PHYSICS: Will Livermore Laser Ever Burn Brightly?

The National Ignition Facility (NIF), a superlaser being built here at Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory in an effort to use lasers rather than nuclear explosions to create a fusion reaction, is supposed to allow weapons makers to preserve the nuclear arsenal--and do nifty fusion science, too. But a new report that examines its troubled past also casts doubt on its future. Even some of NIF's scientific and political allies are beginning to talk openly of a scaled-down version of the original 192-laser design.     

Legal threat, cold delay UC experiment

A controversial University of California, Berkeley, experiment that would have released genetically engineered organisms into the environment has been postponed. Although Steven Lindow and his colleagues received approval for field tests from the National Institutes of Health's Recombinant DNA Advisory Committee, environmental activist Jeremy Rifkin filed suit against NIH, claiming its action violated the National Environmental Policy Act. With one suit pending and another threatened, the decision was made to postpone the tests until spring 1984. The outcome of the Rifkin suit will have an impact on other genetic research with ecological implications.     

Correction

In a list of the world's 10 most-cited scientists (Science, 4 October, p. 28), the name of biologist Robert Tjian was spelled wrong, and his institution was misidentified. Tjian is a Howard Hughes Medical Institute investigator at the University of California at Berkeley. We regret the errors.     

Army agrees to new study of biowarfare laboratory

As a result of a lawsuit initiated by Washington activist Jeremy Rifkin and joined by the attorney general for the state of Utah, the U.S. Army has agreed to defer construction, pending a study of potential environmental hazards, of a new laboratory that was authorized by a small number of Congressmen under an unusual procedure in December 1984. The laboratory, intended for tests of highly infectious and lethal biological aerosols, has aroused controversy because of fears that the data gathered there might be used to develop offensive biological weapons.     

Uranium power and horizontal proliferation of nuclear weapons

Only a few nonnuclear weapons states with uranium-fueled power plants have kept the weapons option open, and none has evidenced activities intended for diverting fissionable material from its civilian system. Analysis of alternative strategies shows that acquisition of nuclear weapons material would probably depend on military production facilities rather than diversion. Horizontal proliferation is primarily a political issue and is related only marginally to uranium power development. Restrictions of the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Act on the supply of equipment and fuel by the United States appear to have induced, in some nonnuclear weapons states, the building of small-scale facilities that can be modified for production of weapons material. More attention should be given to the international political, economic, and military factors that persuade such states to abjure nuclear weapons.     

Erratum

In the article " ;Nuclear winter' from Gulf war discounted," by Eliot Marshall (News & Comment, 25 Jan., p. 372), Tica Novakov's affiliation should have been given as the Lawrence Berkeley Laboratory, not the Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory. The concentrations of airborne soot reported at various locations should have been given as follows: for greater Los Angeles (summer), a daily average of 5 micrograms per cubic meter; Beijing (winter), a monthly average of 50 micrograms per cubic meter; Yugoslavia (winter), a daily average of 60 micrograms; and London (1-day winter peak in 1952), 750 micrograms, now reduced to less than 15 micrograms.     

原核生物现代分类学的主要遗传标记

细菌分类学产生以来,其分类方法经历了多次改变.传统上的细菌分类方法在现代细菌分类学家眼中除了它们的历史价值外就再无其它东西了.对新颖技术特别是核酸的不断了解,发展了更为有效的细菌分类方法,如:DNA阵列,16S rRNA基因分析法等等,它们能彻底解决传统分类法不能解决的问题.这些分类方法必将在原核生物现代分类中扮演举足轻重的角色.     

The killing fields: Science and politics at Berkeley, California, USA

Over the past several decades, a group of scholars at the Berkeley campus of the University of California have frequently challenged many of the dominant themes of contemporary agricultural research. In their work, they have organized curricula questioning the assumptions of conventional agriculture and its sciences while encouraging the development of alternative agricultural practices based on principles of ecology. Their collective critique has stimulated an intellectual climate calling forth a scrutiny of the university's role in the production of knowledge and the social consequences of its works. The result of this intellectual project has been a group that has also largely challenged the dominant themes of the modern university. In place of a setting where ideas are a passive currency, the modern university is a place where knowledge and power are manifest in a dialectic that is revealed not simply by the production of knowledge, but its destruction as well. It is in this context that the recent history of a group of scholars at the University of California provides a striking testimony concerning the disturbing character of science in the modern university. The ecological and social dimensions of “killing fields” that captures the contemporary hazards of food and fiber production in California is also reflected in the gradual demise of a group of researchers at Berkeley who have endeavored to provide an alternative vision of agriculture.     

News of Science

On page 925 of the 9 Nov. issue of Science we stated that "Nineteen members of the Atomic Energy Commission research project at the University of Rochester Medical Center" endorsed a statement criticizing the President's recent defense of nuclear weapons tests. Actually, only five of the 19 members of the university staff who signed the statement were associated with the AEC project. These five constituted about 10 percent of the project's scientific staff.     

Erratum

The publisher of Rattlesnakes: Their Habits, Life Histories, and Influence on Mankind (abridged version) by Laurence M. Klauber, listed in the Books Received column of 30 April, should have been given as University of California Press, Berkeley.     

Erratum

The publisher of The Biology of Seaweeds, edited by Christopher S. Lobban and Michael J. Wynne, listed in the Books Received column of 16 July (p. 272), should have been given as University of California Press, Berkeley.     

Erratum

In the Briefing "Tyler Prize goes to Cornell scientists" (News & Comment, 30 Mar., p. 1539), it is incorrectly stated that the Tyler committee is based at the University of California at Los Angeles. The committee has been based for the past 10 years at the University of Southern California in Los Angeles.     

