Panama Lab Overcomes Political Turmoil

A year ago, Ira Rubinoff was considering a gala celebration, with lots of media and top brass, to dedicate the Smithsonian Tropical Research Institute’s new $8 million laboratory in Panama City. Not any more. When the Earl S. Tupper Research and Conference Center finally opens its doors this winter, months behind schedule, the event will be decidely low-key. Given the increasingly tense political situation between the United States and Panama, Rubinoff isn’t eager to draw attention to the existence of a U.S. facility anywhere near the Canal Zone. It won’t be the first time that STRI has maintained a low profile. The oldest and one of the only laboratories devoted to the study of basic tropical biology, it’s been called one of the Smithsonian’s best-kept secrets. “If you’re a biologist, it’s where the action is,” says biologist Rubinoff, who has been STRI’s director since 1974. But its low visibility isn’t due entirely to its location. For too long, Rubinoff argues, the U.S. research community has ignored the tropics. That situation is changing rapidly, however, as concerns about global climate change and the loss of biodiversity have made even the most parochial scientists look toward the equator for answers. “If we had started a tropical biology initiative when we launched Voyager [in 1977], we wouldn’t be asking these damn foolish questions about whether a tree in North America is as good as one in the tropics for fixing carbon dioxide,” he says. “We need a dozen STRI is.” But now that policymakers are willing to listen, Rubinoff is caught in a difficult situation. On one hand, STRI is poised to step into the limelight as a premier institution for tropical research. Its scientists have collected and are collecting the long-term data that will help climate modelers understand the role of tropical forests. STRI itself is ready to expand, having built new facilities and modernized labs that date from World War II. It has hired a development officer to raise private funds, and it plans to base a scientist permanently in Washington to serve as its liaison to Congress and the executive branch. At the same time, Rubinoff is trying to safeguard the interests of individual scientists who may not want to stump in the name of conservation. He’s also wary of drawing too much attention to an institute with an annual budget of $15 million. Although STRI has privileged status as an international mission, it is still part of the Smithsonian and therefore still vulnerable to becoming a pawn in this increasingly intense test of wills between Gen. Manuel Antonio Noriega and the U.S. STRI’s roots go back to a different test of wills, this one between humanity and nature. Smithsonian scientists first arrived at the isthmus in the early part of the century to survey the plants and animals before the Panama Canal would forever divide the two continents. At the same time, scores of entomologists took up residence there to try to control malaria and yellow fever. They recognized that this place was a biological gold mine and worked to have Barro Colorado Island (BCI), the 13,000-acre island in the center of Lake Gatun in the canal, declared a biological reserve. STRI was born in 1946 when the Smithsonian took over the island. In 1977, as part of the Panama Canal Treaties, BQ was designated a “nature monument” under the 1940 Western Hemisphere Convention for the Protection of Natural Areas and Wildlife Preservation. And STRI was named its legal custodian through at least 1999. The five mainland peninsulas adjacent to BCI became a buffer zone. Over the years, the island has become the world’s most studied piece of tropical forest. Twenty years ago, biologists on BCI marked off 13 plots and mapped every tree more than an inch in diameter. They identified 300 species in the 64 acres under study; the island supports at least 1,000 more. Then in 1980, every woody plant more than 1 centimeter in diameter at breast height was plotted in a 50-acre “Tropical Forest Dynamics Plot” by Princeton ecologist Steven Hubbell and Robin Foster, who works at STRI and at the Field Museum in Chicago. About 250,000 plants were measured and identified, then resurveyed in 1985. Another count will be taken this winter. From these surveys, ecologists get a better handle on growth and death rates, distribution patterns, and new specimens. One scientist even thinks he’s figured out a way to determine relatedness among trees. On BCI, where there’s space for 35 scientists, investigators knew to book a spot well in advance. The island is a mecca for tropical biologists. “You are in a tropical forest, and yet you have all the equipment of a modern university,” says Lynn Kirnsey, associate professor of entomology at the University of California, Davis. Even without the latest equipment, the forest itself would be enough to attract many scientists. “The sights, the smells, the place is so totally different than anyplace ” says John Lighton, adjunct assistant professor at UCLA. “It’s like a very fine balance between hedonism and monasticism.” The group revels in the biological diversity and complexity, breaking