People: Harvard Researcher Named As BBRI Director; Science Chief Takes Over NASA's 'Mission To Planet Earth' Project

Kathleen G. Morgan, a professor of physiology in medicine at Harvard Medical School's cardiovascular division at Beth Israel Hospital, Boston, has been named the new director of the Boston Biomedical Research Institute (BBRI), effective Jan. 1, 1995. BBRI is an independent, nonprofit institute whose mission is to learn more about the natural world through basic biological research. The 25-year-old organization has about 20 principal investigators, funded by competitive grants from the National Institutes of Health and other agencies and organizations. The staff includes senior scientists Chih-Lueh A. Wang, working on a $6 million NIH program project grant to study smooth muscle regulation, and Sherwin S. Lehrer, who has a $1.5 million NIH research grant to investigate muscle biochemistry. In addition, there is a support staff of technicians, postdoctoral fellows, and students. BBRI "is one of the best-kept secrets in Boston," says Morgan, adding that her priority as director will be to "improve its visibility." in the area. One way she plans to achieve this goal is by increasing "the collaborative interaction with Boston's medical community." Morgan also hopes to enhance the research in BBRI's main areas of interest: muscle contraction, cell communication, and cell growth. Her own interest, she says, is studying smooth muscle (for example, the involuntary muscles that line the digestive tract) function at the subcellular level. This a particularly fascinating problem, she says, since "no one really knows how these muscles actually contract." Morgan, 53, graduated with a B.S. in chemistry from the College of Mount St. Joseph in Cincinnati in 1962, and a doctoral degree in pharmacology from the University of Cincinnati College of Medicine in 1976. She has been at Harvard since 1983, and will maintain her current position during her five-year directorship. In addition to the directorship, Morgan was appointed to the position of Amelia Peabody Senior Scientist at BBRI, which is the equivalent of an endowed chair at the institute. Robert Harriss, a professor of earth sciences from the University of New Hampshire, Durham, has been appointed head of the science division of the National Aeronautics and Space Administration's (NASA) Mission to Planet Earth in Washington, D.C. He began his term September 1. With a current budget of about $7.25 billion for its first four years, Mission to Planet Earth is the world's largest nonmilitary scientific project. The aim of the initiative is to increase science's understanding of the global changes occurring in the Earth's life-support systems by monitoring such indicators as climate change and vegetation around the globe. A major component of the mission is NASA's Earth Observation System (EOS), which Harriss describes as "a long-term program to develop and launch a family of satellites to observe [global] climate change and its consequences on the biosphere." EOS, currently in the planning phase, is expected to send up more than 17 satellites over the course of 15 years. The first one, called the Tropical Rainfall Measurement Mission (TRMM) satellite, will be launched in 1997, followed by three more in 1998. In addition to EOS, the Mission to Planet Earth consists of a research and analysis program, which funds studies at various universities, and currently supports about 1,500 grants chosen by a peer-reviewed proposal process. "[This program] is the means by which we take the data and know what it means," says Harriss, who considers this component as the Rintellectual capital" for the program. "The projects include all aspects of earth systems science--not only climate and ecosystem studies, but also solid earth studies like biogeochemistry and geodynamics." As the new head of the science division, Harriss wants to emphasize the importance of a multidisciplinary approach to studying earth systems, and to highlight the relevance of the environment as a security issue. "The security of this planet depends on environmental stability and economic improvement for all its people," he says. "Unless we understand Earth as an integrated system we cannot do that." "I believe that [this] program can be a solution to the efficient use of our global resource base," he adds. Another priority for Harriss will be to diversify the demographic mix of earth scientists supported by NASA and enhance opportunities for women and minorities in the earth sciences. "Right now I am studying [National Science Foundation and National Institutes of Health] programs with similar objectives," he says. "Eventually, I hope to have a special program--peer-reviewed, as all of our programs are-- to attract young women and minority investigators." Harriss, 53, received a Ph.D. in geochemistry from Houston's Rice University in 1965. In a varied career spanning more than 25 years he has taught geochemistry, oceanography, and resource management at several institutions in the United States. He served as a senior scientist at the atmospheric science division of NASA's Langley Research Center, Hampton, Va., for more than 10 years. From 1988 until his current appointment he had been at the Institute for the Study of Earth, Oceans, and Space at New Hampshire, where he helped develop a program on global research stressing environmental-policy implications.

People: Harvard Researcher Named As BBRI Director; Science Chief Takes Over NASA's 'Mission To Planet Earth' Project

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