Notebook

Swiss Cheers AAAS Takes A Stand NYAS Sits It Out All Together, Now New American Research Swiss Cheers The 1993 Rolex Awards for Enterprise--50,000 Swiss francs and a gold Rolex chronometer--were recently presented in Geneva to five researchers. Notable among the recipients is Forrest M. Mims III, who attracted considerable publicity a few years ago over his dismissal as a columnist for Scientific American because of his belief in creation (Forrest M. Mims III, The Scientist, Feb. 18, 1991, page 11). Mims, who wrote three installments of "The Amateur Scientist" column in 1990 before being removed from the job by Scientific American editor Jonathan Piel, was honored for devising TOPS (Total Ozone Portable Spectroradiometer), a hand- held ozone-monitoring device that he built for less than $500. Using TOPS, Mims found an error in NASA's ozone measurements. Mims says he feels his work is vindicated by the Rolex award: "I got the award for an instrument which was to be described in my fourth column for Scientific American," he says. Ironically, he says, the magazine's June 1993 issue contains an ad announcing the Rolex awards, including a picture of Mims holding a partially visible TOPS device: "My instrument finally made it into Scientific American." AAAS Takes A Stand Adding its name to the list of scientific societies that have condemned Colorado's Amendment 2--a change in the state constitution barring antidiscrimination laws against homosexuals- -the American Association for the Advancement of Science has decided to cancel plans to hold its 1999 annual meeting in Denver. AAAS spokeswoman Nan Broadbent says the Washington, D.C.- based group had not yet committed financially to the Denver site, so no money will be lost as a result of the decision. "I'm very pleased and proud that three societies I'm involved with took principal stands" against Amendment 2, says Joseph Birman, Distinguished Professor of Physics at City College of New York. Birman was a member of the AAAS Committee on Scientific Freedom and Responsibility that recommended the move to the association's board of directors. He is also 1993 chairman of the American Physical Society's Committee on International Freedom of Scientists and a member of the national board of the Committee of Concerned Scientists, each of which denounced the amendment. NYAS Sits It Out Not all scientific societies are coming out with resolutions denouncing Amendment 2, however. The New York Academy of Sciences' board of governors has tabled without prejudice a five- point resolution proposed by its Human Rights Committee that would have, among other things, prohibited NYAS cosponsorship of meetings in Colorado in protest of the amendment. Svetlana Stone, director of NYAS's human rights program, says that, nonetheless, NYAS will refrain from holding its own conferences in Colorado. The resolution was tabled, she says, because the mandate of the Human Rights Committee is "to take action when a particular scientist's position is jeopardized for one reason or another. When we have a complete example of an action which was taken against a scientist in Colorado, the Committee on Human Rights would act." All Together, Now Amgen Inc. of Thousand Oaks, Calif., and Genetics Institute Inc. of Cambridge, Mass., have resolved their epic patent battle involving erythropoietin. Genetics Institute has agreed to pay Amgen $14 million, thus resolving all disputes in the case, which dates to 1987. The gulf between the two sides was one of the issues dividing the Industrial Biotechnology Association and the Association of Biotechnology Companies, which have merged to form the Biotechnology Industry Organization (BIO). When the two associations first announced the merger, Genetics Institute executive vice president Garen G. Bohlin said his company would wait to see if "the new organization can provide a proper forum for us" before joining (Barbara Spector, The Scientist, Feb. 22, 1993, page 1). Since then, the Massachusetts company has decided to sign on to BIO, joining even before settlement of the patent case, Bohlin says: "On balance, it makes sense to be part of the organization." New American Research Twelve job-seeking scientists and engineers from the former Soviet Union recently demonstrated the breadth of their research accomplishments at the 38th annual meeting of the New Jersey Academy of Sciences. The program, held in early May on Rutgers University's Douglass Campus in New Brunswick, N.J., included presentations on such wide-ranging topics as "Magnetocaloric Effect in High-Tc Superconductors" by physicist Alexander Bykov, "Some New Methods of Refining and Stabilization of Natural Mineral Waters" by chemist Solomon Belenky, and "A New Approach to Finding a Global Optimum" by mathematician Alexander Bolonkin. The emigre presenters are members of the New York-based Association of Engineers and Scientists for New Americans (AES), a self-help group that aids immigrants in finding technical jobs. In an opening talk, AES president Peyrets Goldmacher explained that most AES members have earned not only the "candidat nauk" degree- -roughly equivalent to a Ph.D.--but also the "doctorat nauk," granted after years of work beyond the Ph.D. One of AES's goals, Goldmacher said, is to expose the emigres "to the professional milieu."

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