its isolation only for two, 30-minute boat rides into town. One is for a weekly seminar on Tuesday, the other a Friday afternoon trip for football, drinking, and dancing. On most evenings scientists gather in the lounge to chat and observe the life and death struggles of the insects underfoot. Through the years STRI has expanded both in facilities and personnel. Now 26 scientists strong, the research staff work at marine labs on both the Atlantic and Pacific oceans and in Panama City as well as on BCI. STRI sponsors about two dozen graduate students and postdoctoral fellows, hosts about 200 - short-term visitors frorn 22 countries each year, and runs programs for Panamanian students and scientists. Its science is increasingly more sophisticated. The Tupper Center and the Naos Marine Lab are full of expensive machinery, tools that are far removed from the pad and pencil of early STRI scientists. In the past few years, STRI has added molecular evolution and high-tech studies of plant physiology to its portfolio. The Tupper center, built with $4 million from the inventor of Tupperware as part of his long-time interest in STRI’s work, has lab space for 12 permanent scientists and 24 visitors, an animal care facility, and a 176-seat auditorium. The STRI library, with 35,000 volumes and 1 ,000 journals, plus on-line connections to the Smithsonian’s central library in Washington, D.C., and Dialog, an electronic bibliography, is one of the best resources in the tropics. BCI is also getting new buildings. “As a research facility, it is unsurpassed,” says Kimsey. Through all the political turmoil, STRI has worked to maintain its role as a neutral, international mission. Yet, because it is a major institution in the canal area, its leaders have developed strong connections with Panama’s power brokers. “STRI married into the Panamanian oligarchy years ago,” says Robert Srygley, a graduate student at the University of Texas. Several STRI administrators, including executive officer Leonor Motta, come from prominent Panamanian families. Although Rubinoff declined to discuss relations between STRI and the host government, other scientists at STRI were more forthcoming. “Ira [Rubinoff] is quite well-connected in terms of the politicians in Panama,” says Don Feener, an assistant professor of biology at the University of Utah. “There are a lot of wheels that are nicely oiled.” Part of the reason the machinery has worked so smoothly is that Gen. Noriega has not interfered. For example, the road to Noriega’s coastal compound also leads to the Naos lab and a beach. While the beach and road have been closed off, Smithsonian staff still travel freely. In fact, say some scientists, STRI is something of an oasis for Americans. “A lot of times what we read in the U.S. is somewhat inflammatory in terms of the safety there,’ says Feener. “People [on the island] don’t seem overly concerned.” What worries the scientists more are the actions of the U.S. government. In September, the U.S. government broke off diplomatic relations with Panama. It refused to allow U.S. Ambassador Arthur Davis to return to his post after he was recalled in May to protest the nullification of the elections. It has banned the payment of taxes and other revenue to the Panamanian government, and it has frozen some $300 million in Panamanian assets in the U.S. The recent coup attempt has only exacerbated U.S. angst about that country and vice versa. “There’s rumors going around that all U.S. citizens will be ordered to leave,” says Richard Condit, a forest biology researcher from Princeton University. “It would be a disaster.” The incendiary relationship between the two nations has already begun to burn researchers. For example, Texas A&M blocked funds usually available to Weldon for travel after the U.S. government posted a traveler’s advisory for Panama. And the chief complaint from NSF reviewers about Weldon’s latest grant proposal was that he wanted to do the work there. “They didn’t think the timing was rght,” he says. In fact, Weldon says he’s so discouraged that he may abandon several years’ worth of work at Naos on sea snakes and instead begin a project in Costa Rica. But U.S. paranoia isn’t the only threat to STRI Economic sanctions and poverty also darken its future. The worsening economy has accelerated deforestation and has resulted in increased poaching for meat inside the canal area, even within the nature monument. Already STRI employs “guardia” who patrol the island waters for poachers. And there is even concern that the tranquility of BCI may be disturbed. Rumors persist that one day BCI may be converted into a gambling resort. But so far, STRI has escaped unscathed. And Rubinoff sees the upcoming dedication of the Tupper Center as a sign of continued good health for STRI. “Nobody has been stopped or bothered,” says Rubinoff about the current state of relations. “I would say that the government of Panama has been as sympathetic, if not more so, than even our government. They recognize that the work can’t be interrupted.”

Panama Lab Overcomes Political Turmoil

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