Watson Departure Vexes Genome Experts

They fear that funding support for their vast gene-mapping project could erode now that the Nobelist is leaving While the head of the nation's premier health agency may not be losing sleep over the resignation of James Watson as head of the Human Genome Project (HGP), many genetic researchers are distressed to see him go. Genome scientists interviewed for this article say it will be difficult for the National Institutes of Health, via its search committee, to find someone with the same drive, vision, and scientific stature--which, they generally agree, translates into an ongoing ability to obtain high-priority funding from Congress. Preceding the resignation was well-publicized friction between the Nobel Prize-winning Watson--noted both for his achievement in identifying the double helix structure of DNA and for his outspokenness--and NIH director Bernadine Healy. Recently Watson lashed out at Healy over her support of NIH's pursuit of patents on partial DNA sequences, known as expressed sequence tags. Watson and many other genome scientists feel these patent applications will inhibit international collaborations and could stimulate a gene patent race (The Scientist, April 27, 1992, page 1). Watson, who was not available for comment at press time, said in an April 10 statement that he feels the ambitious genome project is mature enough to continue without him. And in an apparent reference to strained relations with the NIH director, he said, "My resignation at this time provides Dr. Healy, the current director of NIH, the opportunity to appoint her own director for the project." Watson had been director of the project since its official launch in October 1989; Healy became NIH director in April 1991. Paul Berg, a Stanford University molecular biologist who chairs the NIH advisory committee on the HGP, says the reasons for Watson's departure are not mysterious or complicated. He suffered under the stress of being overextended, Berg says, given his simultaneous directorship of Cold Spring Harbor Laboratory, on Long Island, N.Y. (a position he will continue to hold), and of his being in conflict with Healy. "It's clear there was not a good rapport between them," says Berg, and Watson's undiplomatic public statement that the gene patents filing was "sheer lunacy" did little to bridge the gap between them. According to Berg, Watson's departure in April was not unexpected. Berg says that at the January meeting of the genome advisory board, Watson made it clear that he would be stepping down as director within the year. In the wake of the departure, Healy called a May 4 news conference to reassure the scientific community of her continued support for the Human Genome Project. "This is one of the jewels in the crown of the NIH," she said. The goal of the project is to sequence all of the genes contained in human chromosomes by the beginning of the next century. Healy also said at the news conference that Watson's departure had not engendered much "angst" at NIH, and she announced that a search committee of distinguished scientists had been empaneled to find and recommend a new director for the HGP. While Healy may be angst-free over the Watson departure, many genome researchers are not. "I think his leaving is tragic, to say the least," says Glen Evans, a molecular geneticist involved in mapping of chromosome 11 at the Salk Institute in San Diego. "Without his support and vision, the project wouldn't be going today." Helen Donis-Keller, a geneticist at Washington University in St. Louis, says, "My concern is: Who will NIH find to replace James Watson, who was such a unique individual and very effective in the job? He was the kind of person who always had his finger on the pulse of what makes sense in science." Donis-Keller describes Watson as "brilliant and eccentric" and says that, despite his opinionated manner, he listens to the ideas of other scientists and is willing to modify his viewpoint based on this listening. "I don't know who's going to defend and support genome research now," she says. Leonard Lerman, a molecular biologist at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, says, "The change in leadership is unfortunate. Watson brought a lot to the project." In the interim, Healy has appointed Michael Gottesman, chief of the Laboratory of Cell Biology at the National Cancer Institute, as acting director of the HGP, with the Watson-appointed staff remaining on the job. Evans says Gottesman is an appropriate choice for the transition, since he is well regarded in his field. Moreover, because he is an outsider to the genome project, his appointment won't be perceived as setting a new agenda for the project. The search committee, which NIH says will have up to six months to identify a replacement for Watson, is, for the most part, a "five-star" list of scientists, according to both Evans and Berg. Included are Phillip Sharp, director of the MIT's Center for Cancer Research; Maxine Singer, president of the Carnegie Institution in Washington, D.C.; geneticist Maynard Olson of the Washington University School of Medicine in St. Louis; Nancy Wexler, president of the Hereditary Disease Foundation in New York; and Princeton University biologist Shirley Tilghman. The remainder of the 14 positions on the committee are occupied by ranking NIH division directors. Healy believes the search committee should have no trouble attracting top players as candidates for the director's position. "This is a great job," she said at the news conference. But Donis-Keller, for one, does not paint a rosy picture of the genome project director's job: "The pay's lousy, everybody hates you, and it's hard work." Berg, who has been widely mentioned as a possible successor to Watson, says, "I'm not a live candidate." The problem faced, he says, is finding someone of "impeccable scientific standards," who can also be a forceful advocate of the project. There are two other difficulties, he notes, that prevent him and will prevent other qualified candidates from considering the job--the new director would have to drop all research activities and would probably have to move to Washington, D.C. The stakes are high in the search for a Watson successor. If NIH is unable to find the ideal director with all the requisite qualities that Watson seems to embody, the Human Genome Project could suffer in future funding battles, says Berg: "If we get a weak sister who nobody respects enough, [the HGP] will have a hard time."

Watson Departure Vexes Genome Experts

Interested in reading more?

Become a Member of