Marine Lab and Field Station Opportunities
If youre interested in a summer course and research opportunities at a field
station, check out http://life.bio.sunysb.edu/marinebio/mblabs.html
and http://scilib.vcsd.edu/sio/ for listings of
marine labs, or http://Jasper.Stanford.edu/OBFS/
(case-sensitive) for inland field stations. We had intended to create such a site for
SICB, but thanks to Daphne Fautin and Alan Kohn, who saved us the effort by finding these!
ATCC Offers Workshops and Conferences
The American Type Culture Collection is offering a series of workshops and conferences on
subjects as varied as extremophiles, microscopy, recombinant DNA techniques, biosafety,
DNA fingerprinting, hybridomas and monoclonal antibodies, cryopreservation, and virus
propagation. For further information about these "hands-on" training
experiences, contact the ATCC workshop coordinator at 800-359-7370; e-mail: workshops@atcc.org; or visit http://www.atcc.org/workshops/workshop.html.
Doctoral Scholarships in U.S. National Parks
The Canon National Parks Science Scholars Program, underwritten by the Canon USA, the NPS,
Natural Park Foundation and AAAS, will award four $25,000/year fellowships for up to three
years dissertation research in national parks. The research area that will be
supported in biological sciences is "The Relationship of Fire Regimes to Landscape
Processes and Patterns Within Parks and Their Surrounding Areas." For more detailed
information and application materials, contact Dr. Gary E. Machlis, Program Coordinator
for Canon Scholars, USDI-NPS, 1849 C Street NW (MIB 3127), Washington, DC 20240;
202/208-5391; e-mail gmachlis@uidaho.edu.
Fulbright Awards
The competition for 1999-2000 Fulbright Awards opened March 1, with an August 1 deadline
for lecturing and research grants worldwide. Requirements include U.S. citizenship and a
Ph.D. or comparable professional qualifications. Grants are made to both academic and
non-academic professionals, although for lecturing awards college teaching experience is
desired. Most lecturing assignments are carried out in English, although skills in other
languages are needed in some countries. Deadlines are May 1 for distinguished Fulbright
chairs in Western Europe and Canada, August 1 for lecturing and research grants in
academic year 1999-2000, and November 1 for international education and academic
administrator seminars. For details contact: USIA Fulbright Senior Scholar Program,
Council for International Exchange of Scholars, 3007 Tilden Street NW, Suite 5L, Box
GNEWS, Washington, DC 20008-3009; 202-686-7877; www.cies.org;
e-mail (requests for application materials only): apprequest@cies.iie.org.
Animal Rights Movement: Skirmish with the National Academy of Sciences, and Other
News
Last year animal rights activists, upset with the NASs review of and recommendations
for the "NIH Guide for the Care and Use of Laboratory Animals," brought suit
against the NAS, asserting that it was subject to the Federal Advisory Committee Act and
had to make all its workings public. The U.S. Supreme Court upheld the 1972 law, even
while acknowledging that its not appropriate for a scientific body that should be
able to operate without external pressures. Last November Congress agreed that this was a
"whoops" and passed an amendment to the FACA exempting the NAS from its more
onerous provisions.
This information came via the "National Association for Biomedical Research (NABR)
Update." Since SICB is a member organization, our members now can get all the NABR
Updates and alerts (emphasizing news about the animal rights movement and means to deal
with it positively) through the "members only" section of NABRs web site
(www.nabr.org). To gain access privileges, e-mail your request including your full name,
title, member institution affiliation (SICB), and your e-mail address to: members@nabr.org.
EBO Table of Contents
E-mail Alerts
You can now subscribe to an alert system that will send you the table of contents for
Experimental Biology Online (EBO) or other Springer Verlag journals, whenever they are
updated. To subscribe, surf to http://link.springer.de/alert/.
