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.