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Yale's Leon Rosenberg Moves To Industry After Fruitful 25-Year Career In AcademiaTexas' McDonald Observatory Leader Awarded NASA's Public Service MedalBristol-Myers Squibb Co. of New York has appointed Leon E. Rosenberg, formerly C.N.H. Long Professor of Genetics at Yale University and dean of Yale's School of Medicine, as president of the Bristol-Myers Squibb Pharmaceutical Research Institute. His appointment became effective yesterday.Rosenberg, who never worked in industry before joining Bristol-Myers Squibb, says that the opportunity "came very much out of the blue--there was no plan for me to leave Yale to go anywhere." The 58-year-old former dean says he decided to take the job because "I found myself fascinated by the challenge and by the change in perspective. It's an opportunity to climb one more big hill."At Yale, Rosenberg's research focused on inherited metabolic disorders in children. His group discovered that children with a potentially lethal disorder of organic acid metabolism suffer from defective metabolism of vitamin B-12 (Biochem. Biophys. Res. Commun., 37:607, 1969; 44:375, 1971; Pediatrics, 26:497, 1970). They also have elucidated the basic mechanism by which proteins synthesized in the cytoplasm are transported into mitochondria. Although he had successfully managed to balance the demands of maintaining a research program with those of academic administration (The Scientist, Sept. 3, 1990, page 1), Rosenberg says he will be giving up his research program to devote all his time to his new position: "That was one of the things that made this decision hardest for me." To compensate, the former dean says he intends to formalize a consultation arrangement with Yale scientists.Rosenberg says that, while he learns the ropes at his new firm, "my first priority will be to listen to a number of experienced, intelligent people in the company and to say very little. That will represent a significant change for me." He notes that he sees similarities between his new and old positions: "What Bristol-Myers Squibb wants from the Pharmaceutical Research Institute is for it to be second to none. That doesn't sound like a different challenge than I've always taken up in my academic life."Rosenberg joined the Yale faculty in 1965 as assistant professor of medicine. In 1968, he was named associate professor of pediatrics and medicine and chief of the division of medical genetics. In 1972, he became professor of human genetics, pediatrics, and medicine; that year, he helped establish the department of human genetics and became its first chairman. He was named C.N.H. Long Professor and medical school dean in 1980 and 1984, respectively.Rosenberg received his B.A. in 1954 and his M.D. in 1957 from the University of Wisconsin, Madison. He was an intern and assistant resident at Columbia-Presbyterian Medical Center in New York and was a senior resident at Yale-New Haven Hospital. From 1959 to 1965 he was an investigator with the metabolism service of the National Cancer Institute. He is a member of the National Academy of Sciences and the Institute of Medicine. --Barbara SpectorHarlan Smith, director of the Mc-Donald Observatory at the University of Texas in Austin for more than 25 years, has been awarded NASA's Distinguished Public Service Medal. Smith was presented with the medal in a ceremony on July 17.When Smith joined the university in 1963 as director of the observatory and chairman of the department of astronomy, the observatory was in serious need of refurbishing and the department had only four faculty members. Smith says that he agreed to join UT-Austin only if the university agreed to certain conditions. These included funding major renovations at the observatory, supporting the construction of a larger telescope (an 82-inch telescope had been built in 1938), and fostering the growth of the department.Over the years, Smith says, "they've overfulfilled the goal in all of these." In 1965, a 107-inch telescope was built. The department, with 24 faculty members, is now the largest in the United States. This fall, the university is expected to begin construction of the Spectroscopic Survey Telescope (SST), a 400-inch telescope that will be the second largest in the world. Unlike conventional telescopes, which form images of objects in the universe, this scope will be dedicated solely to spectroscopic analysis. This limitation, says Smith, along with other modifications, means that at $10 million, the cost of the SST will be only 10 percent of the price of a comparable, conventional scope.Smith traces his love of astronomy to his early childhood. When he was about six years old, around 1930, Smith recalls, he got up every morning to listen to "Buck Rogers in the 21st Century," his favorite radio program. "I'm sure that was the initial thing that steered me toward space," he says. Smith says his true mentor, however, was Harvard University astronomer Fred Whipple, for whom Smith worked as an undergraduate at Harvard. Smith earned his Ph.D. in astronomy at Harvard in 1955, and joined the faculty of Yale University, where he remained until moving to Texas.Smith retired as director of the McDonald Observatory in 1989, but remains at the university as the Edward Randall Jr. Centennial Professor of Astronomy. Over the last five years, the bulk of his work has been directed toward space exploration.Smith's current pet project is the establishment of a moonbase. "There are things that are doable from nowhere " he says. However, while some people believe it is possible to set up a base on Mars within the next decade, Smith strongly disagrees. "It will be a terrible risk for the first astronauts who go to Mars." --Rebecca Andrews

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Yale's Leon Rosenberg Moves To Industry After Fruitful 25-Year Career In Academia; Texas' McDonald Observatory Leader Awarded NASA's Public Service Medal

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