Notebook

New Interest in Nubia The Right Stuff The Next Best Thing To Being There Thanks, But No Thanks Disaster Education Collaborative Measures Don't Bring Marshmallows The University of Pennsylvania's University Museum of Archaeology and Anthropology's newest exhibition is a collection of artifacts from ancient Nubia, an African civilization that thrived from 3100 B.C. to 400 A.D. and was Egypt's political rival. The exhibit, which opened October 10 and runs to Oct. 3, 1993, has become the most sought-after traveling exhibition the museum has ever produced, according to curator David O'Connor. The reason for the popularity, said O'Connor at a preview of the exhibit last month, is the "growing interest among the public as a whole in early African civilization." Another factor contributing to the interest, according to museum director Robert Dyson, is the exhibit's small scale. "The public enjoys an exhibit that isn't too big," Dyson said at the preview, adding that going through a large-scale show can be an overwhelming experience, "like going through all the churches in England in one trip." Mathematician Blagovest Sendov, president of the Bulgarian Academy of Sciences and former rector of Sofia University, was recently in Philadelphia to serve on the committee that selected the recipient of the Bower Award in Science (Scott Veggeberg, The Scientist, Oct. 26, 1992, page 4). But last December, Sendov was running for president of Bulgaria. Nominated by 5,000 Bulgarians who signed a petition on his behalf, Sendov came in fourth out of a slate of 23 candidates. "Once you get to second," quipped Sendov about the Bulgarian presidential candidates at a September luncheon meeting of the Bower selection committee, "they're all the same." NASA researchers will be visiting the bottom of an ice-covered Antarctic lake via a technology called "telepresence." The scientists will be donning video headsets that let them use head movements to point the camera on a mini-submarine as it samples the chemical and biological composition of Lake Hoare on Ross Island. "Antarctica is the most Mars-like environment on Earth," says expedition leader Carol Stoker. It's been about four months since the conclusion of the Earth Summit in Rio de Janiero, Brazil. And Martin Holdgate, director of the World Conservation Union in Switzerland, has a ready response to the question of whether there should be another such meeting in 20 years. "I hope not," he says. "Not because I think Rio was a failure--I think it was a considerable partial success- -but because I wonder whether so vast a gathering is the right way to address these fundamental issues. A spectacular summit every 20 years is useless unless the intervening years are well used." The National Research Council is starting a new education program in conjunction with the International Decade for Natural Disaster Reduction, established by a United Nations resolution in 1990. The program--which began on October 14, the third annual International Day for Natural Disaster Reduction--involves 10 elementary schools from across the United States. Teachers and experts instruct students about the reactions and warning signs associated with natural disasters through school assemblies and classroom lessons specifically tailored to help them learn good coping skills. Scientists in the republics that constituted the former Soviet Union will be getting some help. The Fogarty International Center of the National Institutes of Health, located in Bethesda, Md., will award up to $20,000 a year for a maximum of three years to facilitate collaborative research in AIDS, cancer, and genetic- based diseases among U.S. researchers and those in the former Soviet states, as well as Eastern Europe and Latin America. Since the program was first announced this year, 130 applications have been received for 42 grants--16 for collaboration with former Soviet scientists. One successful joint project is that between Fred Sherman, chairman of the biochemistry department at the University of Rochester School of Medicine in New York, and Michael TerAvanesyan at the Cardiology Research Center in Moscow; the pair are investigating genetic mutations. For information, contact the International Research and Awards Branch, Fogarty International Center, NIH, Building 31, Room B2C39, Bethesda, Md. 20892; (301) 496-1653. Canoeing, bonfires, and arts and crafts are the usual mainstays of summer camp. But not when the National Science Foundation is providing the funding. Organizations and institutions from around the U.S. have become part of NSF's Summer Science Camps Program. The foundation is awarding a total of $1.98 million for the summer of 1993, the first year of these three-year grants. The camps target students in grades 7 to 9 and offer activities designed to give hands-on experience with science. For example, New York City's Science Skills Center Summer Science Camp takes 75 African American and Hispanic students on field trips to museums and research facilities. For information, contact Wanda Ward at NSF, (202) 357-7461.

Notebook

The Scientist Staff

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