National Lab Briefs

The Department of Energy and the University of California have gone on the offensive to head off an effort by antinuclear activists to end a 45-year relationship between the state university and the nation's nuclear weapons laboratories. DOE, in an attempt to appease university faculty who are unhappy with the labs, has added $5 million to the system's current five-year contract to operate Lawrence Livermore and Los Alamos national labs, with the money going to non-nuclear research and a campus-based program in peace studies. And the UC system, under pressure from the state legislature, is getting ready to appoint three overseers from among a pool of current and past lab employees to watch for flawed or distorted research. UC officials hope the moves will placate critics and convince the university's Board of Regents, which must decide next year, to continue UC oversight of the labs. But opponents say the moves don't go far enough. UC faculty members are incensed that their governing body will have no say in the selection of the overseers. And Ray Kidder, a Livermore physicist who has criticized Edward Teller's optimistic predictions about SDI, dismisses the new in-house oversight panel as a case of "the fox watching the chickens." For his part, outgoing Energy Secretary John Herrington has opposed the need for additional oversight, calling the idea an attempt "to cripple the labs." The true test of an advisory panel is snaring scientists on the cutting edge of the field under scrutiny. So chalk up a victory for a new committee on computer security formed by the National Institute of Standards and Technology. One of its members is Robert Morris Sr., whose son, Robert Jr., is the Cornell University hacker whose "virus" brought hundreds of computers across the country to a standstill one weekend in November. NIST officials deny any clairvoyance, however; they say the panelists were selected in October and that Morris was chosen because of his job as chief scientist at the National Security Agency. Asked if his recent experiences might be useful to the panel, Morris notes cryptically that "all experiences give new insight." NIST program manager Shirley Radick says the panel will address a number of computer security and privacy issues, potentially including the subject of hackers and viruses. After years in the doldrums, the area of high magnetic field research may finally get a boost. NSF has proposed a new $185 million magnetic field laboratory that would use powerful magnets to explore blood flow and other basic biological functions. The foundation's proposed 1990 budget contains $25 million for the facility, with $16 million to $20 million in subsequent years. NSF foresees paying half of the total cost, with the rest coming from industry and other government agencies such as NIH. The new lab is expected to become the leading site in the country for research in this area, says Cornell's Robert Richardson, chairman of the panel that recommended a new lab. One of the leading contenders for the new center is the existing Francis Bitter Lab at MIT, which, despite cutbacks, still holds a world record for the highest steady magnetic field. NSF currently provides Bitter with $6 million annually for equipment and operations, but has funded little actual research there in the last four years. But the MIT lab faces competition from the University of Texas and a consortium made up of the Argonne National Lab, Northwestern University, and the University of Illinois. And a decision favoring one of these sites would likely signal the end of NSF support for the Bitter lab.

National Lab Briefs

The Scientist Staff

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