been much ado about fraud in science, and even more misunderstanding about its eventual importance in the efficient conduct of science, and our ability to police it. A report on a survey by Judith Swayze was headlined in the New York Times "... the myth that fraud in science is a rarity" (L.K. Altman, Nov. 23, 1993, page C3). In fact, as the text of the story took pains to emphasize, the study found that a majority of interviewees had heard of an example--in other words, that some fra

A longtime reader and periodic contributor to a "fast-track" journal the past 21 years and an editorial board member thereof the past nine years, I read with considerable interest the article "Journals Feel Pressure To Speed The Publishing Process" (R. Lewis, The Scientist, Sept. 19, 1994, page 21), but found no mention of the journal Medical Science Research (MSR). Launched in 1973 by ier Science Publishers (Amsterdam), initially under the title IRCS Medical Science and currently published by

About the pros and cons of destroying the world's last remaining stocks of smallpox virus [K.Y. Kreeger, The Scientist, Nov. 14, 1994, page 1]: It is amusing that the advocates of preserving the virus imply that only virologists can appreciate the value of saving it. I submit that the issue of the likelihood that terrorists or criminals could obtain the virus is one that falls into the province of historians, not virologists. The deliberate release of the smallpox virus is likely to be devast

Science Research Date: February 20, 1995, pp.14 Editor's Note: Along with such familiar rankings of United States universities published in U.S. News & World Report and the Chronicle of Higher Education, which are based in part on funding levels and alumni surveys, provosts and presidents can gauge how their faculty's research stacks up against the competition by examining citation information. Using University Science Indicators on Diskette, a new database from the Philadelphia-based Institu

Y. Chen, A. Mestek, J. Liu, J.A. Hurley, L. Yu, "Molecular cloning and functional expression of a f opioid receptor from rat brain," Molecular Pharmacology, 44:8-12, 1993. (Cited in 81 publications through December 1994) Comments by Lei Yu,Indiana University School of Medicine This description of the genetic sequence of the molecular receptor for "morphine-like drugs" marks the end of a 20-year quest, according to Lei Yu, a professor of medical and molecular genetics at the Indiana University

Y. Ionov, M.A. Peinado, S. Malk-hosyan, D. Shibata, M. Perucho, "Ubiquitous somatic mutations in simple repeated sequences reveal a new mechanism for colonic carcinogenesis," Nature, 363:558-61, 1993. (Cited in 108 publications through December 1994) Comments by Manuel Perucho,California Institute of Biological Research This paper represents the seminal discovery by a research team from the California Institute of Biological Research in La Jolla of an instability in simple repeated sequences o

M. Radmacher, R.W. Tillmann, H.E. Gaub, "Imaging viscoelasticity by force modulation with the atomic force microscope," Biophysical Journal, 64:735-42, 1993. (Cited in22 publications through December 1994) Comments by Manfred Radmacher,University of California, Santa Barbara The development of such high-resolution visualization instruments as the atomic force microscope (AFM) has played an important role in the study of cellular and macromolecular structures, notes biophysicist Manfred Radmac

Ordinary tap water contains a variety of impurities, including dissolved organics, inorganics, and gases; suspended particles; numerous microorganisms; and pyrogens, or endotoxins--the byproducts of bacterial degredation. Although the actual types and amounts of contaminants often vary with geographic location, seasonal cycles, and other factors, they are all considered by researchers to be detrimental to life-sciences investigations and must be eliminated. Six basic water-purification technol

Occupying 30 percent less bench space than the AE models they replaced, Mettler-Toledo's new AG series of analytical balances feature a higher, hexagonal draft shield to accommodate larger weighing vessels and provide greater access to the weighing pan, the company reports. As the draft shield doors are opened, they disappear into the back wall of the weighing chamber. Four models are available with a weighing range of up to 210 grams. Model AG245 offers a semimicro range in the first 41 grams

Average salaries paid to pharmaceutical researchers working in industry, academia, and government rose only slightly in 1993, according to a newly released survey from the American Association of Pharmaceutical Scientists (AAPS), an Alexandria, Va., professional organization. AAPS officials, as well as scientists in the field, attribute the modest increase to concerns over health-care reform. While such fears may have abated somewhat with the Republican takeover of Congress, salaries continue