NASA life sciences. An improvement in vital signs

Last week a hefty Russian module with living and working quarters for astronauts docked with the pieces of the international space station already in orbit, a critical step in creating a full-time orbiting laboratory. Meanwhile, NASA bureaucrats put the finishing touches on a realignment of the agency's struggling biology effort that should bolster fundamental research and allow scientists to make better use of the facility, scheduled to be completed in 2005. The two events raise the hopes of U.S. academic space life scientists that their discipline is at last on the ascent at NASA.     

CHESS: The New Synchrotron Radiation Facility at Cornell

A new synchrotron radiation laboratory, CHESS, will soon be completed at Cornell University. The facility will operate in a mode parasitic to high energy physics experiments on the new 8-billion-electron-volt electron-positron storage ring (CESR) at Cornell. Electron and positron beams have already been stored and the first photons have been extracted. When completed, the laboratory will be available to the scientific community nationally and will provide the most intense tunable source of high energy x-rays in the country.     

高校实验室在申请实验室国家认可过程存在的问题与对策

探讨了我国高校实验室在申请实验室国家认可过程中存在的一些问题,并针对主要问题提出了相应的对策。主要从加强实验室的硬件建设、制度建设、方法标准化建设;加强实验室人员的培训和沟通等几个角度进行了分析,将为高校实验室能顺利通过实验室国家认可、提高实验室知名度和完善分析测试制度等提供一些借鉴。     

Rethinking the role of U. S. development assistance in third world agriculture

International agricultural development as practiced by U. S. sponsored research groups in developing countries has emphasized technical questions of production, ignoring more fundamental social and economic issues that underline rural poverty and hunger. Rethinking the role of U. S. development assistance will require transcending the view that the only way to impact agriculture in the Third World is by increasing the intensity of land use in high potential agricultural areas. The challenge is to find ways of how to further increase agricultural productivity so that the rural poor significantly benefit, while at the same time conserving and regenerating the resource base. U. S. scientists must realize that this is only possible by improving the access of resource-poor farmers to land, water, other natural resources, as well as to equitable credit, markets, appropriate technologies, etc. Solidarious collaboration will emerge from the U. S. siding with progressive governments and/or community-based initiatives that promote political change aimed at securing farmers' control over resources and inputs, and changing the structural conditions and policies that perpetuate poverty. Miguel A. Altieri is Associate Professor at the Division of Biological Control, University of California, Berkeley. He teaches courses in agroecology and rural development, agroforestry, and biological control. His research emphasizes the development of sustainable agricultural systems both in California and in Latin America.     

Perceived risk, trust, and the politics of nuclear waste

The Department of Energy's program for disposing of high-level radioactive wastes has been impeded by overwhelming political opposition fueled by public perceptions of risk. Analysis of these perceptions shows them to be deeply rooted in images of fear and dread that have been present since the discovery of radioactivity. The development and use of nuclear weapons linked these images to reality and the mishandling of radioactive wastes from the nation's military weapons facilities has contributed toward creating a profound state of distrust that cannot be erased quickly or easily. Postponing the permanent repository and employing dry-cask storage of wastes on site would provide the time necessary for difficult social and political issues to be resolved.     

Agricultural genetics goes to court

A coalition of environmental groups headed by activist Jeremy Rifkin has filed lawsuits to halt experiments that would release genetically engineered organisms into the environment. One suit, filed against the National Institutes of Health on 14 September 1983, would block tests by researchers at the University of California, Berkeley. A second suit, filed 16 September 1983 against Cetus Madison and BioTechnica, seeks to halt field tests that had been approved by NIH's Recombinant DNA Advisory Committee. At issue are NIH's role in evaluating the risks of genetic experimentation, and the public's right of access to proprietary information.     

Lunar receiving laboratory

The Lunar Receiving Laboratory will be the permanent depository of a portion of the collection of lunar samples; it will safeguard the collection, providing continuing security and ensuring scientific integrity. In carrying out the time-dependent experiments and continuing functions of the laboratory, NASA will rely on visiting expert scientists supplementing a relatively small resident staff; outside scientists will be relied upon for most investigations and detailed analyses of samples. It is believed that the designed procedures and facilities provided will ensure the maximum scientific return from the Apollo Program in the way of information from lunar samples.     

Social sustainability, farm labor, and organic agriculture: Findings from an exploratory analysis

Much of the attention by social scientists to the rapidly growing organic agriculture sector focuses on the benefits it provides to consumers (in the form of pesticide-free foods) and to farmers (in the form of price premiums). By contrast, there has been little discussion or research about the implications of the boom in organic agriculture for farmworkers on organic farms. In this paper, we ask the question: From the perspective of organic farmers, does “certified organic” agriculture encompass a commitment to “sustainability” that prioritizes social goals? Specifically, we aim to broaden our understanding of the relationship between social sustainability and organic agriculture by drawing attention to issues affecting farmworkers, whose labor and contribution tends to elude most discussions of organic agriculture. We present findings from a survey of organic farmers in California about the possible incorporation of social standards into organic certification criteria. Our findings suggest that, at best, lukewarm support for social certification within organic agriculture exists among certified organic farmers in California. They also question expectations that organic agriculture necessarily fosters social or even economic sustainability for most of the farmers and farmworkers involved. However, we also find exceptions to the patterns evidenced in our survey. In-depth interviews with select organic farmers demonstrate that there are individuals whose practices are atypical and demonstrate that, under some circumstances, an organic production system can be at once environmentally, economically, and socially sustainable.