1998 Summer Course in Sensory Neurobiology
Chuck Derby and Hank Trapido-Rosenthal will be offering a three week course,
"Chemosensory Neurobiology in the Marine Environment," at the Bermuda Biological
Station for Research in July. It should be of special interest to advanced undergraduate
and graduate students who wish to learn cellular, molecular and systems experimental
approaches to the study of nervous systems, and to do so in a beautiful and stimulating
setting. A com-plete description can be found at http://www.bbsr.edu,
or by contacting either of the instructors: Charles Derby, Department of Biology, Georgia
State University, Atlanta GA USA; e-mail: cderby@gsu.edu; 404/651-3058; or Henry
Trapido-Rosenthal, Bermuda Biological Station for Research, Ferry Reach, St. Georges
GE-01, Bermuda; e-mail: hank@bbsr.edu; 441/297-1880.
Evolution Education Crisis (Again!)
Joe Graves, DICI secretary, pointed out that late last year Arizonas board of
education adopted biology standards that did not mention the concept of evolution anywhere
in the K-12 curriculum. At least one of the members of the State Board (the lay member) is
a creationist. Due to the initial pressure of a few intrepid high school teachers, the
standards were amended to include vague language about evolution and
"equilibrium" in the preamble. Joe testified before the board, managed to throw
enough doubt on the quality of the biology standards to get a new hearing, and has been
feverishly soliciting letter-writing and building a coalition of scientists, high school
teachers, lay people, clergy, etc. to face this assault on reason and the scientific
approach to the universe. Similar conflicts over standards are afoot in New Mexico.
Clearly, we must remain vigilant and proactive in teaching the public how scientific
thinking works to produce conclusions from information, and what evolutionary theory
really is (and isnt).
Author/Illustrator/Biologist Institute
The Center of Childrens Literature and the Marine Biological Laboratory (MBL) at
Woods Hole, Mass. will bring together eminent field and laboratory biologists with about
200 of the worlds most prominent childrens book writers and illustrators in
order to inspire the creation of important new childrens books.
For more information, contact The Center for Childrens Environ-mental Literature,
P.O. Box 5995, Washington, DC 20016; 202/966-6110; e-mail: lncherry@aol.com.
Forum to Discuss Salmon in the Pacific Northwest
A web site devoted to the ecology and the conflict over restoring salmon in the Pacific
Northwest is at http://www.cyberlearn.com. This
free commercial site features articles, technical reports, opposing viewpoints and news
updates, as well as a "Town Hall Forum."
AIBS Celebrates 50th Anniversary
The American Institute of Biological Sciences, of which SICB is a member society, hits the
half-century mark this year. It continues to be a voice for all biologists, publishing
Bioscience (now 12 issues/year), holding national meetings, lobbying for increased funding
for science, cosponsoring Congressional Fellows (scientists as assistants to legislators),
and brokering peer reviews, among other services. Its mission statement, since 1947, has
been to "be an umbrella organization for all of biology, and for all
biologists."
The New (XVIII) International Congress of Zoology
In 1889 the First International Congress was organized by P. Blanchard in Paris. It is now
25 years since the last International Congress of Zoology was held in Monte Carlo. The
most serious consequence of the cessation of the congresses has been a tacit recognition
of the general depreciation of zoology in the academic world. However, today zoology is
more alive than ever. The organizers are ready to again bring forward the rich unifying
aspects of zoology.
After the positive reaction of the international community of zoologists and the
support of a number of national organizations, the date of the New Congress, "The New
Panorama of Animal Evolution," has been set for Sept. 4-9, 2000 at the Faculty of
Philosophy, at the University of Athens, Greece, under the auspices of the Hellenic
Zoological Society.
In order to reverse the present trend of fragmentation of zoology and the crisis in the
professional zoological education which became rampant after the suspension of the
congresses in 1972, this first renewed congress is dedicated to a number of integrative
symposia and general discussions.
Unlike ongoing congresses and conferences, this initiative represents a new start. In
order to be able to commit ourselves, a critical mass of positive responses is needed.
Before the end of September 1998, visit the International Congress of Zoology web page at:
http://www. york.biosis.org/zrdocs/
new_icz.