Opinion in 1999

Britain's BSE inquiry is providing a valuable lesson in the relationship between science and public policy.

Following damaging cuts in public spending last year, a new research policy in the Netherlands promises more freedom to researchers to set priorities. But national interests should not be forgotten.

Talk of the demise of Big Science is premature. But its characteristics have changed significantly.

Against a background of progressive change in the running of Germany's research, the universities stand out as bastions of down-at-heel conservatism. Increased competition is the way forward.

George Brown was science's best friend in Congress because he saw it as the only foundation for a just society.

Campaigns on behalf of women researchers are achieving a higher political profile. Recent European initiatives are welcome, but lobbying leadership is needed for them to be followed through amidst political change.

The next head of the US nuclear weapons laboratories must repair the damage done by the recent spy scandal.

University reforms would help Germany to combat its worrying shortage of bioinformaticists.

The results of the World Conference on Science, which ended last week, should not be exaggerated. But they are a firm basis on which governments in the developing world can plan their future support for science.

Now that the giant drug manufacturers are stamping their feet over proposed compulsory licensing as a means of easing South Africa's AIDS crisis, Al Gore's “values of conscience” appear to have withered away.

Introducing a series of essays celebrating quirks and little-known milestones of the past.

A year-long ‘stand-off’ between French researchers and the science ministry signals the need for change.

Among the clamour of voices from around the globe for and against GM crops, many scientific academies have been quiet. Their views are urgently needed in determining the long-term research agenda.

Congress should seize a welcome opportunity to strengthen dilapidated university laboratories.

Although resentment persists against the patenting of genetic knowledge, the breadth of such patenting is of more urgent concern. The time is right for serious political scrutiny of the issue at a global level.

Some branches of science have learnt how to cope with huge amounts of information. Biologists haven't. There is a dearth of essential skills which is only now starting to be taken seriously.

A German synchrotron would be good for the Middle East.

A decision to expose Germany's science to international scrutiny has yielded a constructive appraisal. Although such evaluation can have its pitfalls, other countries should follow suit.

Nature is encouraging authors of papers to say who did what.

A patent dispute involving allegations of scientific misconduct mars the image of the biotechnology industry.